Is your organization passionate about preserving and sharing history? Wikipedia can help you disseminate the history of your community, state, or region to a global audience. To mark the upcoming 250th anniversary of the founding of the United States, Wiki Education is partnering with the American Association for State and Local History to improve Wikipedia’s depth and coverage of American history. Course participants will receive training from Wikipedia experts to expand and deepen the site’s articles related to American history, beginning millennia before 1776 and continuing on to the present. Our free 250 by 2026 eight-week course has been designed specifically with history and cultural heritage practitioners in mind.
We encourage enrollment from practitioners who will be able to attend all eight (8) of the weekly, hour-long meetings. Please note that, in addition to these live sessions, participants will be asked to do about three (3) hours of reading and writing work each week. Registration closes Tuesday, July 1 at 11:59 p.m. PT, with approximately 30 spots available. Successful enrollees will be notified in a timely manner and asked to confirm their participation.
Are you ready to improve the historical content on the world’s largest online Encyclopedia, with 500 million monthly readers? Apply now!
This course is presented in partnership with the American Association for State and Local History (AASLH). Visit aaslh.org to learn more.
The Wiki Scholars course
The Wiki Scholars course Wiki Education invites subject-matter experts to participate in an 8-week virtual course as they learn how to edit Wikipedia. We’ll take a deep dive into Wikipedia’s coverage of United States history and add high-quality information to Wikipedia to inform the public with such crucial knowledge for understanding our past, present, and future. From July 15 – September 2, 2025, you’ll have the opportunity to attend a series of virtual classes facilitated by Wiki Education’s Wikipedia experts.
Meet Tuesdays: 8 live sessions with our Wikipedia experts and a focused group of 20-30 other history experts.
3 hours per week of light reading, researching your chosen topic and writing directly on Wikipedia
Access a collaborative community of Wikipedia experts and professional peers
Amplify the history of the United States from your laptop, reaching an audience of millions
Week 1: Introductions
Get to know each other and begin to see Wikipedia as a powerful tool for communicating information regarding US history.
Weeks 2–4: Joining the community
Discover more about Wikipedia’s community, and select your Wikipedia article. We’ll show you how to identify what information is missing from Wikipedia and how to add it according to Wikipedia’s standards. You’ll begin drafting content for pages that get as many as thousands of readers every day!
Weeks 5–8: Educating the public
You’ll take what you’ve learned and make your work “live” on Wikipedia. Your peers and Wiki Education’s experts will help you polish your work to make sure you meet readers with the best information out there. And you’ll get to commune with them about any challenges and successes you’ve experienced so far.
What will you achieve?
- Extensive knowledge dissemination: Contributions on Wikipedia about the history of the United States have the potential to reach millions, offering immense potential for knowledge dissemination and educating the public about topics still relevant to them today.
- Engagement in a vibrant community: Forge professional connections across fields, and interact with Wikipedia’s volunteer community. Interact closely with a dedicated group each week, sharing expertise and inspiration.
- Wikipedia proficiency: From crafting initial Wikipedia articles to refining editing skills, this course ensures confidence in contributing to Wikipedia, embedding expertise within your institution and field.
- And much more!
Email scholars@wikiedu.org with questions.
