Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Education Program extension: Difference between revisions
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:''The following discussion is an archived record of a [[WP:RFC|request for comment]]. <span style="color:red">'''Please do not modify it.'''</span> No further edits should be made to this discussion. {{#if:Taking each of these in turn:
{{Nutshell | Wikimedia Foundation has built the [[mw:Extension:Education Program|Education Program extension]] to make it easier to keep track of classes where students are assigned to edit Wikipedia. Should this be enabled on English Wikipedia? If so, who should be able to use it?}}▼
*Section 1: intro - nothing to determine
*Section 2: Turning the extension on - This has consensus, though not an overwhelming strong one. While there are more "votes" in support, the subsequent discussion noted questions and concerns from editors who did not "vote", but which should be taken into account as (as we all know) [[WP:CON|consensus is not a vote]]. The comments in the subsequent section 3 were taken into account as well. So '''there is consensus to "turn on", but with restrictions/reservations'''.
*Section 3: Configuring the extension
**3.1: Configure for exclusive Wikipedia Education Program use - '''No consensus''' - There is general consensus to restrict in "some" way, but not necessarily in the way presented in 3.1
**3.2: Configure for any use by anyone, subject to approval by an admin or other trusted user - '''Consensus'''.
**3.3: Configure for use by any autoconfirmed user - '''No consensus'''
**3.4: Configure the administrative roles to be managed by bureaucrats - '''Opposed'''. (And it may or may not be worth noting that the only [[WP:CRAT|bureaucrat]] who commented, opposed this.)
**3.5: Configure some other way - no comments
**3.6: Discussion - There are suggestions for what requirements/crieria the user-rights noted in 3.2 should have prior to granting, but that can be discussed/determined in subsequent discussions, and this rfc closure should not be considered to restrict how that should be done.
To sum up: There is consensus to "turn on", and strong consensus to implement the user-rights system as noted in 3.2. And subsequent discussion is '''''recommended''''' concerning what should be required for the granting of the user-rights in question. - <b>[[User:Jc37|jc37]]</b> 19:29, 27 September 2012 (UTC)
|''A summary of the conclusions reached follows.''
::Taking each of these in turn:
*Section 1: intro - nothing to determine
*Section 2: Turning the extension on - This has consensus, though not an overwhelming strong one. While there are more "votes" in support, the subsequent discussion noted questions and concerns from editors who did not "vote", but which should be taken into account as (as we all know) [[WP:CON|consensus is not a vote]]. The comments in the subsequent section 3 were taken into account as well. So '''there is consensus to "turn on", but with restrictions/reservations'''.
*Section 3: Configuring the extension
**3.1: Configure for exclusive Wikipedia Education Program use - '''No consensus''' - There is general consensus to restrict in "some" way, but not necessarily in the way presented in 3.1
**3.2: Configure for any use by anyone, subject to approval by an admin or other trusted user - '''Consensus'''.
**3.3: Configure for use by any autoconfirmed user - '''No consensus'''
**3.4: Configure the administrative roles to be managed by bureaucrats - '''Opposed'''. (And it may or may not be worth noting that the only [[WP:CRAT|bureaucrat]] who commented, opposed this.)
**3.5: Configure some other way - no comments
**3.6: Discussion - There are suggestions for what requirements/crieria the user-rights noted in 3.2 should have prior to granting, but that can be discussed/determined in subsequent discussions, and this rfc closure should not be considered to restrict how that should be done.
To sum up: There is consensus to "turn on", and strong consensus to implement the user-rights system as noted in 3.2. And subsequent discussion is '''''recommended''''' concerning what should be required for the granting of the user-rights in question. - <b>[[User:Jc37|jc37]]</b> 19:29, 27 September 2012 (UTC)
|A summary of the debate may be found at the bottom of the discussion.''}}
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▲{{Nutshell | Wikimedia Foundation has built the [[mw:Extension:Education Program|Education Program extension]] to make it easier to keep track of classes where students are assigned to edit Wikipedia. Should this be enabled on English Wikipedia? If so, who should be able to use it?}}
==Purpose of this request for comment==
This request for comment is asking whether to turn on the [[mw:Extension:Education Program|Education Program extension]] that the Wikimedia Foundation has been developing to make the activity of Wikipedia Education Program courses—and potentially other educational assignments as well—more transparent and easier for the community to track.
