With more than 100,000 active contributors globally, Wikipedia is one of the world’s most successful experiments in peer production. Volunteers have always made a collective effort to recruit new contributors, by welcoming new users, developing tutorials and help pages, creating promotional materials, meeting face-to-face, and so on. The Public Outreach department of the Wikimedia Foundation works in collaboration with volunteers and with the Foundation’s 20+ worldwide chapters to determine and foster the most effective approaches to public outreach.
With our recently announced Public Policy Initiative, we are developing a flexible model for reaching out to one specific target group: subject matter experts. Professors and students of U.S. public policy will be solicited to participate in writing and improving articles on the English language Wikipedia, and actively supported in their efforts throughout the the 2010–2011 academic year. We will thoroughly evaluate and document the initiative, providing a template for our volunteers to replicate its approach in other disciplines and other geographic areas.
Please visit the job openings page to read more about these and other employment opportunities at Wikimedia today.
Daniel Phelps, Human Resources
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