*Dainik Bhaskar / DNA : Now, you can also become Wikipedia's campus
ambassador*
http://daily.bhaskar.com/article/MAH-PUN-now-you-can-also-become-wikipedias…
*Pune will soon become the first city outside the United States to host the
'Wikipedia campus ambassador programme'.*
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*The initiative is part of the larger 'India education programme' to augment
interest and support the Wikipedia community in the country. Hisham Mundol of
the Wikimedia Foundation's India Programmes explained, "We understand that
information about India and contributed by people from India are sorely
missing from Wikipedia, and we want to change that. The programme is our way
of piloting ways to change this."*
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*The programme involves encouraging professors in city colleges and
universities to implement the use of Wikipedia as an educational tool,
covering a diverse range of academic subjects. It proposes to replace or
augment reports and papers that students are required to prepare with
Wikipedia articles and formally incorporate it into the syllabus.*
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*This is where the campus ambassadors come in. They will help in updating
content, adding references, training student editors, organising workshops
and presentations to promote educational activities using the world's
largest encyclopedia.*
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*The volunteers will work for three to four hours a week, initially trained
by the Wikimedia Foundation. Though the position is unpaid, the benefits
include interacting with educators on a global level.*
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*Mundol said, "This will sharpen their research and critical thinking
abilities, improve writing skills, and will learn how to work
collaboratively by interacting with readers and writers around the world."
He is also confident that the educational programme would play an important
role in motivating students and increase interest of participating
universities.*
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*Harvard University, University of California, Berkeley, Syracuse, and
Georgetown University in the US have already incorporated Wikipedia in the
curricula of different academic subjects. The campus ambassador programme
was launched in 2010 to facilitate this, with volunteers mentoring
first-time editors, along with providing lessons plans, online and video
tutorials.*
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*When Wikimedia Foundation decided to take their education-based programme
globally, Pune was the pilot city chosen in India.*
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*"We chose Pune as the region for the kick-off because the city has a strong
reputation for education in India and is reported to have the highest
concentration of education institutions in the world. Also, a very
interesting aspect of the Pune student body is that they come from all over
the country; so there is great diversity which is also very important to
us", said Mundol.*
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*City institutions open to innovative teaching and learning practices are
currently being approached as partners. The launch of the programme is set
to coincide with the start of the academic year of 2011.*
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*Applications for campus ambassadors will be accepted from students,
professors, faculty members and others related to the educational field
based anywhere in India but willing to come to Pune for training sessions.*
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*The Wikimedia Foundation's presence in India will also help promote
awareness, access and readership of its other projects like 'Wikimedia
Commons' as well as 'Indic language Wikipedias', revealed Mundol.*
Regards
Tinu Cherian
http://wiki.wikimedia.in/wiki/In_the_news#May_2011