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===Support — the extension should be turned on===
# I don't even see the need to discuss anything here. What grounds could anyone have for opposing this? --<sub style="border:1px solid #228B22;padding:1px;">[[User:Piotrus|Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus]]|[[User talk:Piotrus|<
# --[[User:Guerillero|<
# [[User:Drmies|Drmies]] ([[User talk:Drmies|talk]]) 18:11, 23 August 2012 (UTC)
# [[User:OhanaUnited|<b
# Ok. [[User:Protonk|Protonk]] ([[User talk:Protonk|talk]]) 21:34, 23 August 2012 (UTC)
# Go for it. [[User:the wub|the wub]] [[User_talk:The wub|<span style="color: #008000">"?!"</span>]] 22:43, 23 August 2012 (UTC)
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# An immense help in courses run in the formal way under the Education Program , and very useful for anyone running a WP related course of any sort. We've been making do it with improvisations, but this is the right way to do. Does not compromise in the slightest any basic WP princiiple or policy. '''[[User:DGG| DGG]]''' ([[User talk:DGG| talk ]]) 01:33, 24 August 2012 (UTC)
# This is better than the status quo, as I found out the hard way during the [[WP:IEP]] cleanup. [[User:MER-C|MER-C]] 14:01, 24 August 2012 (UTC)
# What MER-C said. —''[[User:Ruud Koot|Ruud]]'' 15:27, 29 August 2012 (UTC)
# yes! --[[User:Open Research|Open Research]] ([[User talk:Open Research|talk]]) 20:58, 9 September 2012 (UTC)
===Oppose — the extension should not be turned on===
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#:Note that the extension is designed to track users' edits on the same wiki where it is installed, so it wouldn't be possible to put it on Outreach or Wikiversity for use with classes editing Wikipedia. That would also defeat the purpose of making it easier for the community to keep track of what these classes are doing.--[[User:Sage Ross (WMF)|Sage Ross (WMF)]] ([[User talk:Sage Ross (WMF)|talk]]) 00:16, 25 August 2012 (UTC)
#::I disagree. With CentralAuth/unified accounts that would be a trivial matter, especially if a dedicated wiki is used.--[[User:Jasper Deng|Jasper Deng]] [[User talk:Jasper Deng|(talk)]] 00:30, 25 August 2012 (UTC)
#:::I can't speak to the technical side of rewriting the extension to monitor work on a different wiki, but that's not possible with the current version and since there wouldn't be much point in running it from a separate wiki anyway, that's not something being considered for development.--[[User:Sage Ross (WMF)|Sage Ross (WMF)]] ([[User talk:Sage Ross (WMF)|talk]]) 02:37, 26 August 2012 (UTC)
#Terrible design; explanation on talk. <span style="font-variant:small-caps">[[User:John Vandenberg|John Vandenberg]] <sup>'''([[User talk:John Vandenberg|chat]])'''</sup></span> 00:45, 24 August 2012 (UTC)
#:I would counter with "better this than nothing". --<sub style="border:1px solid #228B22;padding:1px;">[[User:Piotrus|Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus]]|[[User talk:Piotrus|<span style="color:#7CFC00;background:#006400;"> reply here</span>]]</sub> 16:02, 11 September 2012 (UTC)
===Discussion===
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:::Parallel to MER-C's observation, doing these things in pure wiki fashion basically ensures that different people and different groups will do things differently. Often that's fine, but it's not good enough for purposes of keeping track of many courses at once, especially as the number of people involved grows. Some classes will have their students sign up on-wiki and list the articles they work on, some won't. The extension creates a baseline that both removes a lot of organizational burden and creates the opportunity for better monitoring and analysis of class activity. The problem MER-C noted with incomplete or incorrect student lists with the IEP also crops up in other courses, and even then, it took a lot of busy work on the part of both volunteers and WMF staff to make sure student lists (and the list of active ambassadors) was complete and current enough to be useful. With the extension, students can create an account and then enroll in a course and be recognizable to the community *before* they learn enough basic wiki skills to do things like sign up on a pure wiki list of students.
