User:MartinPoulter

It's nice to be important, but it's more important to be nice - American proverb

This effin' guy

As of June 2013, I'm the Jisc Wikimedia Ambassador, running a nine month project to explore overlaps between Jisc, Wikimedia, and academia in general.

I was a trustee of Wikimedia UK from April 2011 to May 2012. I got my PhD from the University of Bristol and am presently employed there in three different jobs: as well as the Jisc ambassador post, I work in communications for a major health research project and running the web sites for a national teaching support project. I have taught symbolic logic and introduction to philosophy at the university. On English Wikipedia (User:MartinPoulter) I have more than eight thousand edits, mainly in the area of psychology.

I'm a certified Lead Trainer for Wikimedia UK in Membership Development (which means reaching out to new audiences and getting them to take their first steps as Wikipedians) and a trained Campus Ambassador as part of the Wikipedia Education Program. For the period September 2012 to mid-June 2013, I was an Associate of Wikimedia UK focusing on building partnerships with academia, stepping down to seek a related job. I have been media trained and have a few media appearances (mostly local radio) under my belt. I have also been trained in contributing to Wikidata.

Email: martin.poulterwikimedia.org.uk

/Declaration of interests

Opinion Essays

/Training on one leg

Activity summary

Publications and interviews

For a summary of publications and interviews about Wikimedia and Wikipedia, see my Wikipedia user page.

Workshops led or run solo
Wellcome Library editathon	26 February 2014
Veterinary Science editathon	20 November 2013
British Psychological Society workshop	10 April 2013
Two workshops on “The future of Wikimedia and Higher Education” for “Changing the Learning Landscape” Strategy Implementation Programme course	21 February 2013
Two Knowledge Café sessions at the NIACE/ BBC Digital Learning conference	4 December 2012
JISC Digital Infrastructure Team workshop	8 October 2012
Science Learning Centre South West workshop	5 March 2012
Oxford Free Speech Debate workshop	27 January 2012
Bristol Girl Geeks Wikipedia editing event	15 January 2012
Institute of Physics Workshop	1 September 2011
Bristol Wiki Academy 2	4 July 2011
Bristol Wiki Academy 1	19 March 2011

Workshops supported
Ada Lovelace Day: Women in Science editathon at Oxford University	15 October 2013
Coventry medical Wiki workshop	31 August 2012
Wiki Wildlife Bristol (2 workshops)	15 September 2011
Medical Research Council Workshop, London	1 July 2011
Cancer Research UK Workshop	28 March 2011

Presentations to researchers and educators on behalf of Wikimedia UK
"Wikimedia: linking research impact and open education", Coventry University	3 March 2014
"Wikimedia: linking research impact and open education", Bath Spa University	23 January 2014
"Wikimedia: linking research impact and open education", University of Newcastle	2 December 2013
"Wikimedia: linking research impact and open education", University of Sheffield	14 November 2013
"Wikimedia: linking research impact and open education", EduWiki Conference, Cardiff	1 November 2013
"Wikimedia: linking research impact and open education", Oxford University	15 October 2013
“The Wikipedia Education Program: open educational practice on a global scale” at Open Educational Resources conference 2013 (video)	27 March 2013
"Wikimedia and Higher Education" seminar at Beyond Distance Research Alliance, University of Leicester	18 June 2012
Presentation to PVCs and other senior staff at University of Hertfordshire (joint with Roger Bamkin),	25 April 2012
“Wikimedia: Elitism for the masses” seminar, IDeoGRAMs group, University of Leicester	29 February 2012
“Sausages and Scholarship: the role of openness in digital literacy” at ESRC Research Seminar on "Digital Policy: Connectivity, Creativity and Rights"	18 November 2011
“Wikimedia and public engagement for scientists” at meeting of the Biology Online Media Group	5 December 2011
“Common pitfalls in engaging with Wikipedia” at Bathcamp #26 "The Spirit of Openness", the University of Bath	5 October 2011
“Wikipedia and Higher Education: beat them or join them?” at Open Educational Resources conference 2011	11 May 2011
“How to avoid common pitfalls and interact with others” at Cancer Research UK Wikipedia event	31 January 2011

My own site lists my other talks advocating free and open content and practice.

