Overview of the CEE Hub’s journey
In just three years, the Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) Hub has become a cornerstone of regional collaboration and community support.1 With a cumulative investment of USD $565,000 and a current annual budget of $237,000, the Hub has developed into a reliable coordination centre connecting over 40 communities and affiliates of varying size, maturity, and capacity.
The Hub’s work demonstrates the power of decentralised, community-led structures. It was able to pioneer as a hub given the region’s long-standing culture of trust and cooperation2, an action-oriented mindset, a willingness to experiment, and the solidarity between mature affiliates and emerging communities.
By pairing a clear strategic vision with three dedicated staff and a ten-member volunteer steering committee, the Hub has demonstrated its potential to enhance youth engagement, coordinate technological needs, catalyse growth in emerging communities, strengthen affiliates’ content-generating campaigns, facilitate access to resources, and foster a sense of belonging among Wikimedians in the region.
Empowering young volunteers and future leaders
Through sustained mentoring, skills-building, and co-designed projects, the Hub has helped transform early experiments into a growing youth ecosystem.
The CEE Youth Group began as a result of the CEE Hub and has grown to 81 members from 23 countries, acting as a supportive environment for young new editors and organisers.
A major milestone was the first Wikimedia Youth Conference, co-organised with Wikimedia Czech Republic. Interest from 223 young Wikimedians resulted in 83 participants from all eight regions globally. The conference became a rare space for young volunteers to articulate shared challenges, build confidence, and imagine long-term pathways for engagement.3
Strengthening tool adoption and regional tech collaboration
The Hub’s volunteer-led Tech Advancement working group focused on improving tool discoverability, documentation, connecting developers for maintenance support and experimenting with an initiative to increase usage of Cat-a-lot tool.
This collaborative approach has been recognised as a regional model for building technical advisory capacity.
“I’m so thrilled to see this kind of thinking from the region, as it mirrors thinking from the Product and Technology Advisory Council (PTAC), and the current pilot work coming from the Unsupported Tools Working Group….”Selena Deckelmann talking about the CEE hub, Chief Product and Tecnology, Wikimedia Foundation
Working more closely with the Wikimedia Foundation, the hub has also promoted newcomer tools. 16 out of 24 Wikipedias in the region (64%) now use the mentorship feature, and the CEE region accounts for 11% of all completed suggested edits by newcomers worldwide. These achievements highlight how coordinated regional support can significantly accelerate tool uptake and newcomer retention.
Expanding the impact of campaigns and community programs
Campaigns remain central to volunteer engagement across the CEE region. The Hub has played a strategic role in reinvigorating existing campaigns and helping organisers design more effective outreach, guidelines, and training materials.
A notable example is CEE Spring. After years of declining participation following COVID-19, the Hub’s support contributed to renewed momentum:
- 15% increase in articles created
- 72% increase in female contributors
- 31% more participating communities
- 157 new contributors since 2022
The addition of Human Rights and Youth subcategories in 2025 expanded the thematic reach, while the integration of the Wikidata “Coordinate Me” challenge led to a remarkable 340% increase in edited Wikidata items compared to 2024. Notably, 30% of participants came from CEE countries, with 38% being newcomers.
Beyond CEE Spring, the Hub has supported both global and regional campaigns, including Wiki Loves Earth, Wiki Loves Monuments, International Roma Day initiatives, and Wiki Loves Film. This support has consistently led to increased participation, more diverse content, and stronger local capacities.4
The Hub has also helped emerging communities organise their first-ever open knowledge events5, building partnerships in contexts where awareness about Wikimedia is challenging.
Supporting emerging communities and catalysing growth
One of the Hub’s most transformative roles has been in nurturing emerging Wikimedia communities. In 2024, the Hub invested in part-time staffing for Greece, Cyprus, Romania, and Moldova.
- Romania and Moldova launched academic partnerships and integrated Wikipedia into university programs.
- Greece and Cyprus developed strategic plans and secured their first annual grants.
These advancements increased the number of local contributors, established durable institutional partnerships, and positioned these communities to co-host future regional events, such as the 2025 CEE Meeting.6
Improving access to resources and strengthening regional funding
The CEE Hub has begun to play an essential role in promoting equitable access to funding. Its microgrant program, budgeted at $18,000 over two years, has issued 28 grants, with half going to communities that had never before received Wikimedia Foundation funding.
These agile, low-barrier grants helped spark content-creation activities, community-building events, and new volunteer groups.7 Around 65% of funded activities focused on content and contribution, resulting in over 330 editors and more than 9,000 content contributions (diff post for more stories of impact).
