Grants:Project/Magioladitis/Why women don’t edit Wikipedia

statusproposed

Project Grants

Why women don’t edit Wikipedia

summaryResearch why women don’t edit Wikipedia, how the community should approach the problem and find some solutions

targetGreek Wikipedia

amount€2860.00 (3,192 USD)

nonprofitnot incorporated

grantee• Magioladitis

advisor• Geraki

contact• Magioladitis

volunteer• Glavkos• desantonop• Amaliavr

organization• Wikimedia Community User Group Greece

this project needs...

volunteer

contact

created on08:30, 23 July 2016 (UTC)

Friendly space expectations

Project idea

What is the problem you're trying to solve?

Explain the problem that you are trying to solve with this project or the opportunity you’re taking advantage of. What is the issue you want to address? You can update and add to this later.

Greek Wikipedia has few articles, especially articles concerning women's issues. For example: a strong feminist movement existed in the country during the late seventies and it raised many serious issues concerning women's reproductive rights (abortions, free contraception), sexuality and prostitution. Despite its struggles against the traditional roles of woman in the Greek family and its serious impact in Greek society, there is still not even one article written in Wikipedia about it.

Moreover, the synthesis of the Greek Wikipedia community is largely male oriented.

In the foreign literature, the limited participation of women in Wikipedia is often attributed to causes such as: "Wikipedia is sexist. Women lack confidence. Women have less spare time. Women have problems with the editing interface. Editing is tedious. Women have fewer opportunities to develop social relationships than on other websites". The same common beliefs also prevail in Greece.

Following the outreach method we used last year with success (talks, meetings with feminist groups and female targeted groups, edit-a-thons) in a larger scale we want to raise awareness of these problems and increase female participation in Wikipedia projects, Wikimedia community and at the same with creating more articles of female interest.

What is your solution?

If you think of your project as an experiment in solving the problem you just described, what is the particular solution you're aiming to test? You will provide details of your plan below, but explain your main idea here.

We will organise meetings with female oriented groups, feminist organisations, give talks and organise edit-a-thons in collaboration with various groups. The idea of using collaboration has already been demonstrated and presented in Wikimania 2015 (watch video version of the related poster).

Project goals

Explain what are you trying to accomplish with this project, or what do you expect will change as a result of this grant.

The goal of our project is to enrich the current discussion on the matter. We expect to increase female (as was in Greek Wikimedia community and an amount of articles to be created or expanded.

Project plan

Activities

Tell us how you'll carry out your project. What will you and other organizers spend your time doing? What will you have done at the end of your project? How will you follow-up with people that are involved with your project?

• 3 talks (2 x Athens, Thessaloniki)
• 1 presentation to an educators' conference
• 2 workshops (Athens, Thessaloniki)
• 2 meetings (Athens, Thessaloniki)
• 2 videos
• 1 scientific paper
• 250 questionnaires

The plan is that the duration of the project will be 6 months due to personal restrictions in time. The project is scheduled to start at the beginning of December 2016 and be completed by the end of May 2017.

Budget

How you will use the funds you are requesting? List bullet points for each expense. (You can create a table later if needed.) Don’t forget to include a total amount, and update this amount in the Probox at the top of your page too!

• Handouts for women
• Travelling expenses
• Incidentals

No	Category	Description	Units	Cost/unit	Total Amount
1	Posters	Promotion of the events such as cheap single use posters	50	€1.00	€50.00
2	Other print materials	Handouts, certificates, etc.	~600	€0.25	€150.00
3	Swags	Buttons and stickers	14 packs of 50 pcs	~9 EUR +pp	€200.00
4	Travelling expenses	Travelling (incl. buses), accommodation and per diem expenses for 8 events	8	€250.00	€2000.00
5	Soft drinks, etc.	For the talks and the meetings	6	€60.00	€360.00
6	Incidentals	Expenses that are not projected in the budget but may still occur	n/a	€100.00	€100.00

Total cost of project

€2860.00

Community engagement

How will you let others in your community know about your project? Why are you targeting a specific audience? How will you engage the community you’re aiming to serve at various points during your project? Community input and participation helps make projects successful. Three members of the user groups will actively take part in the events. We also plan to use the user group blog, Facebook page and other social media.

We already contacted SheSharp Greece and Telesilla - Greek Feminist Network. Two female communities that we already organised events with them in 2016. The project is also support by feminist group TO MOV.

See also:

• Grants:TPS/Magioladitis/SheSharp
• Grants:TPS/Magioladitis/Telesilla

Sustainability

What do you expect will happen to your project after the grant ends? How might the project be continued or grown in new ways afterwards?
The conclusions will help us improve outreach projects, engage more women in the Wikimedia community and also reduce the gender gap and gender bias problems in the existing content.

