Welcome, Colleen!

I’m excited to share that Colleen McCoy has joined Wiki Education as our Communications and Outreach Coordinator. In her role, Colleen supports the development and implementation of communications across all departments, including outreach to new and ongoing partners. She also leads key projects for our Wikipedia Student Program’s Knowledge Equity initiative in partnership with the … Continued

Filling gaps in the mineral cabinet

In Wiki Education’s Wikipedia Student Program, students are assigned to edit a Wikipedia article on a course-related topic by their higher education instructor. For some students, they pick something they’re already deeply familiar with; for others, it’s a personal interest. But for Zoe Muccatira, a junior at North Dakota State University, she picked her topic … Continued

Communicating the science of groundwater contamination by improving Wikipedia

When Georgia Institute of Technology student Annika Trout learned she’d be improving a Wikipedia article for her Introduction to Environmental Sciences class this fall, she felt like it would be an interesting change from her typical research essay or presentation. “I also felt daunted by the challenge – it seemed like a huge responsibility to … Continued

Did life begin in a “warm little pond”? A student’s article lets you learn the science

Charles Darwin coined the term “warm little pond” to describe the potential origin of life. But the idea lacked a Wikipedia article until Ula Jones created it this fall as part of a class assignment to improve Wikipedia’s coverage of the origin of life. Ula is a first-year graduate student in earth and space sciences … Continued

Adding underrepresented scientists to Wikipedia — and gaining skills along the way

The recent movie Oppenheimer brought recent attention to the Manhattan Project. For Lone Star College – Kingwood sophomore Connor McAdams, an important part of learning more about the Manhattan Project is learning about the traditionally underrepresented scientists who also contributed. “People often acknowledge scientists such as J. Robert Oppenheimer, but other scientists who worked on … Continued

Adding Claibourne Smith’s Wikipedia article: “like it was a piece of art that I kept looking at”

Mahmoud “Mody” Hassan is a freshman at Rutgers University Newark. It was his first term of college, and he had just started at Rutgers after being born and raised in Egypt. So there were a lot of changes in his life when he showed up to Dr. Laura Porterfield’s class on “Education and Social Change … Continued

Clovis students add biographies of diverse people in STEM

This fall, students in Melanie Sanwo’s Honors English class at Clovis Community College came together with a common mission: Add biographies of diverse people in STEM to Wikipedia. The 12 students split in four groups to add four new biographies to Wikipedia: Steve Ramirez, Joseph Monroe, Juan G. Santiago, and James M. Jay. For the … Continued

Telling the story of an African American chemist

Chemist Harold B. Evans was one of a handful of African American scientists who worked on the Manhattan Project. A photo of him has been included in the Wikipedia article on African-American scientists and technicians on the Manhattan Project for several years — but Wikipedia lacked his biography until student De’Narie Breeland created it this … Continued

Howard students improve representation of Black women in STEM on Wikipedia

This fall, Howard University professor Msia Clark taught a course on “Black Women and Pop Culture”, which focuses on Black women’s representations. So what could be more perfect than to ask her students to improve the representation of Black women on Wikipedia, the website the world visits when it wants to know more about topics? … Continued