Editing Building Successful Online Communities (Fall 2024) (section)

== Assignments ==

The assignments in this class are designed to give you an opportunity to try your hand at using the conceptual material taught in the class. There will be no exams or quizzes.

Unless otherwise noted, all assignments are due at the end of the day (i.e., 11:59pm on the day they are listed as being due). All times given are local time in Seattle.

=== Case discussion ===

The course relies heavily on the case study method which describes a particular form of instructor-mediated discussion. A standard "case" usually involves reading an example—perhaps up to 20-35 pages of background about an organization or group facing an ambiguous or difficult challenge. I will mark certain readings as "[Case]" in the syllabus, and I expect you to read them particularly closely. It is important to realize that '''I will not summarize case material in class, and I will not cover it in the lectures'''. I expect you all to have read it, and we will jump in and start discussing it.

Cases ask students to put themselves in the positions of individuals facing difficult situations to tease out the tensions and forces at play in the case and to construct — through group discussion — the broader lessons and takeaways. Cases are a wonderful way to connect the sometimes abstract concepts taught in many academic courses to real examples of the type of ambiguous situations that you will likely encounter in your career. Generally speaking, there are no right or wrong answers in cases.

==== Cold Calling ====

Cases rely roughly on the [[:wikipedia:Socratic method|socratic method]] where instructors teaching cases cold call on students—i.e., instructors call on people ''without'' asking for volunteers first. I will be doing this for the majority of our class sessions.

Because I understand that cold calling can be terrifying for some students, I will be circulating a list of questions (labeled "Reading Note" in the syllabus) that describe the kinds of questions I am likely to ask each week along with the weekly announcements (i.e., at least 6 days in advance). Although it is a very good idea to take notes guided by these questions or to write out answers to these questions in advance, we will not be collecting these answers. You are welcome to work with other students to brainstorm possible answers. Although I will also ask questions I do not distribute ahead of time, these questions will give you a good sense of where to focus your reading and note-taking.

I have written a computer program that will generate a random list of students each day, and I will use this list to '''randomly''' cold call students in the class. To try to maintain participation balance, the program will try to ensure that everybody is cold called a similar number of times during the quarter. Although there is ''always'' some chance that you will called upon next, you will become less likely to be called upon relative to your classmates each time you are called upon.

==== Assessment for case study discussion ====

I have placed detailed information on case study-based discussion on [[User:Benjamin Mako Hill/Assessment#Case Discussion|the case discussion section of my assessment page]]. This describes both the rubrics I will use to assess your case discussion and how I will compute the final grades in the course.

=== Papers === 

You will hand in two papers in this class. In both cases, I will ask you to connect something you have experience or knowledge about to course material. The "Writing Rubric" section of [[User:Benjamin Mako Hill/Assessment|the detailed page on assessment]] gives the rubric I will use to evaluate these papers.

=== Project 1: Contributing to Wikipedia ===

Because this course is going to cover an enormous number of different online communities, I've found that it's helpful to have one online community that can serve as a sort of common object to think about and engage with. In this course, that community is going to be Wikipedia.

In the first component of the class, you will be asked to learn about Wikipedia, its norms, rules, and processes. With this knowledge, you will all be asked to research and substantially extend an encyclopedia article on Wikipedia. To do this, I will use material from [https://wikiedu.org/ the Wiki Education Foundation (WikiEdu)] to help you learn how to participate in Wikipedia. As part of this process, you will interact with other community members who are not part of the class.

You will need to participate in Wikipedia each week during the first compontent of the class. The teaching team will be able to see this activity and help you.

Every Friday during this first component of this class, there will be an assignment due that corresponds to one step in the process of getting involved in Wikipedia. Most weeks, this will involve completing learning modules and assignments on a website put together by WikiEdu. These Wikipedia participation assignments won't be synced up with the theory, but they will provide you with lots of opportunities to reflect on the theoretical work we are covering.

I plan to take time to discuss our progress and experience with Wikipedia and to connect it explicitly to the theoretical concepts we are covering. As we finish the ''micro'', ''meso'', and ''macro'' sections of the first component of the course, we will read about Wikipedia and have three case discussions about it.

Finally, as a dress rehearsal for the final project, I will ask you all to think through a major problem facing Wikipedia.

