Hi all,

Today, we are opening nominations https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSctHahuVnJQQNG2eo_3F7aB1Z2jQi1JxhNMRuzPCWLU4dJSig/viewform for the next round of grants from the Knowledge Equity Fund.

The Knowledge Equity Fund was launched by the Wikimedia Foundation two years ago as a pilot program to advance knowledge equity, one of the two pillars of the movement strategy, through a focus on racial inequities in free knowledge.

Since our launch, the Knowledge Equity Fund has gone through several iterations. Over the past several months, the Knowledge Equity Fund Committee has solicited feedback from Wikimedia communities on our approach to supporting knowledge equity. We hosted an open community call https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_Equity_Fund/Commmunication#Notes_from_Community_Calls on October 6 to share more about our approach and discuss ideas for future knowledge equity grants. Through this conversation and onwiki comments, we heard consistent feedback https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_Equity_Fund/Commmunication#Follow-up_from_Knowledge_Equity_Fund_community_call about the need to connect grantees and their work more closely with the Wikimedia projects. These suggestions have focused on increased communication and visibility into the work of the Knowledge Equity Fund and grantees; developing stronger connections between grantees and movement groups in order to drive direct impact to the Wikimedia projects, which will in turn benefit our larger mission of free knowledge; and clarifying the impact of Knowledge Equity Fund grantees.

These are important suggestions that we as a Committee are taking on as we launch the next round. We’ve just shared a Diff post https://diff.wikimedia.org/2024/01/17/we-need-your-nominations-for-knowledge-equity-fund-grantees/ with details on the changes that we’re making moving forward, including a new Connected Grants pilot that will be available to movement groups to support existing partnerships with external organizations.

We will also be hosting two community calls to answer questions and hear suggestions for nominations for Round 3:

-

January 22, 11 am UTC -

January 26, 3 pm UTC

If you are interested in attending these calls, please email equityfund@wikimedia.org and we will share information to join. We welcome your nominations for organizations for Round 3! Nominations will be open through the end of February.