:::I'm hopeful that future iterations of the extension will add tools to help students communicate with the experienced Wikipedians; figuring out who to talk to and how to reach them is something that we've seen a high proportion of students get tripped up on, leading to frustrations on the part of both students and experienced Wikipedians about the lack of communication.--[[User:Sage Ross (WMF)|Sage Ross (WMF)]] ([[User talk:Sage Ross (WMF)|talk]]) 14:55, 24 August 2012 (UTC)
*Are we at risk of confusing the hell out of the other admins, who won't be using this extension at all? [[User:Deryck Chan|Der]][[User talk:Deryck Chan|yck C.]] 12:13, 27 August 2012 (UTC)
**How so? The only things that will change, for an admin who isn't using the new pages, is that (1) (if admins are the control point for the rights) there would some new rights options they would notice if they were using Special:UserRights to assign rollback or the like to someone, and (2) there would be new log entries for events related to the course pages. I trust that admins will be able to figure out the purpose and proper uses of these things, if they get confused initially.--[[User:Sage Ross (WMF)|Sage Ross (WMF)]] ([[User talk:Sage Ross (WMF)|talk]]) 15:30, 27 August 2012 (UTC)
*How will this affect current processes? Will we have a new namespace open up only to have it fill with spam, cv, and other unacceptable material, or will there be some built-in set of checks involved? Will current systems such as new page patrol, speedy deletion, proposed deletion, and XfD work in this namespace out of the box, or are we looking at reinventing a round, friction-reducing rotating oobject? --[[User:Nouniquenames|Nouniquenames]] ([[User talk:Nouniquenames|talk]]) 15:53, 29 August 2012 (UTC)
**I haven't checked out how the extension interacts with new page patrol feeds—I'll look into that—but deletion works just like for any other page. Because the course pages themselves are not strictly wiki pages, we'd probably need to use the talk pages (which work like any other talk page) for tagging pages for deletion. Other than that, the extension pages should be compatible out-of-the-box with existing deletion processes.--[[User:Sage Ross (WMF)|Sage Ross (WMF)]] ([[User talk:Sage Ross (WMF)|talk]]) 20:29, 29 August 2012 (UTC)
***I'm concerned about that, and am looking forward to hearing how the NPP interface will work. I am also concerned about the potential lag between deployment and implementation for Twinkle, Stiki, et all to make neccessary updates so that the tools we now use to fight spam and vandalism can be used with the extension. Is there a plan to reach out to these tool creators in advance so that such updates (if needed, I don't know as I don't maintain any of them) can be deployed and tested before we see a need in the new pages? --[[User:Nouniquenames|Nouniquenames]] ([[User talk:Nouniquenames|talk]]) 05:46, 31 August 2012 (UTC)
****The course pages themselves show up in recent changes as log entries when they are created, while the talk pages show up in the basic new pages feed ([[Special:Newpages]]) like other new talk pages. Given that it looks like course page creation (and the editing of course descriptions) will be limited to admins and trusted users (at most), there shouldn't be any significant spam/vandalism concerns there, and monitoring the talk pages should work fine with existing tools. (The pages won't show up in [[Special:NewPagesFeed]], because that's only configured for user and article space.)--[[User:Sage Ross (WMF)|Sage Ross (WMF)]] ([[User talk:Sage Ross (WMF)|talk]]) 15:31, 4 September 2012 (UTC)
==Configuring the extension==
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====Support====
#restrict it --[[User:Guerillero|<
# [[User:OhanaUnited|<b
# Simplest. If the workload gets too high, then we can look at broadening access. [[User:the wub|the wub]] [[User_talk:The wub|<span style="color: #008000">"?!"