Although this means we'll be spending a lot of time talking about Wikipedia, the goal here is to build and apply critical skills about online communities ''in general''. Wikipedia's incredible openness and impact make it an excellent place to learn and explore the ideas of the course, but the goal is always to engage with the broader principles and underlying concepts and practice their applications.

==== Wikipedia Task #1 ====
;Task: Get started on Wikipedia!
;Due: Friday October 4
;Deliverables: Following the instructions in the training, make contributions in Wikipedia and [https://dashboard.wikiedu.org/courses/University_of_Washington/Building_Successful_Online_Communities_(Fall_2024) the class WikiEdu dashboard]

* Complete the [https://dashboard.wikiedu.org/courses/University_of_Washington/Building_Successful_Online_Communities_(Fall_2024) WikiEdu] trainings for Week 1. 
* During this training, you will create an account. After you have created an account, you '''must''' enroll in the course so that your account on Wikipedia is associated with the course and so that I can track your activity on Wikipedia. [https://dashboard.wikiedu.org/courses/University_of_Washington/Building_Successful_Online_Communities_(Fall_2024)?enroll=evyuwzoc click this link] and then click "Join" to enroll in the course. If you are asked for a passcode, you can enter '''evyuwzoc'''.
* Once you are enrolled in the course, you should begin the training modules and complete the first two, ''Wikipedia policies'' and ''Sandboxes, talk pages, and watchlists'', and ''Communicating with others on Wikipedia''.
* Finally, practice communicating on Wikipedia by introducing yourself to a member of the teaching team and at least one classmate on Wikipedia (it can be anybody) using their talk page (not your own talk page!). I am [[:wikipedia:User:Benjamin Mako Hill|Benjamin Mako Hill]]. You can find a list of all of your classmates on the [https://dashboard.wikiedu.org/courses/University_of_Washington/Building_Successful_Online_Communities_(Fall_2024)/students WikiEdu class page].

;Tips: The biggest pitfall in the past has been failing to enroll in the course. Make sure that you have created an account on https://en.wikipedia.org/ and are logged in. Then follow [https://dashboard.wikiedu.org/courses/University_of_Washington/Building_Successful_Online_Communities_(Fall_2024)?enroll=evyuwzoc this link] and click "Join".

==== Wikipedia Task #2 ====
;Tasks: Choose and evaluate an article
;Due Date: Friday October 11
;Deliverables: Make contributions in Wikipedia and [https://dashboard.wikiedu.org/courses/University_of_Washington/Building_Successful_Online_Communities_(Fall_2024) the class WikiEdu dashboard]

'''(1)''' First, complete the online training topics for Week 2 in the [https://dashboard.wikiedu.org/courses/University_of_Washington/Building_Successful_Online_Communities_(Fall_2024) the class WikiEdu dashboard].

'''(2)''' Second, choose 3-5 possible articles in Wikipedia that you would like to significantly expand and improve. The WikiEdu module will walk you through sketching some brief notes on changes you might make; the next step will have you dig more deeply into a single article.

Choose articles that are as short and simple as possible and I ''strongly'' recommend that you choose a <code>stub</code> article on Wikipedia. Because some people are going to start with articles that are better than others, we're going to assess you on the amount to which you can improve the article—not on the final state of the article.

You can find a list of <code>stub</code> articles arranged by topic here (there are literally ''millions''):

* [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_Stub_sorting/List_of_stubs List of Stubs] — This is an extremely long list of articles that are currently stubs and which is also sorted into categories and then subcategories. It might be a little bit out of date so be sure to click through before you decide on an article.
<!-- If there is a topic you know you are interested in writing about that doesn't have an article,  that is also possible but will be more difficult so we're recommending ''against'' that relatively strongly. If you're committed to doing that in any case, there are a few resources you might find helpful:

* [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requested_articles Requested Articles] — This is a list of articles that others have asked to be created. It is sorted into categories and sub-categories. When you're looking at the list, remember that it's possible that somebody else has "gotten" to them first and forgot to remove it. Remember that a [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Red_link red link] indicates that there is no page with that name.
-->

When you're done looking at possible articles, you'll see that there is a "'''Choose your article'''" exercise on the WikiEdu dashboard that will end with you being prompted to fill out a page on Wikipedia with a list of articles you want to work on. The page will ask for "Evaluation" and "Sources" -- jot down a few thoughts here. You'll do a comprehensive evaluation of one article in the next part of this task.