Measures of success

How will you know if the project is successful and you've met your goals? Please include specific, measurable targets here.

• Number of participants in presentations: 40 in each event
• Number of participants in workshops: 20 in each event
• Number of Wikipedia articles written by workshop participants after 3 months: 60
• Filled in questionnaires: 250
• YouTube videos released: 2

Get involved

Participants

Please use this section to tell us more about who is working on this project. For each member of the team, please describe any project-related skills, experience, or other background you have that might help contribute to making this idea a success.

• Marios Magioladitis is an educator and a long-time Wikimedian in English and Greek Wikipedia. He is studying the gender gap, he is in cooperation with the Independent Women's Movement - Greek Feminist Network, has given lectures about Wikipedia's gender gap, hosted a specialised editathon, and published a number of papers on the subject.
• Konstantinos Stampoulis is an editor in Greek Wikipedia since 2003, and he has given many presentations and hosted workshops for various audiences. He has coauthored with Magioladitis a conference paper on using educational programs to address the gender gap problem (accepted).

Community notification

Please paste links below to where relevant communities have been notified of your proposal, and to any other relevant community discussions. Need notification tips?

• Talk:Wikimedia_Community_User_Group_Greece#Grant_proposal

Endorsements

Do you think this project should be selected for a Project Grant? Please add your name and rationale for endorsing this project below! (Other constructive feedback is welcome on the discussion page).

•  Support Marios is a quite experienced user on gender gap issues and his approach will throw more light on the reasons why women are less represented in Wikimedia Projects comparatively to their role in economy and society in Greece. His long term commitment on this issue is a strong sign that this project will be a fruitful one. I will support this project both on organizational and practical level. I would love also to help with the research. --Γλαύκος (talk) 08:39, 3 August 2016 (UTC)
•  Support SheSharp Greece supports this project. We trust Marios abilities and believe in his longtime vision to increase the number and commitment of women who edit Wikipedia. In May 2016 we had the pleasure to organize with great success, an edit-a-thon on “gender gap in Wikipedia” with the valuable help and contribution of Marios and Geraki. There is work to be done and Marios is the right person to achieve the desired result. We are willing to support this project on practical level and we are looking forward to the co-organization of the next workshop referring to the topic. We would also be glad to assist the survey and the administration of the questionnaires. --desantonop 10:21, 6 August 2016 (UTC)
• Comment Please note that two of the individuals engaged in this grant proposal were involved in a harassment incident at Malpensa Airport hours after the closing of Wikimania 2016. Namely, the adviser of this project User:Geraki was the offender and User:Magioladitis was present at the incident (as was User:Kalliope (WMF)). The matter is currently being investigated by User:Jalexander-WMF of the Support & Safety Dept. In my opinion review of this proposal should be suspended until the harassment issue is resolved. Read more here. However, even if the Committee decides that the aforementioned incident is not an obstacle to approval of this grant proposal, I find it amusing (to say the least) that Geraki should be the advisor of a proposal targeting the participation of women on the WM projects when he shouted loudly at a woman editor in a public space (I'm female, for those of you who don't already know me). Not to mention that the incident occurred in the presence of a female WMF employee. --Saintfevrier (talk) 09:45, 24 August 2016 (UTC)
•  Support Marios' work on gender gap is admirable. His talks are not only informative but also inspiring. Projects that research the lack of female contributors and approach this issue in a unique way are very important in order to find solutions. As a Wikipedian and a female user I support this project. --Amaliavr (talk) 21:36, 1 September 2016 (UTC)
•  Support We are the Greek feminist collective “TO MOV” (which means «the purple» in Greek), an independent organisation for women’s rights and other issues, and we would like to “strongly endorse this project and fully support its implementation”. We are all activists and volunteers; we organize actions and we publish articles on our daily electronic newspaper http://tomov.gr/ about several issues of interest for women, such as rights, demands, daily life, equality among locals and migrants, sexual orientation and gender identity, ideological analyses and studies, law, contribution of women in arts and science, young women, actions for women’s rights in Greece and abroad, internationalist solidarity. We use our website as a tool to undermine and overturn the existing patriarchal mentalities, logic, hierarchies and powers, and promote a global discourse for social change, from the standpoint of equality and feminism. We think that this project will have a positive impact and encourage the dynamic presence of women and the feminist discourse in the public sphere. This is indeed very important and necessary in Greece and we do believe that there is a great potential in this direction. We would like to give special thanks to Marios for being sensitive on this issue and taking this great initiative. We appreciate his long-time commitment on the gender gap issues and we will support this effort too. Tomov.gr (talk) 14:13, 6 September 2016 (UTC)