Why this student says Wikipedia’s stigma is undeserved
Philip Marr is a student at Louisiana State University, where he completed a Wikipedia writing assignment in Dr. Josef Horacek’s English course last term. Here, he reflects on what he found most valuable about learning how to contribute content to Wikipedia articles. All throughout high school, I was always told that Wikipedia should not be … Continued
When social media savvy students write for Wikipedia
Dr. Carolyn Cunningham is Associate Professor of Communication & Leadership Studies at Gonzaga University. Here she shares what it was like for her media students to join the “Wikipedia ecosystem” in an assignment. I teach in the Communication and Leadership Studies program at Gonzaga University. This is a Masters level program offered in a hybrid … Continued
Me, a Wikipedian?
A few months ago, I got a text from a friend. “I think you’d be interested in this.” She’d sent me a link to an application for a course offered by Wiki Education and the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) to train people to improve Wikipedia’s coverage of women’s suffrage in the United States. … Continued
Wikipedia assignments are perfect for my Freshman Composition students
Instead of turning her students away from Wikipedia, Janice Airhart decided to have her students at Tulsa Community College write articles related to their course. Here’s what she and her students thought of the assignment. In some ways, a Wikipedia assignment is the perfect method for instructing Freshman Composition students. It’s a class that essentially … Continued
An emerging movement of health professional students contributing to Wikipedia
Dr. Amin Azzam, MD, MA, Adjunct Professor at the UCSF School of Medicine shares how health professional students are improving Wikipedia as part of their formal curricula. Since 2013 I’ve had the great privilege of running a Wikipedia-editing elective course for fourth year medical students at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) School of … Continued
Why a Wikipedia assignment: a student’s perspective
Sienna Stevens was a student in Dr. Rachel Miller’s Baroque Art class at California State University Sacramento this spring, where she expanded a Wikipedia article as an assignment. Here, she talks about what the experience means to her. Before taking this class, I honestly had no idea that anyone could edit a Wikipedia page. Sure, … Continued
Engaging students with Wikipedia
Guest author Dr. Kathleen Sheppard is is an alumna of the History of Science Department at the University of Oklahoma and is now an associate professor of history and political science at Missouri Science & Technology. She was awarded 2019 Woman of the Year at MST “in recognition of her efforts to improve the campus environment for women … Continued
Unerasing Gert Town
Dr. Jason Todd’s students at Xavier University of Louisiana dramatically improved the Wikipedia article of their local town, saving the area from erasure in cultural memory. This is Dr. Todd on the impact of such an assignment. I tried incorporating Wikipedia into a writing class back in the spring of 2008, during my first year … Continued
Wikipedia’s place in higher education
Alliana Drury is a first year undergraduate student at Indiana University of Pennsylvania. In the Spring 2019 term, she took an English 101: Composition 1 course, taught by Dr. Matt Vetter and Teaching Assistant Oksana Moroz, and learned to contribute to Wikipedia as a major assignment in that course. In the following essay, she reflects … Continued
Catalyzing deeper learning in the Humanities with Wiki Education
When the nature of an assignment leads to discovery, not simply to compliance, the learning becomes the students’ own. Dr. Gardner Campbell began teaching Wikipedia writing assignments at Virginia Commonwealth University in 2018. Here he shares the results that he says have “far exceeded” his expectations. For over two decades, from writing projects in freshman composition … Continued