'''(3)''' Third, you should evaluate an article. I recommend that you evaluate an article you plan to improve! After following the tutorial material on WikiEd about how to do an evaluation, you'll see that there is a corresponding exercise called "'''Evaluate Wikipedia'''" in the WikiEdu dashboard that you should complete.

If you run into any trouble, find the teaching team in the Discord ''well in advance of the deadline''!

==== Wikipedia Task #3 ====

;Task: Compile research and start editing
;Due Date: Friday October 18
;Deliverables: Make contributions in Wikipedia and [https://dashboard.wikiedu.org/courses/University_of_Washington/Building_Successful_Online_Communities_(Fall_2024) the class WikiEdu dashboard] 

# Complete online trainings for Week 3
# Finalize your topic/article.
# Make a small edit to Wikipedia (e.g., by adding citations).
# Gather notes and links into an informal bibliography of relevant research.

In order to do these, you will need to make sure you have assigned your article to yourself in the [https://dashboard.wikiedu.org/courses/University_of_Washington/Building_Successful_Online_Communities_(Fall_2024) dashboard]. If you have not done this yet, you'll have to do it before you can proceed. You can do so by (a) going to the WikiEdu course homepage, (b) finding the section entitled ''My Articles'', (c) clicking on ''Assign myself an article'', and (d) entering the article title as shown in Wikipedia and click ''Assign''.

Once you have selected an article to work on, the "My Articles" section will show you a number of steps and links. The two links to focus on right now are collecting your bibliography notes and editing your article in your sandbox, which correspond to the two key tasks above.  You will need to:

:Add the sources that you've found to the bibliography page which will be created when you click on the "bibliography" link. These are your notes about sources. As a reminder, while academic sources are the "gold standard", match your citations with the content. If your article is about a movie star, you will likely be citing interviews that were published in magazines or on the radio. Try to vary the types of sources and select the more notable ones. Additionally, if you are having difficulty finding sources, reach out to [https://www.lib.washington.edu/about/contact a reference librarian]. they are a great resource!

In general, you should refer to the [https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/90/Editing_Wikipedia_brochure_%28Wiki_Education_Foundation%29_%282017%29.pdf WikiEd Foundation's guide to editing] which I've found extremely useful.
<!-- Because the nuts-and-bolts of completing this is complicated, I'm sharing a short screencast made by a prior instructor when he taught this class:

* [https://uw.hosted.panopto.com/Panopto/Pages/Viewer.aspx?id=b10d27c1-ed6c-4367-b33f-b15500e14c80 Screencast of Wikipedia Task #3] (Requires Canvas access)

# Create a copy of the current page in your sandbox through the following steps:
## open the article sandbox and the article itself in two separate tabs
## in the article tab click ''Edit''
## change to ''Source editing'' mode by clicking the pencil icon in the top right
## select all of the "wikimarkup" (Article content code) and copy it
## click the ''Create'' tab on the article sandbox
## paste the cloned/copied content over
## click "Publish page"
# Begin editing, drafting, and generally improving the article sandbox page!

* Note: Rules about copyright and plagiarism still apply in your sandbox -- and your sandbox is not private. Some images (like logos) are not approved for use in the sandboxes, even though they are allowed in the main Wikipedia page! To check your sandbox for this issue, and BEFORE you copy-paste in the article, click each image in the article you're planning to improve. If the image is marked "Fair use" in the media viewer ([[fairuse image - do not clone |see an example]] of what that looks like), you will need to delete the link from your sandbox, and make a plan to re-add it by hand when your article goes live.

-->

==== Wikipedia Task #4 ====
;Task: Finish the bulk of your edits
;Due Date: Friday October 25
;Deliverables: Make contributions in Wikipedia and [https://dashboard.wikiedu.org/courses/University_of_Washington/Building_Successful_Online_Communities_(Fall_2024) the class WikiEdu dashboard] 

# Complete online trainings for Week 4
# Make the bulk of the changes you hope to make to you articles. In general, I expect a minimum of 2-3 new paragraphs of content with a range of new references.

