[Foundation-l] Wikiversity - feedback

Tue Jul 4 11:36:31 UTC 2006

Hi all,

I emailed this list (and textbook-l) a few weeks ago about final
feedback on Wikiversity [1], but, surprisingly, there was no response
at all on this list (only on textbook-l). Can it be true that nobody
here is interested in Wikiversity? Or is it that nothing new can be
said at this stage? Or possibly that a lack of response indicates
tacit agreement/approval?

There was, in any case, a single response on the current proposal's
talk page [2] (by Amgine) - which I found instructive. Amgine is still
concerned about a lack of clarity in the proposal - I'm wondering if
anyone here agrees/disagrees, and how so? I see Wikiversity as
occupying a niche within Wikimedia as well as serving the interests of
the other projects, but there is still some ambiguity about some of
these inter-project relationships - particularly with Wikibooks. I'll
briefly define how I personally see this working, and the
distinctions.

* Wikiversity and Wikibooks will both host educational materials - but
of a different kind. Wikibooks attempts to develop its resources into
textbooks; Wikiversity will turn its materials into discrete learning
objects, designed to fit within a course structure (though not
nercessarily), so that students can avail of them in their own
self-directed learning. On top of this, teachers may use these
materials "off the shelf" in their lessons, and Wikiversity will
construct lesson plans to facilitate their ease-of-use. If people want
to do further reading on a subject, they can do so on Wikibooks.

* If someone wants to develop a course (or some sort of body of
information for learning), they can start doing so immediately on
Wikiversity. It may very well be that this material will, through
time, develop into a textbook. I think that the material should then
be *copied* (not moved) to Wikibooks, leaving behind material to be
used in learning activities. (Note: I'm not sure if the mechanics of
this will work within the GFDL licence - I'd appreciate comments on
this.)

* Some learning activities on Wikiversity will be to develop content
on other Wikimedia projects. For example, a learning group/community
will apply their learning in writing a textbook (on Wikibooks) on
their subject of interest, or apply their, say, researching skills in
writing an article for Wikipedia or Wikinews.

* Finally, as a clear difference between it and Wikibooks, Wikiversity
will allow research - though how this is to be done should be left to
its community. Personally, I feel that we should be allowing for
original research to be carried out and published on Wikiversity -
this will then require a peer reviewing process and possibly a way for
work to be "protected". How all this is to be done needs to be worked
out by the community - we have been hesitant to define such a process
on the wikiversity subcommittee, because the project really needs to
be developed through its participant community [3].

As an update, I'm still trying to move this process along within the
Special projects committee, and hopefully there will be something to
show for it soon. Meanwhile, however, I continue to invite comments,
suggestions, criticisms from anyone, however new or peripheral to the
discussion you may feel yourself to be.

Best regards,

Cormac / Cormaggio

[1] http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikiversity/Modified_project_proposal
[2] http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Wikiversity/Modified_project_proposal
[3] http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikiversity_community