Help students make a real-world impact through their work
In Wiki Education’s Wikipedia Student Program, college and university instructors assign students to write Wikipedia articles, empowering them to share knowledge with the world. Students research course-related topics that are missing or underrepresented, synthesize the available literature, and use our free tools and trainings to add the information to Wikipedia.
We’re now accepting submissions for the Spring 2024 term. To apply, click the button below.
With more than 10 years of experience helping instructors in the U.S. and Canada to run Wikipedia assignments, we know that students can have a powerful impact on Wikipedia and that Wikipedia can have a powerful impact on students. For more information on impact, see this post.
Learn more at an upcoming webinar!
Wiki Education runs regular teaching with Wikipedia webinars. Register for an upcoming event to learn more and have your questions answered.
How the Wikipedia Student Program works
Course instructors use their subject-matter expertise to guide and evaluate student contributions to Wikipedia.
Students research their topic, learn to write for an international audience, and gain information literacy skills.
Wiki Education provides teaching resources for faculty and trainings for students — all through our course Dashboard tool. And you’ll have a human point of contact to assist you and your students along the way.
Wikipedia’s millions of readers get access to reliable, fact-based information on previously under-developed topics on Wikipedia.
The Wikipedia Student Program is free for participants, funded by generous donations to Wiki Education.
Powerful learning for students
As students write Wikipedia articles through our program, they learn how to collaborate with their peers, frame academic research to the public, and convey knowledge to a non-expert audience. Essentially, they do work that really matters! And faculty notice:
- 97% of instructors agree that a Wikipedia assignment improved their students’ digital and media literacy skills.
- 96% of instructors agree that a Wikipedia assignment helped their students develop a sense of digital citizenship (e.g., a desire to contribute to and ensure the accuracy and accessibility of information).
- 93% of instructors agree that a Wikipedia assignment improved their students’ research skills
- 77% of instructors agree that a Wikipedia assignment helped their students to become more socially and culturally aware (e.g., the ability to identify underrepresentation and other content gaps stemming from bias).
How instructors integrate Wikipedia into their courses
Sounds good, but wondering how it integrates into a syllabus? Browse current Wikipedia assignments (click the “timeline” tab on each course page to see a week-by-week breakdown), or read some instructors’ blog posts about their experiences.
Interested in peer reviewed literature about teaching with Wikipedia? Many instructors have published about their experiences teaching with Wikipedia.
Learn more
Interested in teaching with Wikipedia in your college or university class in the United States or Canada? The first step of the application process is an online orientation for instructors. Click the button below to start your application.
We’re now accepting submissions for the Spring 2024 term. To apply, click the button below.
Interested in teaching with Wikipedia later on?
Please fill out the form below if you would like to hear from us about the Wikipedia Student Program. Note: We only work with courses taking place in the U.S. and Canada.
Testimonials
By the end of the quarter, they realize that their work has been affecting people, something that rarely happens with a standard term paper. In their evaluations of the course, students routinely mention the Wikipedia assignment as their favorite part.
My students wrestled with their status as quasi-gatekeepers to particular information. I believe this revelation made their commitment to and belief in free and accessible information even more poignant. We used this project to reconsider power and privilege in the academy and exercised our positionality as a driving force in contributing to the Wikipedia articles.
Students’ Wikipedia pages and presentations also showed me that they achieved everything that a traditional research paper is supposed to do and more—they conducted research, analyzed it, wrote effectively about their topics, but also shared their work in a meaningful way with each other and with the public.
In the past two years, writing for Wikipedia has added intellectual substance and verve to my courses, while giving me and my students a sense of accomplishment as we produce and disseminate knowledge.