</span>]] 22:47, 23 August 2012 (UTC)
# I can support either this approach, or the one directly below, in which administrators decide who gets the permissions. I oppose the third option, in which any autoconfirmed user can get it. Please note that there needs to be some quality control in giving these permissions, because we don't want instructors simply to use Wikipedia as an easy place to dump students, as has started to happen recently. Anyone can, of course, come here and teach a class by having students work on pages, and they don't need anyone's permission to do so. But if we are going to give them extra tools to facilitate the project, we are entitled to expect them to show a willingness to work within Wikipedia's ways of editing (much as we require for someone who wants the rollbacker permission). I think there should be a basic requirement of having received a series of links in the general manner of a welcome template, and the person requesting the permission saying (their saying so should be enough, per AGF) that they have read it. --[[User:Tryptofish|Tryptofish]] ([[User talk:Tryptofish|talk]]) 23:01, 23 August 2012 (UTC)
#:''Added later:'' I would oppose the newer proposal, about having a community discussion closed by a bureaucrat, for each class project. That would be ''way'' too time-consuming. However, I would not object to an RfA-like process for anyone who is not already an administrator on the English Wikipedia who wants to be able to ''give out'' the permissions. --[[User:Tryptofish|Tryptofish]] ([[User talk:Tryptofish|talk]]) 20:14, 24 August 2012 (UTC)▼
# I agree with Tryptofish. :) [[User:Banaticus|Banaticus]] ([[User talk:Banaticus|talk]]) 01:02, 24 August 2012 (UTC)
# [[User:Deryck Chan|Der]][[User talk:Deryck Chan|yck C.]] 12:14, 27 August 2012 (UTC)
====Oppose====
#Why should we restrict other people than those officially permitted by the Ed Program from using it? However that program is eventually set up, and we can expect several different arrangements during a period of transition. there will be other ways to run courses. Some of them will probably be as good as the official way. Had we in the past been limited to what the education program of the time did, we would have lost many good courses. I am reasonably confident that the new program, under the control of its own organization and benefitting from several terms of experience, will be substantially better than what the Foundation has been doing, but it won't be perfect. I am reasonably confident, but I am not certain; there's at least a potential that it might not be satisfactory--for example, that it might have requirements at odds with what the others at enWP think productive. At present, the plans are to have it entirely separate both from us and the Foundation. If we do this, we are setting up something to be run on the enWP that will not be under the control of the enWP. It's absurd at this stage to be this inflexible.
#The WEP does not represent all classes on Wikipedia, therefore it should not exclusively benefit from this extension. As the IEP has demonstrated, the WMF cannot be trusted to hand out these permissions. [[User:MER-C|MER-C]] 07:12, 27 August 2012 (UTC)
===Configure for any use by anyone, subject to approval by an admin or other trusted user===
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====Support====
# This. --<sub style="border:1px solid #228B22;padding:1px;">[[User:Piotrus|Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus]]|[[User talk:Piotrus|<
#restrict it --[[User:Guerillero|<
#If this extension ''is'' used, the community should be able to control it like any other user rights.--[[User:Jasper Deng|Jasper Deng]] [[User talk:Jasper Deng|(talk)]] 22:50, 23 August 2012 (UTC)
# I can support either this approach, or the one directly above, in which trusted members of the Education Project decide who gets the permissions. I oppose the third option, in which any autoconfirmed user can get it. Please note that in an earlier trial of Pending Changes, some administrators were careful about who was given the Reviewer permission, but other administrators unfortunately gave it out like candy. Here, we need to be more careful than that. There need to be clearly defined criteria, agreed to in advance of enabling the extension, about which users may or may not be granted permissions. --[[User:Tryptofish|Tryptofish]] ([[User talk:Tryptofish|talk]]) 23:06, 23 August 2012 (UTC)
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This type of setup would be the most accessible and the most likely to draw in more classes that would otherwise attempt Wikipedia assignments without community involvement or on-wiki documentation, but it would also have most potential for misuse and would limit opportunities for requiring community interaction and vetting of classes before they get started. A community process would need to be developed for how the "course coordinator" right should be assigned, although in the meantime admins would be able to handle administrative tasks such as distributing the "course instructor" right and deleting unused course pages.
