Wikipedian-in-Residence

I saw a flyer for a public lecture about Wikipedia and the Cultural Sector, and I was struck by the titles of the two speakers. One is Liam Wyatt, the first ever “Wikipedian-in-Residence” at the British Museum, while the other is a “Wikipedia Campus Ambassador” at Indiana University in Bloomington.

I presume that Wikipedia is here to stay, and so perhaps the most important and appropriate questions for educators to ask are not along the lines of “How can I get students to stop using it?” but rather “How can I and my students contribute to making this public resource better and more reliable?” If this were the Encyclopedia Brittanica or some other such traditional encyclopedia, and we were invited to write an article, as academics we’d probably welcome the opportunity. And so why not take the opportunity to contribute when we don’t have to wait for an invitation, do not have to meet a deadline, probably won’t have to write the whole article, and do not need to write our contribution all at once? Also, how can we mobilize our students so that contributing to improving Wiki sources becomes part of their coursework?

Here are some presentations and a video related to this topic:

http://www.youtube-nocookie.com/v/uSeiHtEJmqI?fs=1&hl=en_US&rel=0