Hi! I have a lot of Wikimania Scholarship statistics - obviously what is in
the report on wiki only highlights a piece of them. As always, comments on
meta reports are always helpful (there are none).
There are some gaps in data: I (/WMF) don't have the registration
information from year to year, so I can't confirm whether or not someone
has registered for and attended Wikimania outside of a scholarship. What I
did just quickly look up is our percentage of repeat WMF scholars from 2012
and 2013:
- *85% *of 2013 Scholars *did not receive scholarship *in 2012 or
received a scholarship but were unable to attend in 2012
- *5% *of 2013 Scholars received a partial scholarship in 2012
- 10% of 2013 scholars were also scholars in 2012
Those are for WMF scholarships. It is important to note that about 40-50%
of attendees at Wikimania who arrive on scholarships are actually sponsored
directly by *chapter* rather than WMF. It is possible that this group of
people are repeat attendees/scholars (I don't know). It is also true that
many chapters send board representatives and/or staff to Wikimania. Again,
this may contribute to the feeling that the same people are always
attending. (Note: the same is true for WMF and WMF board.)
As is evident in the selection criteria the scholarship committee puts
forth, contributions on our wiki projects is the key component to receiving
a scholarship. The scores are so close, it is really difficult
(impossible?) to receive a scholarship from WMF without having
contributions on wiki. The committee also tries to look at someone's
contributions in relation to his/her local-wiki context. One specific
example of this is a former scholar from the Kyrgyz Wikipedia. On first
glance, it looked like her aggregate edit count was low, but on further
digging the committee realized she had only been editing for a year, and
was already a top 5 contributor on that wiki!
I have lots of comments on the various topics that are getting throw around
-- partial scholarships, needs-based scholarships, disclosing of scholars
names, data collection ... but I don't feel this is the best forum for
discussion. If someone has a wiki page with these topics sectioned off, we
should tackle a few together!
On Mon, Jan 13, 2014 at 12:26 AM, Samuel Klein <meta.sj(a)gmail.com> wrote:
On Mon, Jan 13, 2014 at 12:06 AM, Philippe Beaudette
<
philippe(a)wikimedia.org> wrote:
On Sun, Jan 12, 2014 at 7:35 PM, Samuel Klein <meta.sj(a)gmail.com> wrote:
I too am concerned that the current scholarship
process tends to
polarize the community, and too often simply rewards long-time community
members, or those who are connected to large movement entities, with free
travel: rather than increasing the diversity of new voices and faces at
global events.
Do we have any statistics to back up this claim?
I share a concern; it would be welcome to find it unwarranted.
The public statistics I know of are these reports:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimania/Scholarships/2013
That level of detail does not address either of the two stated concerns:
that some recipients are not so active, and that there is limited rotation.
It would be welcome to see a count of the # of recipients who attended
Wikimania for the first time; the # who received a travel scholarship for
the first time; the # who were active contributors and to which {clusters
of} projects. I also find Nemo's version of transparency compelling: In
cases where scholarships are presented as an honor, the recipients are
named, which also seems in the wiki-spirit.
SJ
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