Wikipedia:WikiProject United States Public Policy/News/Fall learning points

What we've learned so far

We're at the midway point in the semester for most of the schools, which is always a good time to stop and reflect on what we've done well and what we haven't done so well. Our Campus Team Coordinator, Annie Lin, recently returned from a three-week trip across the country to meet with professors at the participating universities to see how things are going. From Annie's trip and our own internal discussions, we've learned a lot about the decisions we've made so far. We'd like to share what our learning points are and how we are adapting our work to meet the challenges we're facing.

Assignment differences

The learning point: Almost every participating professor approached what they were assigning students differently. Some assignments spanned the entire semester, while others began halfway through the semester or only had a duration of a couple of weeks. Some were mandatory, some were optional. Some students worked on articles individually, while others worked in small groups or larger groups collaboratively on an article. Some articles were directly related to public policy, others were not. And professors are struggling to determine how to grade each student's Wikipedia assignment.

What we're changing for next term: We weren't clear enough in our directions to professors about what form we expected the assignment to take. We're in the process of developing a set of resource materials, including a modular approach to syllabus design and suggested grading rubric, for professors interested in adopting a Wikipedia assignment, to follow. Professors participating in the spring will be asked to sign a more explicit version of our Memorandum of Understanding that establishes clearer guidelines for what the assignment is, so we can be sure we're allocating resources appropriately. We've also learned that just because a professor is in a public policy school, it doesn't mean they will assign students to work on public policy articles. Next term, we'll be much more explicit in our expectation that every student will write on a public policy topic.

Support materials

The learning point: Students loved the "Welcome to Wikipedia" brochure. Over and over, students said that they prefer printed support materials to online ones. Students have also found the web link to the #wikipedia-en-publicpolicy freenode IRC channel extremely useful. What they'd like to see is a more advanced brochure covering references, Wikipedia policies, and the unwritten guidelines. Students also requested a glossary of terms.

What we're changing for next term: We're adapting a long existing glossary of terms into a shorter, printable version for students' use. And we're working on more brochures that address topics like how to do references. Of course, we'll continue distributing the "Welcome to Wikipedia" brochure and having Online Ambassadors available via IRC.

Campus Ambassador program

The learning point: Our Campus Ambassadors are usually working in pairs, and we've heard that pairing an outgoing presenter who's just learning about Wikipedia with a longtime Wikipedian works very well. They often relate to students differently, and they both provide valuable input for the students. The longtime Wikipedian does an excellent job of answering students' questions and mentoring the other Campus Ambassador on Wikipedia ways. And the newer Wikipedian who has expertise in outreach is doing a great job of setting up student clubs and other outreach activities on campus.

What we're changing for next term: We want to emphasize the importance of these two groups of people more in the Campus Ambassador training. Current cohorts will lead sections of the training for the next round of Campus Ambassadors, and the training curriculum will include more hands-on work, more time on how to edit, less time on presentation skills, more break-out sessions, and more information about how to plan Wikipedia workshops. Ambassadors will be split into a track for either experienced Wikipedians or new Wikipedians to ensure the core content matches what that person needs to learn. We're also trying to start the initial communication between the Campus Ambassadors and professors before the semester begins, giving them adequate time to plan the activities.

Additionally, we'll be reaching out to staff of universities more -- teaching and learning center staff, writing center staff, and librarians make excellent Campus Ambassadors. We're also looking to include some people with related interests, such as museum staff, into our trainings for the spring.

Online Ambassador program

The learning point: While mostly positive, our interactions with students have a lot of room for improvement. We haven't been able to staff our own IRC channels consistently enough to ensure that every student who shows up on IRC unexpectedly gets good help in a timely manner. There have also been some instances of discouraging or off-putting interactions, and instances of giving students too many (good) options when all they want is clear instructions for getting started. Mentor matching hasn't gone as smoothly as we hoped, especially in classes that weren't explicitly assigned to find mentors. It hasn't been easy to keep track of which students need help when, nor has it been easy to make sure students get timely on-wiki feedback when they want it.

What we're changing for next term: We've taken the first steps of identifying specific roles within the ambassador program, and we'll be building on that and refining the roles in order to make sure all the important needs from students, professors and Campus Ambassadors can be met. As student interaction winds down this term, the group of ambassadors will turn our discussions to improving guidelines and finding better ways of training ambassadors for specific tasks and making sure they are good at them.