Since the launch of the Wiki Loves Women Focus Group members in members, in June 2021, the focus group has intensively and committed to hosting monthly dedicated working sessions that are packed with a lot of knowledge harnessing the skills of the women in the focus group to be competent community leaders with the digital, community and diverse knowledge of the Wiki sister projects such as wiki quotes and wiki tools. Over the past 3 months, the focus group members learned how to apply for rapid grants, profiling, and requirements needed to plan events before the event, during the events, and after the event.
August was one of the Focus Group member highlight months where they were featured in the Wikimania virtual conference where Candy made a presentation on who the Focus group members are, what they do, and what the Focus group aims to achieve.
In September 2021 the focus group members attended a number of office hours and a monthly working session where Florence led on the following topics; creating red lists, in wiki quotes, wiki tools such as tools, fountain tools, and hashtag tools. Furthermore, the women in the focus group were taught how to operate an outreach dashboard tool and understand how to monitor and track their participants’ contributions. In the next coming months, the Focus group is expected to run the #SheSaid campaigns in their communities and provide reporting on how their events went, and share their feedback.
The women in the Focus Group members are very committed, open, and comfortable to learn and share their knowledge and skills amongst themselves and extend their knowledge to their community which is great progress and a step in the right direction to have such a programme uplifting women.