====Support====
# Or this, no real preference for now. --<sub style="border:1px solid #228B22;padding:1px;">[[User:Piotrus|Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus]]|[[User talk:Piotrus|<
# Like Piotr, I think this is quite possible. I am not altogether sure it will be the best thing to do immediately, but I think it safe. The reason I think it safe is that no real harm can be done--we do have the ultimate control where it belongs. , of deleting articles by AfD , and other pages--including course pages if necessary, by MfD. By appearing open, we will best fulfill the general philosophy of Wikipedia, We may have programs in conjunction with schools, but we can ahardly pretend we know the only way of doing it right. I would be willing to try this immediately, but I can understand that others might not yet feel totally confident about it.
====Oppose====
#'''Oppose'''. We need more community control than this. --[[User:Tryptofish|Tryptofish]] ([[User talk:Tryptofish|talk]]) 19:05, 25 August 2012 (UTC)
#[[User:Deryck Chan|Der]][[User talk:Deryck Chan|yck C.]] 12:15, 27 August 2012 (UTC)
#[[User:Nouniquenames|Nouniquenames]] ([[User talk:Nouniquenames|talk]])
# [[User:OhanaUnited|<b style="color:#0000FF;">OhanaUnited</b>]][[User talk:OhanaUnited|<b style="color:green;"><sup>Talk page</sup></b>]] 19:34, 29 August 2012 (UTC)
===Configure the administrative roles to be managed by bureaucrats===▼
If you would like to suggest some other configuration of the rights for the extension not listed above, do so here.
▲===Configure the administrative roles to be managed by bureaucrats===
*Permission to set up institutions and courses within the community project should require a community discussion, and a 'crat conferring the permission based on the input from the community.
====Support====
====Oppose====
▲#
#[[User:The ed17|Ed]] <sup>[[User talk:The ed17|[talk]]] [[WP:OMT|[majestic titan]]]</sup> 22:03, 25 August 2012 (UTC)
#Agree with Tryptofish. --[[User:Nouniquenames|Nouniquenames]] ([[User talk:Nouniquenames|talk]]) 15:58, 29 August 2012 (UTC)
# Far too restrictive. [[User:OhanaUnited|<b style="color:#0000FF;">OhanaUnited</b>]][[User talk:OhanaUnited|<b style="color:green;"><sup>Talk page</sup></b>]] 19:37, 29 August 2012 (UTC)
===Configure some other way===
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**One thing the Wikipedia Education Program is now starting to do is having new professors go through [[outreach:Wikipedia Education Program/Training modules/Educators|this wiki orientation]] before they begin. (We've got similar ones for [[outreach:Wikipedia Education Program/Training modules|Ambassadors]] and [[Wikipedia:Training/For students|students]] as well, which we'll try out this term for the first time.) This could be easily be adapted as an orientation for other instructors as well.--[[User:Sage Ross (WMF)|Sage Ross (WMF)]] ([[User talk:Sage Ross (WMF)|talk]]) 18:36, 24 August 2012 (UTC)
***Thanks, those are exactly the kinds of things I would want to see. In my opinion, although the one for students should simply be communicated to all students as a helpful aid, without strings attached, I believe that anyone who wants to be either an instructor for a class, and wants to be able to use the extension, or anyone who wants to be an ambassador, ''must'' indicate that they have read the appropriate training orientation before they can be admitted to that role. Required, not optional. --[[User:Tryptofish|Tryptofish]] ([[User talk:Tryptofish|talk]]) 20:08, 24 August 2012 (UTC)
*I do not like the word ''must'' for this or anything at WP except the basic principles.
