New subject: [Wikimediaindia-l] IEP Pilot - Preliminary Analysis

2 Dec 2011

      Hi Folks,
My apologies for not replying sooner. I am on the ground in India, doing in person interviews, while juggling communication on email, talk pages, skype, etc.
Here is a summary of what I have been up to:
20 hours in US reviewing talk pages and email list communication regarding IEP
Interviews so far, in order in which they were done (in person, unless otherwise noted):
- Barry Newstead, WMF SF
- Frank Schulenburg, WMF SF
- Annie Lin, WMF SF
- LiAnna Davis, WMF SF
- Hisham Mundol, WMF India
- Nitika Tandon, WMF India
- Shiju Alex, WMF India
- Ram Shankar Yadav, CA Pune
- Ishita Ghosh, professor, SSE, Pune
- informal conversation with 2 SSE students and 2 CAs over lunch in Pune
- Rashmi Barua, SSE student
- Devanchi Tripathi, SSE student and CA
- Ashwin Baindur, Mandar Kulkarni (Pune WP community members) and Sudhanwa Jogalekar (OSM friend of WP, Pune), group interview over dinner
- Abhilasha Sharma, SSE student
- Anushikha Benazur, SSE student
- Dr. Jyoti Chandiramani, SSE Director
- 3 more SSE students, informal conversation over lunch
- Debanjan Bandyopadhyay, CA SSE
- Radha Misra, professor, SNDT Women's College, Pune
- Shweta Shinde, student, COEP
- Gautam Akiwate, student, COEP
- informal conversation with 3 CAs and 1 student, COEP
- Dr. Anil V. Sahasrabudhe, Director, COEP
- Dr. Pradeep Waychal, professor, COEP
- Kudpung, WP Admin (skype video)
- Srikanth Lakshmanan, WP editor, OA for IEP (skype audio)
- Hisham Mundol, WMF India (telephone)
Reviewing user, talk and article pages of all CAs and students interviewed.
Ongoing check-in on talk pages regarding program communication.
Interviews to come:
- Wasim, CA COEP
- Pratik Lohati, CA COEP
- Arjun M. K., CA COEP
- Vaibhav Chandak, CA COEP
- Prof. Abhijit Sir, professor, COEP
- Bala Jeyaraman (telephone)
- Risker (skype)
- Ruud (email)
- Andy Dingley (email)
- Voceditenore (email)
- Fluffernutter (email)
- Danger (talk page)
- MER-C (talk page)
- Matthiespaul (tbd)
- Moonriddengirl (telephone)
- Ayush Khanna, Data Analyst, Global Development Program, WMF SF (telephone)
This is my complete list. Data gathering closes Monday, 5 December, except I will take the statistical numbers from WMF whenever I get them.
My contract includes 20 interviews, and I am already doing many more, so please refrain from adding to my list.
I am completely off line and away from cell phone from noon 5 December - noon 12 December, San Francisco Time. I will not respond to any communication during that time.
I will be collating interviews and drafting my report 12 - 31 December. I will deliver as a word file to WMF and also post to my Userspace (exact location TBD, I am just learning all of this WP online method as I go).
Please assume good faith. I am very good at what I do, and I have a lot of integrity. I respect Wikipedia and everyone who contributes to it.
Warm Regards,
Tory Read
On Nov 30, 2011, at 12:18 AM, wikimediaindia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org wrote:
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Today's Topics:

Re: IEP Pilot - Preliminary Analysis (Ashwin Baindur)
Re: [[Brian Horrocks]] not an Indian FA (Srikanth Ramakrishnan)
Re: [[Brian Horrocks]] not an Indian FA (Pradeep Mohandas)

Message: 1
Date: Tue, 29 Nov 2011 23:11:22 +0530
From: Ashwin Baindur ashwin.baindur@gmail.com
Subject: Re: [Wikimediaindia-l] IEP Pilot - Preliminary Analysis
To: Wikimedia India Community list
   wikimediaindia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
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   CAMo0PChjr6RtX_93k9S_ytUvAhfx--9tO7kKnLdT-T8hBvmHAQ@mail.gmail.com
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Often, it helps to have an outsider perspective. We in the Pune community
met Torey to day and are of the opinion that the Foundation wants someone
from their side to provide an impartial outsider's view and also to explore
ways ahead in addition to finding out whats going on and what had happened.
Obviously, her assignment is just one of a number of initiatives that are
underway to improve/get feedback regarding the IEP fiasco.
Warm regards,
Ashwin Baindur
On Tue, Nov 29, 2011 at 10:57 PM, Anirudh Bhati anirudhsbh@gmail.comwrote:
...
On Tue, Nov 29, 2011 at 2:40 PM, Barry Newstead bnewstead@wikimedia.orgwrote:
...
Hi all,
Thanks for the engagement on the questions that should be tacked in this
evaluation.  See inline for a brief response to Theo's question about Tory
Read.
Best,
Barry
On Mon, Nov 28, 2011 at 9:16 AM, Theo10011 de10011@gmail.com wrote:
...
I really didn't read the entire thread to have a lot of comments, I just
have one point I noticed that I wanted to ask - Why is Tory Read conducting
the "evaluative study"?
As I recall, her only exposure to India and Wikipedia before this was
the research project. And even that had nothing to do with the Education
program directly. Is there a reason why she's leading the study?
It seems like the same pattern of avoiding knowledgeable
and experienced members of the community to focus on the "outside
perspective". I thought the only lesson that the team did take away was,
you can't do in India what the global education team and Frank did in the
US. They don't scale and you need local solutions.
I'm pretty sure Ms. Read is a competent researcher and would do a good
job but I don't see how Ms. Read's expertise or exposure to India and the
Education program would make this process any different from the pattern
that brought IEP here. Talking to the staff in SF, or spending a day in
Delhi or Pune is not going to give a clear picture at all.
Tory is indeed a competent researcher who built a solid understanding of
the community and how things work in Wikimedia during her engagement with
us in the India Chronicles.  I selected her for this assignment because she
has a good working knowledge of our general situation from her work on the
India Chronicles, she has the skills to interview a good cross-section of
those involved (WP editors, students, profs, Campus Ambassadors, online
ambassadors, staff, others), she can look at the issue with fresh eyes and
help synthesize learning and recommendations for changes, she will get this
done in a timely fashion while memories are still fresh (which is really
important).
She is doing a combination of Skype, email and in-person interviews...and
is in Pune this week actually. I'm confident that her work will be valuable
to all of us and it will be shared in its entirety with the community.  It
won't be the only work on this. Both the India team and the Global
Education Program team are committed to doing more joint problem-solving on
future changes to the program with those interested in engaging with us.
Hi Barry,
My understanding is that conducting an evaluative study requires a deep
comprehension of our projects and the volunteers.  At the same time, an
exercise like this demands objectivity while analyzing empirical evidence.
By building a repertoire of anecdotal evidence through a series of
interviews mostly conducted over phone/VoIP, I do not see how this report
will inform us beyond what discussions on this mailing list already have.
Tory Read is an accomplished story-teller, but she is not a Wikipedian.
Can we simply not have WMF staff in New Delhi handle the interviews and
requests for comment?  (They should also seek help from some of the
established Wikipedia editors.)
The reason why I am stressing on this is because I think that an
established Wikipedia editor would be better-placed to objectively analyze
what worked and what did not work, and how this program may be improved.
Such editors need not be Indian, they can be a group of Wikipedians who
were directly or peripherally involved on Wikipedia when the IEP program
was being executed.
Best,
anirudh
...

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