I had never given much thought to adding or editing content on Wikipedia. The malleable encyclopedia had been used mostly for starting points when I was research something ingrained in pop-culture. The resources that are contained at the end of the page were more valuable to me than the text that could be edited by the world.
An assignment in my graduate course asked me to edit my school district's page on Wikipedia. I immediately felt that I was overstepping my boundaries as a teacher for this school district. I am a representative of the school district; however, I do realize that the page is public and has the ability to be edited by the countless masses. I familiarized myself with the mechanics of editing a Wikipedia page, but decided to only update with a little information. Our school district houses and maintains health clinic that services the community. In addition, I added a link to our athletics' page since there existed an Athletics heading without any following text.
I too was nervous about adding and editing a school entry - it felt like something the district tech director should be doing. I had to laugh that the only notable thing about our school to show up on the Dexter page was that we had cross country champions. I wonder who was responsible for that tidbit.
ReplyDeleteHi All! I was in the same boat. My school was not even on it. I created a wiki for it but am in agreement with you. I feel like a student discussing my school on facebook. I know it isn't the same thing and I didn't add much information. It just feels a little unsettling.
ReplyDeleteCasey,
ReplyDeleteI familiarized myself as well but did little editing. I liked the behind the scenes look at Wikipedia editing, but don't think I have any immediate use for it.