Wikipedia’s articles about US federal laws tend to have high numbers of pageviews — despite the fact that they’re often incomplete. Like all articles, those about public policy tend to focus in on what was of particular interest to the volunteers who have contributed to it in the past, leaving other sections missing or underdeveloped. … Continued
University of Alaska Southeast freshman Gio Renegado has always known about Wikipedia. But until he took a class with Professor Jonas Lamb, he didn’t know anyone could edit it. How did he learn this? By editing it himself, as a class assignment, with support from Wiki Education. “I didn’t know that I was going to … Continued
In the spring 2020 term, College of Wooster student Emma Schell took her first college-level history class, with Professor Katie Holt. The class was about modern Latin America and it included the assignment to improve Wikipedia’s coverage of Latin American topics, through Wiki Education’s Wikipedia Student Program. “I was nervous when I learned I was … Continued
Joe Valle majored in Economics during his undergraduate experience at the University of Virginia, where he graduated in 2020. One of his last classes in college focused on coding with the programming language R, which spurred his interest in data science. With the COVID-19 pandemic making the job market grim, Joe pivoted toward pursuing his … Continued
Koneal Laguidao was shocked when he enrolled in Professor Jonas Lamb’s Writing Across Contexts course in his first term at the University of Alaska Southeast — and discovered he’d be editing Wikipedia as part of the class. “I never knew students my age were able to write for Wikipedia; let alone write for Wikipedia as … Continued
Carmen Fernández Fisac had long wanted to start contributing content to Wikipedia. “It’s a resource I’ve used countless times and I was excited to give back by adding content that could help others as well, but I always felt like I lacked the tools to do it properly,” she says. “What if instead of helping … Continued
As the Digital Initiatives Librarian at Rochester Regional Library Council, Ryan Hughes supports member library contributions to various online repositories, including identifying relevant collections, supporting creation of metadata, advising on copyright issues, and recommending best practices for digitization. As a fellow at the New York Data Carpentries Library Consortium (NYDCLC), Ryan recently had the opportunity … Continued
January 15 is Wikipedia’s 21st birthday. Happy birthday, Wikipedia! In honor of the occasion, we at Wiki Education are reflecting on 21 ways our organization’s work has made Wikipedia better (in no particular order). 1. We’ve added a LOT of content to Wikipedia. In 2018, Wiki Education reached a milestone: Student editors in our Wikipedia Student Program … Continued
Chemist Maggie Tam had never edited Wikipedia before taking one of our recent 500 Wiki Women Scientists courses — in fact, she didn’t even know you could. “I used to think that each Wikipedia article was written by a single author,” Maggie admits. “I didn’t realize that anyone can edit and make changes to articles. … Continued