Activity log

Recent

• 2 February: Took part as an observer in the second day of Training_the_Trainers/February_2014_event

2013

• 16 December: Morning meeting with Dan Brickley, schema.org, in Google offices, London. Discussed scope of Wikipedia and Wikidata.
• 11 December: Lunchtime meeting with Zak Mensah, Bristol City Museums
• 10 December: Visit to Wikimedia UK office for Christmas party. Saw lots of great Wikipedians, staff and partners, and had lots of fun.
• 3 December: Visit to North of England Institute of Mining and Mechanical Engineers graciously hosted by Robert Forsythe
• 24 October: Submitted proposal for Wikimedia workshop at OER 14 conference. Wrote Wikimania 2013 report.
• 17 October: Took part remotely in Ada Lovelace Day editathon at Conway Hall, although was still logged in to my User:MartinPoulter Jisc account.
• 4 September: Interviewed for The Signpost's report about Wikiproject Psychology. Mentioned external outreach activity and educational assignments.
• 2 September: Phone meeting with NHS Bristol contact about medical outreach

Speaking at the Wikipedia Education Program Pre-Conference

• 7-12 July: attended Wikimania 2013, Hong Kong. Gave a session on "Building formal relationships with institutions and goverments" as part of the Education Program workshop.
• 28 July: One of eight attendees at Bristol Wikimeet, along with BRO contact
• 25/26 July: took part remotely in NIMR Women in Science editathon
• 25 July: Meeting at Bristol Records Office about possible backstage pass event/ editathon
• 13 July: Improvements to Expert outreach index.

• Begin Jisc Wikimedia Ambassador role
  • During this time I will record my activity as a Wikimedia UK volunteer on this page, and my activity for the Jisc project on User:MartinPoulter_Jisc

• 8 June: Plenary talk on "Three Prongs of Outreach" at Wikiconference 2013, Lincoln Slides available on Commons Video on Youtube. Video forthcoming on Commons.
• 28 May: Education Committee audio meeting
• 16 April: Education Committee audio meeting
• 11 April: meeting with Toni Sant in Bristol
• 10 April: leading British Psychological Society workshop
• 29 March: writing blog post about the OER 13 conference, which went online 4th April
• 26-27 March: presenting and running a stall at Open Educational Resources conference 2013, Nottingham
• 23 March: Attended open day, including jointly delivering the Education workshop with Toni Sant
• 22 March: Visiting the office to take part in Toni Sant's induction
• 11 March: Working on a post about education for the Wikimedia UK blog, published as Learning and Teaching in the age of Wikipedia
• 4 March: Writing a short piece for The Psychologist magazine about British Psychological Society outreach.
• 27 February: Writing a post about open access to research for the Wikimedia UK blog, later published as Researchers: are you Wikipedia-compatible?
• 22 February: Spent day at the office to be on the interview panel for Education Officer.
• 21 February: Delivered a one-hour presentation/workshop, twice, about "The future of Wikimedia and Higher Education" at Changing the Learning Landscape Strategy Implementation Programme event, Bristol. Slides available on Commons
• 18 February: Preparing for forthcoming workshop
• 30 January: Education Committee audioconference
• 28 January: Created an outline of a Campus Ambassador training workshop and worked on Training strategy
• January: heard through Twitter about a conference session where medical practitioners' use of Wikipedia was discussed. Tracked down the email of the session chair and, through her, got in touch with the presenter. Drew attention to our existing blog posts about this topic and asked if she had any findings to share. It turned out the question about Wikipedia was just one element in a broader survey about social media, and the findings weren't particularly surprising, so left it there.

