Dear members of the Wiki Project Med,
We are writing to invite you to be a part of a new project that the
Wikimedia Foundation Trust & Safety Team is hoping to create. This project
aims to maintain and expand peer-support networks within the Wikimedia
communities, improve the working atmosphere on our projects, and to help in
the fight against harassment.
As a Foundation, we believe that your participation and opinion is
important as it will enable us to gain diverse perspectives and new
information. This is because your affiliate has professional knowledge
about health related issues, including mental health. Therefore, we are
looking for your input.
For a project that aims to connect volunteers in a way that they can
support each other, your knowledge, skills and experience will be highly
appreciated. For more information on the project, please visit our Meta page
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Peer_Support_Networks_within_the_Wikimedia_…>
.
To tap into that expertise that you already have, we are organizing Focus
group meetings as a next step. In those meetings we hope to learn about
already existing networks, ideas on how volunteers could connect more and
better and what support they would need to do so. There will be meetings
that are suited to different time zones, each meeting will last two hours.
Feel free to sign up for the meeting that is most comfortable for you.
Focus group meetings for affiliate leaders or staff will be held on the
days and times listed below:
4 October 2021, 19:00 - 21:00 UTC
8 October 2021, 7:30 - 9:30 UTC
25 October 2021, 15:00 - 17:00 UTC
Focus groups for individual contributors will meet at these times:
1 October 2021, 7:30 - 9:30 UTC
15 October 2021, 15:00 - 17:00 UTC
22 October 2021, 19:00 - 21:00 UTC
Please feel free to encourage members of other communities to reach out to
us if you believe that this project will be of interest to them
Do let us know if you are available to participate in one of the meetings
listed above and we will send out invites to you. If you are interested and
are unavailble in the above listed times, let us know and we will look for
ways to connect.
Please be aware that Trust & Safety will also reach out soon with a similar
offer to talk about training around the UCoC. Feel free to concentrate on
the issue that is most important to you, but of course you are also very
welcome to take part in both discussions. We are aware that capacity is
limited and will highly value any kind of participation!
Looking forward to hearing from you.
Best,
Christel Steigenberger (she/her)
Senior Trust and Safety Specialist
Wikimedia Foundation <https://wikimediafoundation.org/>
Dear Wikimedia affiliate representatives,
We are contacting you today because you are an important part of forming
the Movement Charter Drafting Committee
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Movement_Charter/Drafting_Committee>.
The Movement
Strategy
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Strategy/Wikimedia_movement/2018-20/Recomme…>
process
recommended the creation of a “Movement Chater.” The Charter will be a
document defining roles and responsibilities for all parts of the Wikimedia
Movement. The Drafting Committee will create a draft of the Movement
Charter. The process will include researching and consulting with
communities, experts, and organizations.
Timeline
We have created together
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Movement_Strategy/Events/Documentation/27_J…>
a process for setting up the committee:
Now - September 14Everyone can nominate themself for the common candidate
pool
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Movement_Charter/Drafting_Committee/Candida…>
October 11-24
All (eligible) Wikimedians across all project communities vote on the
candidates to elect 7 members
October 11 - 24
Wikimedia affiliates will select 6 members of the committee (through a
group of selectors).
October 25 - 31
The WMF appoints 2 members of the committee.
By October 31
Drafting Committee announced
More detailed process overview can be accessed on meta
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Movement_Charter/Drafting_Committee/Set_Up_…>
.
Affiliate engagement
Wikimedia affiliates are an important part of the Wikimedia Movement and
thus in creating this Movement Charter. We kindly ask you to support us in
the following several tasks:
-
The nominations are still ongoing! Who in your networks would make an
excellent candidate for the Movement Charter Drafting Committee? Encourage
and support them to nominate themself. We are especially looking for
people with experience in organizational governance and international
collaboration. Demonstrated cultural, linguistic, and inclusivity awareness
is important. (The matrices for diversity and expertise can be seen here
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Movement_Charter/Drafting_Committee/Diversi…>
).
-
The affiliates will select their candidates via 9 selectors. All
affiliates are divided into eight geographic regions and one “thematic
region.” Each region chooses one person (selector). The division follows
existing regional collaborations with some adaptations to avoid overlap
(e.g. Africa). You, as an affiliate representative, please check the
list and correct it
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Movement_Charter/Affiliates_by_Region>,
if you feel that you "belong" to another region.
-
We then ask you to convene on the regional level and define your
representative in the selector group. It is up to each region on how to
select your selector, but doing it in a transparent way (e.g. on Meta) is
helpful. The selector needs to be selected by October 10, 2021 (before the
election for the online communities starts)
-
The 9 selectors will convene later and will choose candidates from
the common
pool of candidates
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Movement_Charter/Drafting_Committee/Candida…>
.
For the full context of the Movement Charter, its role, as well the process
for its creation, please have a look at Meta. You can also contact us at
any time on Telegram or via email (wikimedia2030(a)wikimedia.org).
Your support in this is absolutely essential. We are looking forward to
working on this with you.
Best regards,
*Mervat Salman (She/Her)*
Movement Strategy and Governance Facilitator
wikimediafoundation.org