Live
- 2024 on track to be hottest year on record
- PM Modi’s visit to Solapur: Women applaud ‘Double-Engine’ government’s initiatives
- Nagarkurnool MLA Dr. Kuchukulla Rajesh Reddy Campaigning in Maharashtra Elections
- Wife Kills Husband with Her Lover: Details of Veldanda Murder Case Revealed by SP Gaikwad
- Strict Action on Violations of Food Rights: Telangana Food Commission Chairman Goli Srinivas Reddy
- Smooth Conduct of Group-3 Exams with Strict Security Measures: Collector Badavath Santosh
- Delhi HC orders cancellation of LOC issued against Ashneer Grover, wife
- Shami’s absence a major blow for India in BGT, says Paul Adams
- Will organize protests at borders if attack on minority Hindus in Bangladesh not stopped: Bengal LoP
- Dutch Ambassador Marisa Gerard Meets Telangana CM A. Revanth Reddy in Delhi
Wikipedia provides useful info, says educationist Dhakal
In one of the presentations at the third-day of Transforming Education Conference for Humanity (TECH)-2017 here on Monday about ‘How using Wikipedia in the classrooms benefits students,’ the speaker Saroj Dhakal from Wikimedia Foundation highlighted the ways of using the content and attempted to dispel the myths about fake information being surfaced on Wikipedia.
Visakhapatnam: In one of the presentations at the third-day of Transforming Education Conference for Humanity (TECH)-2017 here on Monday about ‘How using Wikipedia in the classrooms benefits students,’ the speaker Saroj Dhakal from Wikimedia Foundation highlighted the ways of using the content and attempted to dispel the myths about fake information being surfaced on Wikipedia.
Dhakal said that Wikipedia was a global movement whose mission was to bring free educational content to world with help of educators, students and volunteers.
Explaining the philosophy behind the Wikipedia Education Programme, Saroj Dhakal, who has been contributing to Wikipedia for the past one decade said the programme’s idea was to make educators and students around the world contribute to Wikipedia and other Wikimedia projects in an academic setting.
Responding to the concerns of students and teachers over the posting of fake information on Wikipedia, Saroj clarified that putting up the content on platform goes through rigorous phases.
Moreover, he said that contributing to Wikipedia about any event, person and culture should have notability, verifiability and neutral point of view backed by facts. Some of the participants admitted that Wikipedia would be an amazing starting point to have superficial understanding about any topic.
When a student and a few educationists pointed out that Universities and other educational institutions were not accepting the information provided by Wikipedia terming it as unauthentic, Dhakal informed them that educational institutions have been gradually changing their perceptions on the issue.
Saroj underscored that Wikipedia believed in freedom and gives equal opportunity for every person to come up with fact-based content. He concluded that students and educators could contribute not only to English version of Wikipedia but other local languages too.
By Y Abhishek Paul
