Education/Newsletter/May 2017/Wikipedia Education Program Ashesi University

First Wikipedia Education Program in Ghana at Ashesi University Launches

Author: Flixtey, Rberchie

Summary: Open Foundation West Africa rolls out the first ever Wikipedia Education Program in the West African sub-region at the Ashesi University.

Article:

Until now, there was no Wikipedia Education Program in West Africa. The only Wikipedia Education Programs that existed on the continent were those in South Africa and North Africa. Raphael Berchie and Felix Nartey both active Wikimedians and members of Open Foundation West Africa realized the need to bring the benefits of Open Education to West Africa through the Wikipedia Education Program. The Open Foundation West Africa is a non profit organization with its primary aim to promote the activities of Open Movements through Open Education, GLAM and community activation.

The Open Foundation West Africa decided to spearhead the first ever Wikipedia Education Program in West Africa. It was first rolled out at Ashesi University in Ghana. Ashesi University is a private non for profit liberal Arts College in Ghana established in 2002. Talks were held with a Faculty member of Ashesi University who enthusiastically embraced the idea and made the program possible by offering to use her course as a pilot for the Wikipedia education program. The Ashesi University Education Program then came into being. It involved training over 180 students about Wikipedia and how to be contributors. Raphael and Felix were facilitators of this training and offered support and assistance to the Academic Faculty who were involved with the Education Program. The students were taking an academic requirement course called social theory. The students were introduced to Wikipedia and how they could edit Wikipedia and its other sister projects. As an assignment, they were to make contributions to Wikipedia on which they would be graded and would count towards their final assessment for the Spring Semester.

In the quest to sustain this project and the activities of Wikimedia on this campus, the Wiki Ashesi Club, a campus based club has also been set up and it is fully operational after its approval and official launch on the campus. This Campus based club will coordinate the activities of Wikimedia and its sister projects with close supervision from (OFWA).

This Education Program has been very inspirational and has motivated other Wikimedians to start other education programs within Ghana and other parts of West Africa.

Tags: Ashesi University, Open Foundation West Africa, Wikipedia Education Program, Ghana