<!-- [https://uw.hosted.panopto.com/Panopto/Pages/Viewer.aspx?id=b9db303b-2fe8-48d5-a402-b1530135ca53 See my video with tips and some mechanics!] (Requires Canvas access) -->

==== Wikipedia Task #5 ====
;Task: Conduct peer reviews
;Due Date: Friday November 1
;Deliverables: Make contributions in Wikipedia and [https://dashboard.wikiedu.org/courses/University_of_Washington/Building_Successful_Online_Communities_(Fall_2024) the class WikiEdu dashboard] 

* Select '''two''' classmates’ articles that you will peer review and copy-edit. To sign up, you can mark this in [https://dashboard.wikiedu.org/courses/University_of_Washington/Building_Successful_Online_Communities_(Fall_2024) the dashboard] by using the '''Assign a review''' button. Try to pick articles that other students are not yet reviewing.
* Peer review two of your classmates’ articles and produce a written peer review. If you click on the "Peer review" link next to the assigned review article on your student page in the WikiEd dashboard, you'll see that it pops up a template that will create a sub-page on your classmate's sandbox and prompts you with a bunch of questions. If you do fill out that template, be sure to leave a message on the users talk page so that they know you created the sub-page with your peer review! Using that template will probably be useful but it's not required. What's important is that you engage in the peer review and get your classmate useful feedback. I don't care too much about how you do it.
* Improve and copy-edit the two reviewed articles by editing them directly to help fix issues, improve sourcing, create a more [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WP:NPOV neutral] or [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WP:TONE encyclopedic] tone, etc. Where you see an opportunity to help out, [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Be_bold be bold]!

==== Wikipedia Task #6 ====

;Task: Incorporate changes based on peer reviews and polish article
;Due Date: Friday November 8
;Deliverables: Make contributions in Wikipedia and [https://dashboard.wikiedu.org/courses/University_of_Washington/Building_Successful_Online_Communities_(Fall_2024) the class WikiEdu dashboard] 

* Complete online trainings for Week 6
* Respond to your peer review. Consider their suggestions and decide whether they make your work more accurate and complete.
* Continue improving your article. Refine your text, do more research, make sure things are well organized, think about adding images, infoboxes, and templates. If you add images be sure to complete [https://dashboard.wikiedu.org/training/students/images-and-media the WikiEd material on images and media].
* Polish your article, it should be ready for public consumption. There are some general suggestions on polishing in [[Ideas for polishing a Wikipedia article]].

==== Wikipedia Task #7-A ====
;Task: Finalize your article
;Due Date: Friday November 15
;Deliverables: Make contributions in Wikipedia

# Read the material in [https://dashboard.wikiedu.org/courses/University_of_Washington/Building_Successful_Online_Communities_(Fall_2024) the class WikiEdu dashboard] and make final checks on your article.
# Check to ensure that the changes you've made match our expectations.
# ...otherwise, that should be it!

==== Assessment: Wikipedia Assignment ====

I will use the following criteria as a rubric for assessing your work on the contributions made to Wikipedia:

# Substantial new article text shows fluency in Wikipedia norms — A student fluent in Wikipedia norms will have created an substantial article or brought an existing article at least one quality class to a higher one in the eyes of most Wikipedia members by adding new encyclopedic text, adhering to policies on tone, adding references for statements from reliable third party sources, and so on.
# Peer reviews of other student were thoughtful, critical, and constructive.
# Deadlines for tasks #1-7 were met in a way that allowed for the interactive and collaborative aspects of the class (e.g., draft was published to allow for reviews, peer reviews were made on time, article was published live on time, and so on).

==== Wikipedia Task #7-B ====

;Task: Turn in your Wikipedia advising report
;Due Date: Friday November 15
;Deliverables:
:*Turn in report as subpage of your Wikipedia userpage and turn in the URL [https://canvas.uw.edu/courses/1774897/assignments in Canvas].
;* Maximum length for report: 1,500 words (~6 pages double spaced)

Turn your report into a subpage of your user page. For example, I would create mine with http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Benjamin_Mako_Hill/Report as the URL. Of course, you should replace "Benjamin_Mako_Hill" with your Wikipedia username. You can also go to your user page by clicking on your username on Wikipedia and then adding "/Report" at the end of the URL. When you go to that page, it will say '''Wikipedia does not have a user page with this exact name.''' You can create a new page by just clicking the "Create" tab on that page. When you're done, you can paste the URL into Canvas.