2012

• 4 December: Delivered 2 "Knowledge cafe" sessions on behalf of Wikimedia UK at the NIACE/ BBC Digital Learning Conference, Salford
• 1 December: Attended media training event at the WMUK office.
• 17/18 November: Attended both days of the Board meeting in London.
• 24 October: Took part in Digital Disruption Summit in London to talk about Wikimedia's role in promoting digital literacy.
• 19 October: Took part in Ada Lovelace Day editathon remotely
• 19 October: Guest post for Wikimedia UK blog goes online: Bringing evidence-based medicine to the world
• 17 October: spoke at a staff meeting at Bristol Airport, describing Wikimedia and its mission. I thanked them for supporting Bristol's (ultimately unsuccessful) Wikimania bid. I explained that Wikimedia can't be used for advocacy, but they were already well aware of this. They told me that the Bristol Airport page in Wikipedia was "largely accurate" and they didn't have any problems with it. I said they could help Wikimedia's mission by uploading photos, and that releasing them under a Creative Commons licence so that they could be seen by lots of people usually made more sense than keeping total control. They seemed receptive to the idea, and I hope to keep in touch. Feedback from the meeting organiser: "we really enjoyed having an external speaker and it was really good for us to learn so much. Personally I didn’t know quite how Wiki worked before Wednesday."
• 8 October: led JISC DI team training workshop in London
• 21 September: working on a guest post for a LSE blog, published on 5 October as Writing for Wikipedia has forced me into good scholarly habits and accessible writing
• 20 September: interview about Wikipedia in education published in Times Higher Education. Writing a post-conference email for EduWiki
• 14 September: wrote a Wikimedia blog post reflecting on EduWiki
• 8 September: Board strategy/planning meeting in Coventry
• 5-6 September: Chairing and speaking at the EduWiki Conference 2012 in Leicester
• 4 September: meeting with NIACE in Leicester about Wikimedia in adult and community education
• 31 August: Helping out at Coventry medical Wiki workshop
• 17 August: visit to WMUK office for education brochure mailout
• 22 June-5 September: various publicity for EduWiki conference
• 20 June: Phone meeting with WMUK staff about education outreach.
• 18 June: Spoke at Research in Learning Innovation seminar on "Wikimedia and Higher Education" at Beyond Distance Research Alliance, University of Leicester. (Storify)
• 12 June: Wrote up Wikimedia for schools workshop
• 11 June: Phone meeting with consultant about trainer accreditation
• 11 June: Met with someone from JISC Digital Media to discuss the Digipedia project and what lessons can be learned from Wikipedia about encouraging community contributions.
• 9-10 June: Took part in the Train the Trainers event.
• 12 May: Attended Wikiconference 2012 and AGM. Left board.
• 5-6 May: Emailing lots of education contacts about the conference and new mailing list
• 4 May: Audioconference with Jon and Harry about Train-the-trainers
• 28/29 April: more planning and writing for education outreach: Draft education strategy put online
• 25 April: joint presentation with Roger Bamkin to senior staff at University of Hertfordshire
• 24 April: spoke to a small group of early-career scientists at the University of Bristol about Wikipedia for outreach
• 23 April: Long-term planning. Various emails and education stuff write-up, incl. /Education staff proposal
• 21-22 April: Board meeting in Monmouth
• 14 April: working on Annual Report and other Board matters; writing blog post about doctors' use of Wikipedia; first go at blog post about Academic Spring.
• 10 April: writing up education strategy; education section of Annual Report
• 9 April: Bristol Open Geodata Consortium is now a thing. Email about Trainer Training event.
• 27 March: Board meeting (audioconference)
• 17 March: Stall at Association of Humanist Students National Convention, London
• 5 March: Delivered a solo half-day workshop to 12 staff at Science Learning Centre South West
• 29 February: Presented at IDeoGRAMS seminar, University of Leicester, on "Wikipedia: Elitism for the Masses"
• 11 and 12 February: Board meeting, London
• 10 February: Working on education strategy
• 9 February: Meeting a software developer in Bristol about geodata, along with SV.
• 4 February: further work on Trainer training
• 2 February: Organising Geological Society workshop for March.
• Investigating possibility of involvement in Bath Digital Festival, late March.
• 27 January: Training session for Oxford graduate students for the Free Speech Debate project, improving Wikipedia's Freedom of speech article in 13 languages
• 26 January: Board audioconference
• 24 January: Board audioconference
• 22 January: campus ambassador meeting, Imperial College
• 19 January: trip to Oxford to meet Free Speech project participants
• 18 January: interviewed by BBC Radio Wales in the early morning, about enwiki blackout
• 15 January: Delivering training at Bristol Girl Geeks Wikipedia event
• 4-11 January: creating more pages about training: Trainer training, For trainers, Basic Commons training, Improving Wikipedia training, Training preparation email, Evaluation of training, draft observation form, Training, Student societies
• 3 January: Starting to wikify training documents: Basic Wikipedia training. Evening: Board meeting
• 2 January: Day catching up on email + phone meeting with Fae.

