Derrick & all, Another thought: how do we want to handle issues where some part of the program (be it an entire course or a Campus/Online Ambassador) is having problems? Let's face it – not every student will contribute the same quality content. Although we know through surveys that many of them are highly motivated and have a lot of respect when it comes to see their own words appear on a medium that they're using almost daily, some of them will still underperform. And also the other way round: not every Campus/Online Ambassador is on the same level or has enough time to support the students as needed.
So, getting back to Sonia's case: how can we make sure that we handle issues effectively? Would it be beneficial to create a page (e.g. "Wikipedia:Education program noticeboard") where both community members and instructors could flag issues? I guess it would be a good first step _to be aware_ of issues like the one that Sonia is referring to. Part of what Rob Schnautz is doing as a contractor is to look into the students' contributions (by taking reasonable samples) and to flag issues to other members of my team. How about if we did this in a more collaborative way and started a page like the one I suggested above? Would that be more effective? Frank Am 16.04.2012 um 20:05 schrieb Frank Schulenburg: > Agreed. I think it's a great idea to have a kind of "checkpoint" review > earlier in the semester. Did you know that Pharos started an 'Educational > peer review' process recently? > > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Educational_peer_review_requests > > I really like the idea and it could be a significant improvement when it > comes to giving the students feedback. I would be more than happy if this > kind of initiative was successful. > > Thanks a lot for your thoughts, Derrick! > > Frank > > Am 16.04.2012 um 19:27 schrieb Derrick Coetzee: > >> My thoughts: >> >> Even with the very best student groups I've seen, it was absolutely >> necessary to review their work periodically. These days I use my Followed >> users tools to facilitate this. >> >> http://toolserver.org/~dcoetzee/followedusers/ >> >> I absolutely agree that it should be *mandatory* to have an experienced >> Wikipedian review each contribution before it goes live in mainspace, or >> else you can end up with a lot of people panicking to clean up contributions >> that were not ready for deployment. This is feasible because of the program >> requirement that there are a limited number of students per CA/OA, and >> contributes directly to student learning and to the project. >> >> Moreover, I think it's very important to have at least one less thorough >> "checkpoint" review earlier in the semester, where the student's initial >> draft is reviewed for any problems. Students are deploying very late in the >> term, and if they have serious issues such as copyright violations it may be >> too late to do much about them. >> >> Finally, I think it's vital that ambassadors examine the topic choices of >> the students as soon as they're made, and make sure they're suitable for >> articles. >> >> I don't believe Sonia's experience with her class is representative (that >> particular faculty member has a history of issues), but I do think that >> certain measures are good for every student int he program. >> >> -- >> Derrick Coetzee >> User:Dcoetzee >> >> On Mon, Apr 16, 2012 at 4:45 PM, Sonia Newton-Shostakovich >> <[email protected]> wrote: >> Seconding Guerillero, with a little added thought: >> >> Some, okay, a lot of the edits students have made have been frankly >> terrible. Many classes do not have ambassadors actively supervising them, >> and are putting out edits that are more harmful than helpful to the project >> and don't get fixed (and personally, I've been involved with a class just as >> "on call for questions"; just reviewed their work recently and was kicking >> myself for not having the foresight to monitor them regardless of my >> explicit role. Yay cleanup!) We don't have enough active ambassadors to >> follow each student around, nor is there infrastructure in place to make >> sure each class has some oversight of that sort. >> >> It's a dual-fold problem: firstly, as an Articles for Creation reviewer, I'm >> sometimes coming across students who are obviously part of classes but who >> have not made any edits which would allow me to find their course page, and >> whose instructions have clearly been dismal; secondly, as an ambassador, I'm >> sometimes overwhelmed when looking at just a couple of courses and trying to >> make a student's contributions conform to our standards without destroying >> their morale and/or grade. A lot of this could be prevented on the campus >> side of things: before the in-hindsight cleaning up, instructions for >> students should be sufficient and accurate, and supervision by experienced >> Wikipedians made compulsory. Too many terrible paragraphs will fall through >> the gaps otherwise. >> >> The more work I see from this project the more I'm inclined to agree with >> Piotr that profs who haven't ever done tasks similar to that they set for >> their students should not be setting those tasks. >> >> Sonia >> >> >> On Tue, Apr 17, 2012 at 11:31 AM, Guerillero Wikipedia >> <[email protected]> wrote: >> That is the issue world wide. Here are some of the issues that I see. >> >> (a) We need to have the guts to say no sometimes. At least in the states, I >> feel that we would get better results if we tried to get more small liberal >> arts schools who have class sizes that range from 10-30. One hundred plus >> person classes do not work well with our model. >> >> (b) We need to shoot for upper level classes. PSY 100 or ENG 101 should not >> be our target class. The students do not know yet how to write effectively >> in their subject area, for the most part, and have yet to do real research. >> 200 or 300 level classes would be easier to work with. >> >> These two things cut down on the number of volunteers. Who wants to work >> with 100 freshman who do not comunicate with you no matter how hard you try >> and who have yet to learn how to produce a workable product. >> >> --Guerillero >> >> >> On Mon, Apr 16, 2012 at 7:21 PM, Everton Zanella Alvarenga >> <[email protected]> wrote: >> Interesting thread! >> >> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Ambassadors#The_future_of_our_program >> >> This is the main challenge in my opinion for the second semester for >> WEP in Brazil, multiply the number of ambassadors - there is some >> progress here in the pilot. To convince professors on the importance >> and need of this program after showing successful cases seems easier >> than to have enough campus ambassadors for the demand. A key step of >> the project when we are thinking about expanding in any place. >> >> Tom >> >> -- >> Everton Zanella Alvarenga (also Tom) >> Wikimedia Brasil >> Wikimedia Foundation >> >> _______________________________________________ >> Education mailing list >> [email protected] >> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/education >> >> >> _______________________________________________ >> Education mailing list >> [email protected] >> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/education >> >> >> >> _______________________________________________ >> Education mailing list >> [email protected] >> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/education >> >> >> >> _______________________________________________ >> Education mailing list >> [email protected] >> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/education >
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