Each year, we develop and publish an annual plan that underscores our mission, reflects on the accomplishments and challenges of the previous fiscal year, and sets a course for the year ahead. Wiki Education’s 2025–2026 Annual Plan builds on last year’s strong progress, deepens our commitment to free knowledge and student learning, and prepares us to mark key milestones – for both our organization and for history itself.
Looking Back: 2024–2025
Fiscal year 2024–2025 was an outstanding year for Wiki Education. We improved content for millions of Wikipedia’s readers, launched an exciting new content campaign, finished work on our new impact visualization tool, and celebrated Wiki Education’s 10-year anniversary. We are tremendously proud of what we accomplished together.
Key Highlights
Thanks to our three-year grant from the Mellon Foundation, our Wikipedia Student Program continued the largest ever social justice initiative in the humanities on Wikipedia, empowering postsecondary students across the U.S. and Canada to close long-standing content gaps. These contributions are expected to reach more than 200 million readers by the end of 2026.
Other notable Student Program campaigns included an initiative supported by the Broadcom Foundation which increased the representation of diverse STEM professionals on Wikipedia, providing young readers with relatable and aspirational figures in these fields.
During a critical election year, our Scholars & Scientists Program offered expert-led courses focused on enhancing Wikipedia’s election-related content. Articles improved throughout the campaign’s courses were viewed nearly 21 million times. We also deepened our public health work through partnerships with PCORI and the WITH Foundation, expanding content on medical topics and healthcare for adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities.
And in celebration of next year’s U.S. Semiquincentennial, we launched the “250 by 2026” campaign in partnership with the American Association for State and Local History, empowering experts across the country to improve Wikipedia’s coverage of U.S. history.
Supporting all of this work is our Dashboard platform, which is also used by Wikimedia affiliates and volunteers worldwide. Throughout the past year, we’ve made significant improvements to its performance, reliability, and features to respond to increasing interest in and use of the software.
Looking Ahead: 2025–2026
Key Highlights
In the upcoming fiscal year, we will continue our social justice in the humanities initiative, and advance the “250 by 2026” campaign celebrating U.S. history. We will further improve health-related content on Wikipedia and make complex scientific information accessible and understandable to the general public. Finally, we will continue shining a light on the biographies of women and people of color in STEM.
In 2025–2026, we’ll embark on research that will help us understand how and to which extent students are currently using AI tools for their writing assignments. We’ll also launch a pilot to better understand the potential of using AI as a tool for their own information research process, and we’ll update our resources to improve our guidance on engaging with AI.
Technology continues to be a vital part of our work, and we’re excited to build upon our promising exploration of a Canvas integration for the Dashboard platform. We’ll also continue to assess the responsiveness of our digital tools to the needs of cultural institutions, especially as we seek to expand our “250 by 2026” campaign.
The Wiki Education Board of Trustees approved our new annual plan during their June meeting. We’re grateful to our Board, funders, partners, program participants, and the global Wikimedia community for their ongoing support of our work and collective mission.
We look forward to another great year of shared progress and impact!
For the complete 2025–2026 Annual Plan, please visit wikiedu.org/annual-plan
Interested in incorporating a Wikipedia assignment into your course? Visit teach.wikiedu.org to learn more about the free resources, digital tools, and staff support that Wiki Education offers to postsecondary instructors in the United States and Canada.