2011

• 5 December: Speaking at Social Media Lunch for scholarly societies, hosted by the Institute of Physics in London (15 min talk followed by discussion) Slides: "Wikimedia and public engagement for scientists"
• 1 December: Meeting with British Psychological Society/ History of Psychology Archive/ Wellcome Library in Manchester
• 19/20 November: Board away weekend
• 18 November: speaking at ESRC Research Seminar on "Digital Policy: Connectivity, Creativity and Rights", Leicester University (15 min. talk followed by discussion). Dinner in London in the evening. /Sausages and Scholarship (slides and summary)
• 16 November: Finishing up researcher brochure draft and sharing on-wiki
• 13 November: More work on researcher brochure
• 12 November: Writing up outline proposal for a geodata project focused on Bristol
• 7 November: afternoon in Bristol with Jon Davies and Steve Virgin; internal discussions and meetings with local partners
• 5-6 November: working on brochure for researchers
• 4 November: one-hour meeting with a researcher for a University of Bristol/ University of Cardiff project on crowdsourcing. Explained how Wikimedia projects can benefit arts and humanities researchers
• 3 November: 25 minute interview on BBC Radio Bristol and BBC Radio Somerset on Wikimedia and other topics
• 16 October: Attending EGM_2011 in London
• 11 October: Board meeting
• 11 October: Project wrap-up meetings with ARKive and University of Bristol
• 5 October: Speaking on "Common pitfalls in engaging with Wikipedia" (slides) at Bathcamp, the Innovation Centre, Bath Storify of tweets from the session
• 29 September: Meeting At-Bristol staff (with SV)
• 15 September: Wiki Wildlife Bristol
• 12 September: Board audioconference re CE recruitment and Charity application
• 11 September: London Wikimeet and meeting Chief Executive candidates
• 8 September: Meeting with ARKive about Wiki Wildlife Bristol
• 1 September: Institute of Physics Workshop
• 27-28 August: Board meeting
• 18 August: Wikimedia Girl Geek Dinner
• 3 August: another round of edits to Physics World article
• 2 August: meeting ARKive about collaboration project, then lunchtime meeting about media opportunities
• 1 August: meeting Centre for Public Engagement at University of Bristol
• 25 July: Board meeting
• 20 July: Meeting with contact from Arts & Humanities Research Council
• 19 July: edits to press release about Bristol placements
• Weekly from 19 July: Meetings with Sam Knight (University of Bristol Outreach Ambassador)
• 17 July: Finishing & submitting first draft of Physics World article
• 15 July: First attempt at feature article for Physics World
• 7-10 July: attending Wikipedia in Higher Education Summit
• 4 July: Bristol Wiki Academy 2
• 3 July: Filing expenses for self and others, adding blog post to blog, preparing for workshop tomorrow.
• 1 July: Medical Research Council Workshop in London and subsequent write-up
• 28 June: Preparing for MRC Workshop + Meeting with Pigsonthewing and ARKive
• 25 June: Writing blog post about Wikipedia and librarianship
• 23 June: Preparing press release for Medical Research Council Workshop
• 23 June: Preparing 2 slides for pre-sessional Bristol students on use & evaluation of Wikipedia
• 22 June: Interviews for University of Bristol Outreach Ambassador
• 21 June: Presented at meeting of Subject Librarians at the University of Bristol
• 18 June: Attended Campus Ambassador training at Imperial College, London
