Draft proposal: Thurrock Libraries

Recently I had a conversation with a friend who is a librarian and the conversation turned to Wikipedia. I floated the idea of providing Wikipedia booklets and information in public libraries as it's obviously one of the websites that's used most frequently across public libraries. This led to a very fruitful conversation with the Operations and Data Manager for Thurrock Libraries (Thurrock is a unitary authority in Essex).

Based on this conversation here is a draft proposal for a working relationship with the library service.

The relationship would see Wikimedia UK delivering one or two training sessions to library staff (mostly librarians) about how to edit and use Wikipedia effectively. Those people trained would be in a public facing role within the libraries. Once trained they would be able to pass their skills on to local residents and service users. We would also provide how to edit booklets, membership leaflets and other useful materials such as cheat sheets.

After a few months we would assess the scheme on a formal (or informal basis) – metrics yet to be determined – to assess whether there is a case to be made for extending the scheme, perhaps offering similar initiatives to other local authorities, whether on a borough by borough or county-wide basis.

If the scheme is successful on a pilot basis Wikimedia UK could extend the scheme although any extended scheme would incur costs in terms of volunteer travel for training and production of printed materials. It may be that local authorities could provide contributions to this (or in the case of larger authorities meet the costs of all printed materials used in the scheme).

Obviously there are a few details to be ironed out but in my view there is great potential for this scheme to add great value as a way of encouraging participation in Wikimedia projects, increase engagement with the chapter. In areas where there are large communities of speakers of non-English languages there is also great potential for “linguistic” outreach.

I welcome discussion of this short paper, which has been shared with Thurrock Library Service. Once some details have been ironed out then a more solid and detailed proposal will emerge. Stevie Benton (WMUK) (talk) 11:51, 29 October 2013 (UTC)

We have run some similar things at the British Library, at Senate House and in Scotland. Yes librarians are exactly the sort of people who we should be showing how to use Wikipedia, but the training for them should be a little tailored to cover some issues such as citation styles, reliability and age appropriateness that are common queries that we can expect from librarians, as well as a reassurance that we are improving their skills at handling wikipedia related queries from their readers, not that we or their employers require them to start editing. We should also plan this for at least two, preferably three training weekday sessions as library staff will expect this to be delivered in working hours and they still need to staff the libraries. To ensure sufficient attendance at three sessions we would hope that Thurrock would act as the lead authority and invite colleagues from neighbouring boroughs. Assuming Thurrock has a reference library and a community of active library users it would also be good to extend the offer to include some training sessions for their reference library users. From past experience these events need to have an assistant or two on hand who can do a one to one session for those people turning up for guidance about contributions they have made that have been deleted or reverted. Jonathan Cardy (WMUK) (talk) 14:07, 29 October 2013 (UTC)

This sounds like a great project. I hope it goes well. I think you're on the right track starting with the staff and developing their confidence and skills. I do, however, think that it would be worthwhile encouraging the staff to become editors and to later hold events for the library users. Local WMUK volunteers could provide support. This would allow the encyclopedia to be enriched, not solely by new content, but by a diversity of editors in the local community.

During EduWiki there was a twitter conversation about how Wikipedia was still seen as something of a closed shop in terms of editorialship. A project like this makes it possible to challenge that myth, and to help turn learners into producers. Encouraging library staff to become editors would also contribute to the discourse about the function of libraries. Making it easier for libraries to become places where knowledge is created, and made available to the world, rather than simply a place where knowledge is found has to be a good thing.--Graeme Arnott (talk) 07:15, 5 November 2013 (UTC)