Details on the report and how we will handle assessment are included on the [[/Wikipedia Advising Report]] subpage.

=== Project 2: Final Project ===

For the final assignment, I want you to take what you've learned in the class and apply it. Because this class is being taught in both the Communication Leadership and the Department of Communication MA/PhD, I'm going to offer two options for final projects:

;(Option 1) Community Advising Project: Serve as an expert advisor to the leaders and members of an online community to provide evidence-based insights into how to better address a specific challenge they face. This will be a ''client based'' project. In most cases, you can bring your own client (e.g., your workplace, a community you participate in) but I'm also happy to work with Commlead to help pair you with a community. I expect that most Commlead students in the course will choose this option.

;(Option 2) Original research project: Complete an original research project that takes the form of (1) a detailed research plan/proposal; (2) a replication/revisit of an important and influential study; (3) a completed original research manuscript (i.e., a "submission-ready" draft of a journal article or conference paper). I expect that most students in the course doing research degrees will choose this option.

==== Final Project Identification ====

;Due Date: November 22
;Deliverables: Turn in [https://canvas.uw.edu/courses/1774897/assignments through Canvas]
;Maximum Length: 500 words (~1 page double spaced)

;(Option 1) Community & Challenge Identification:

:For students conducting a community advising project, you should identify a community you are interested in and the challenge you hope to address in your final project and report. I encourage you to choose a community in which you are a member or leader and where you could, even if only in theory, deliver your recommendations to other members/leaders and have some chance of seeing the recommendations debated or adopted. I expect you to draw on sources and evidence from the course and any additional materials you deem relevant or useful.

:For this initial assignment, I am asking you to write 1-2 paragraphs explaining what community you want to study, why you care about it, and to identify a challenge you think the community is facing or could be facing.  If relevant or possible, it might be useful to also provide a link.

:I hope each of you will pick a community that you are intellectually committed to and invested in your personal or work life. You should also remember that you will be presenting this publicly to the class. You will be successful in this assignment if you identify a community and clearly explain why you think it would be a useful community to study, if you identify a challenge that the community is facing, and if you outline why you think the conceptual tools taught in the class will give you an angle on this challenge.

;(Option 2) Abstract/proposal:

For students following the original research project path, you are also required to submit an extended abstract and/or proposal for the project. Because I understand that the most useful specific shape of this might vary, I'm happy to go back-and-forth with you on the details if you believe that a 500 word extended abstract that lays out the proposed work is not going to be sufficient or appropriate.

In either case, I will give you feedback on these write-ups and will let you each know if I think you have identified a project that might be too ambitious, too trivial, too broad, too narrow, etc.

==== Final Deliverables ====
;Final Presentation Dates: Tuesday December 3
;Paper Due Date: Friday December 13 @ 11:59pm
;Maximum paper length: 4,000 words
;Deliverables: 
:*Details on final presentations including due dates, instructions, and dropboxes will be posted to [[/Final presentations]] {{forthcoming}}
:*Turn in a copy of the paper [https://canvas.uw.edu/courses/1774897/assignments in Canvas]

For your final project, I expect students to build on the final project identification assignment to describe what they have done and found. I'll expect every student to give both:

* A final presentation (see instructions on  [[/Final presentations]]) {{forthcoming}}
* A final report that is not more than 4,000 words.

Each project should include: (a) the description of the community and challenge you have identified (you are welcome to borrow from your Final Project Identification assignment), (b) a description of how you would use the course concepts to address the challenge in question.

You will be evaluated on the degree to which you have demonstrated that you understand and have engaged with the course material and not on specifics of your community. Your audience is people who are interested in the community and the general public. A successful project will tell a compelling story and will engage with and improve upon the course material to teach all of us—that is, an audience that includes me, your classmates, and students taking this class in future years, how to take advantage of online communities more effectively. The very best papers will give us all a new understanding of some aspect of course material and change how I teach some portion of this course in the future.

=== Grading ===

* Case discussion: 30%
* Wikipedia assignments: 15%
* Wikipedia advising report: 10%
* Final project identification: 5%
* Final presentation: 10%
* Final project: 30%