:
::I agree that the WEP orientation should not be compulsory for instructors -- the only compulsory bit should be a community discussion (for user rights) where instructors demonstrate that they have the required clue (including understanding of Wikipedia and its goals) to guide a group of students around WP. We can also quiz the instructors on other things like the chosen subject area and the English language competency of their students. [[User:MER-C|MER-C]] 06:49, 25 August 2012 (UTC)
:::These comments make me see ways in which what I said earlier was unclear, so please let me elaborate on where I do, and do not, favor a "must". I actually agree entirely with DGG that we shouldn't tell instructors how to teach their classes. It's none of our business. But that wasn't what I was trying to say. Sage provided links to pages where we have instructive material on how to edit as instructors and ambassadors (and students). These are, in my opinion, helpful things to read. It's not about "how to teach your class", so much as "how to navigate Wikipedia". As I said above, I'm against any "must" about this for students, although I'd love to see all of them get a link to the page for students, by way of a helpful pointer to use as they wish. For instructors, and ambassadors, I am, indeed, arguing for a "must", but only to the extent that they be given a link to the appropriate guide page, and say (and we'll just AGF their saying so) that they read it. That's it!! The extension doesn't get turned on for their accounts until they say that they read it. They can always teach a class on Wikipedia with no string attached, no "musts". The "must" only comes into effect if they want to have the extension turned on for their account for them to use. If they do not want to bother with the extension, they are free to edit just as anyone else. It's really no different, at all, from what we require before an editor has the rollback permission turned on for their account, just a simple demonstration that they are unlikely to break the Wiki.
:::Here's why I feel this way. Most of the class projects with which I crossed paths have been terrific, really positive all around. But (as a former college professor myself) I'm aware of the pressures within the profession to find easy ways to teach classes (don't get me started on that!). This past year, a class worked on some pages on my watchlist, and the students thought, among other misperceptions, that they had to sign everything they put on the page, the way we sign comments on talk pages. I and other editors fixed their edits and tried to explain to them what we did. The students, however, edit warred over it and were upset that they wouldn't get "credit" for their edits. I went to the instructor's talk page and tried to explain, and got politely blown-off. I then asked the ambassador for the project, who left a brief note to the students, which the students ignored. Aside from anything else, I believe it was a bad experience for the students, which is exactly what we shouldn't want! They are potential new members of the editing community. I think they felt that their instructor was telling them to do one thing, and Wikipedia was telling them to do something else. And this wasn't about "how to teach the class", just about "how to edit Wikipedia". I agree with DGG that there is no guarantee that someone who says they read the guide will actually do better than someone who didn't, but at least this simple, unobtrusive "must" will improve the odds. --[[User:Tryptofish|Tryptofish]] ([[User talk:Tryptofish|talk]]) 19:38, 25 August 2012 (UTC)
:::: Maybe we should have a bot or abusefilter that reverts/prevents users from adding signatures to article space (can't think of a case where that is necessary) [[User:OhanaUnited|<b style="color:#0000FF;">OhanaUnited</b>]][[User talk:OhanaUnited|<b style="color:green;"><sup>Talk page</sup></b>]] 23:27, 25 August 2012 (UTC)
:::::I've never seen it happen except in this case, so I guess an argument could be made that a bot isn't needed. But for me, that's not really the issue. I could imagine that those particular students would have felt just as "bitten" by a bot as by living editors, maybe even more so. The erroneous editing can be fixed. What cannot be as easily fixed is a bad student experience. But the bad experience can be ''prevented'', which is what I want to do. --[[User:Tryptofish|Tryptofish]] ([[User talk:Tryptofish|talk]]) 20:34, 26 August 2012 (UTC)
[[Category:Wikipedia Education Program]]
:''The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. <span style="color:red">'''Please do not modify it.'''</span> No further edits should be made to this discussion. <!--Template:Rfc bottom--></div>
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