• 15 June: With Steve Virgin, met with teachers in a local school
• 11/12 June: Board strategy day (Saturday), meeting and Birmingham Wikimeet (Sunday)
• 8 June: Got University of Bristol to put up news item about Ambassador post.
• 6 June: Phone meeting with BPS contact
• 3 June: Worked with Phil Barker of JISC CETIS to create "Wikimedia Commons for UKOER resources", a guide for projects releasing open educational resources in UK Higher Education
• 2 June: WMUK Blog post, Six unorthodox ways to use Wikipedia
• 2 June: Meeting with SETSquared
• 2 June: Phone meeting about BOB lectures
• Contributed to Reports/2011/May
• 19 May: With Steve Virgin, met with University of Bristol partner to design Wikimedia Outreach Ambassador post.
• 11 May: Presented at the Open Educational Resources conference 2011 on "Wikipedia and Higher Education: Beat them or Join them?" (slides PDF)
  • Abstract: "The presenter works on OER projects in Higher Education, and also in a voluntary capacity for Wikipedia, which aims to bring the world's knowledge to all of humanity. Both efforts are worthwhile, but their reach and impact is very different. I will argue that Wikipedia and its related projects have achieved enormous impact due to cultural factors that are only evident "behind the scenes". These cultural factors, including very high degrees of risk tolerance and individual empowerment, are largely alien to present-day Higher Education and become more so as universities become increasingly managerial. Some attempts to improve on the Wikipedia model, such as Citizendium, lack this special ingredient and enjoy considerably less impact. Universities have entirely different strengths from Wikipedia, but cannot put off the decision of whether they will try to compete with it, work with it for the common good, or work in a complementary way. If they want to be more wiki-like, they need to realise that this is not a matter of mere technological change, or even of individual practice."
• 9 May: Audioconference with Institute of Physics
• 30 April: Online meeting about Ambassador programme
• 29 April: Online meeting about application for charitable status
• 28 April: With Steve Virgin, met with a potential partner organisation to write and present a Memorandum of Understanding
• 20 April: Met with Watershed Media Centre about content sharing
• 19 April: Interviewed by TheNextWeb, published the next day as "Wikimedia UK to Hire Full-Time Staff, Aims to Increase Content Quality on Wikipedia"
• 16 April: Presented on /Psychology on Wikipedia 2011 at Annual Conference 2011. Joined board.
• 5 April: Presented at plenary session of Scottish Economics Society on "Bringing remix culture to Economics." Made positive mentions of Wikipedia, Wikimedia Commons and the Wikimedia community.
• March: Designed promotional image for Annual Conference 2011.
• 31 March: Interviewed by The Times about Cancer Research UK Workshop. Published on 4 April on page 14.
• 28 March: One of the Wikipedia guides at Cancer Research UK Workshop
• 19 March: Co-hosted and co-organised Bristol Wiki Academy 1 at the University of Bristol. Five minute interview in the morning for BBC Radio Bristol
• 14 March: Met with a manager of an image archive to discuss possible content partnership
• 23 February: Attended Digital Humanities workshop at University of Bristol to meet archivists.
• 31 January: Brief presentation at Cancer Research UK Workshop

2010

• Other meetings with local partners, in conjunction with Steve V.

/Education