The Hub has also supported 11 of the region’s 54 Rapid Fund applicants8, providing hands-on guidance during proposal development. This led to:
- 26% increase in Rapid Funds distributed to the region
- 5 new communities successfully accessing funding
- Approval of 90% of supported proposals (usually at 75%)
- Diversification of work to include partnership building, content partnerships with GLAM institutions, and designing training toolkits.
“The whole team felt invested in us succeeding and that felt reassuring” (Community member supported by the CEE hub for their grant proposal
“ A rapid grant is harder, for people who aren’t experienced; it can be challenging, with documents, and a lot of questions. The process is much longer. Microgrants can help build this experience, it is a first step to access rapid grants.” (Microgrant grantee)
In 2026, the Hub will take on a new role by directly managing Rapid Funds for the region, enabling more context-aware and efficient grantmaking.
Beyond internal movement funds, the Hub has also initiated efforts to unlock external financing through bodies such as the EU, Erasmus, USAID, and the Swedish Institute, an important step toward long-term sustainability.
Building engagement, connectivity, and shared identity
Research in online communities consistently shows that “people participate eagerly in online spaces that provide rewarding connections”.9 CEE Hub has successfully created these touchpoints.Through newsletters (160 monthly views), CEE Catch-Up meetings, and documentation spaces, the Hub helps volunteers stay aware of regional and global conversations. Over two years, volunteers have contributed more than 175 articles to the Hub’s newsletter alone.
Grantee feedback shows a notable rise in volunteers feeling recognised and connected to the movement as a result of the hub.10
The Hub has also played a stabilising role in organising the annual CEE Meetings. By supporting bidding processes and mentoring first-time organisers, the Hub has helped ensure consistently well-managed events with strong programs and space for difficult discussions, including equity issues around delegation and participation.
In everyday practice, the Hub often serves as a human-centred contact point where community members can seek timely, context-specific support and connect with Wikimedia Foundation staff or other movement actors.
“People want to know who they can turn to and that someone will respond within days or even hours. Just knowing that support is there can motivate and encourage people to get involved.”
Barbara Klen, CEE Hub coordinator
Finally, but not least important, CEE hub has taken essential steps to establish a transparent, representative and community-based governance system that focuses on serving communities. After gathering learning and community input, it is starting to experiment with a new system to select Steering committee members with community involvement, and a more structured process for community participation in the hub’s 6 working groups.
Stay tuned for 2026!
- Current grant:The CEE Hub – Year 3. Previous Reports: CEE Needs Research Report, Building a CEE Hub Report ↩︎
- This was built despite the region’s history of geopolitical conflicts and its broad diversity of countries, languages, and ethnicities. ↩︎
- This includes regions developing action plans for their communities, aspiring to leadership positions, establishing mentorship structures, and implementing youth-focused programs in their communities. For more information see this conference outcomes diff post. Feedback and insights from this conference directly informed the Wikimedia Foundation’s Product and Tech teams’ work, particularly regarding mentorship models, task recommendations for newcomers, and retention tools. ↩︎
- In 2022 the CEE region accounted for 22% of content contributed in the campaign and 18% of contributors. In 2025 it accounts for 42% of content (+90K images from CEE region) and 33% of contributors (+1k CEEeditors), 50% of which are newly registered users. In the last 3 years the number of CEE communities has grown from 7 to 11 CEE communities contributing 25% of the campaign’s contents and contributors, (+20k images, +1k contributors) with a high rate of CEE newcomers (65% of CEE contributors). ↩︎
- For instance, working with Wikimedia Bulgaria to organise a Wikimedia track at the Sofia Information Integrity Forum 2025 ↩︎
- With the Hub’s support the Greek community successfully hosted the 2025 CEE meeting and Romania will do so next year. Organising these events is a significant milestone that activates local volunteers, fosters partners, and media visibility, and further develops organisational capacities within the affiliate.
↩︎ - Two examples: 1. Ionian Wikithon is a satellite event of the Wikimedia Hackathon that enabled the Greek community to bring in20 active technology students and professors and the institution is now seeking continued partnership. 2. This project in Turkey, allowed İmmortalaneing, a Turkish user with extended rights to lead a team to upload 2000 photos from 50 cultural heritage sites within days. ↩︎
- The hub provided more lightweight support or endorsement to other proposals.
↩︎ - Wikimedia Foundation Annual Plan 2025-26 – Global Trends ↩︎
- Learning from grantee reporting in the CEE region, 2023 ↩︎
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