So you're here as a teacher coordinating a class project to improve the SkokieWiki, or you're a student that's part of one of these projects. Thanks! We're here to help!

First, make sure you've looked over our Welcome to the Wiki page. Then come back here - the advice on this page builds on that content.

Why should you contribute to SkokieWiki?

Service learning can be one of the most fulfilling ways to learn - not only do you learn in a real-world setting, but you also get to help your community. There are many ways high school, college and university classes can contribute to the SkokieWiki in ways that are relevant to the class:

  • Political science classes can write about the politics of Skokie(on the village, county, state or federal levels)

  • History classes can write about Skokie history

  • Science classes can write about Skokie flora and fauna

  • Journalism classes can write about current events and issues

  • English classes can write about nearly anything

  • Photography classes can take photos of Skokie (see the Guide for Photographers instead of this one)

  • ...and nearly any other class can find some aspect of Skokie to write about for the wiki.

Suggestions for teachers

  1. Say hello to one of the site admins (e.g. Nitoshia Ford) so they'll know your class will be editing pages, and so they can offer your students advice and guidance as they edit. One of them might even be willing to come in to give a presentation/orientation to your class!

  2. Pick a topic for your students to contribute to. See also the To-Do list for some other ideas of ways your class might want to contribute

  3. See the help edit the wiki page for some advice on how to edit the wiki. And rely on the admin you contact - they can really be a good resource for helping out your students!

  4. Visit the Educators Portal on Oakland Wiki, they have compiled a fantastic list of examples and resources. 

  5. If you have questions/concerns/suggestions about the overall process of teachers and students contributing to SkokieWiki, contact an admin to discuss it. Encourage other teachers and professors to contribute, as well.

A few notes:

  • Once something is published to the SkokieWiki, other editors (especially the admins) may jump in and make corrections and updates. So you may want to advise your students to write their articles offline, and upload them when they're done with them. It's anyone's right to improve a page once it's publicly posted to the SkokieWiki, so keep that in mind when students post pages. You may want to talk to an admin in more detail about how this might work out in practice.

  • SkokieWiki is a public web presence which is indexed by search engines and freely accessible to all. LocalWiki (our wiki host), provides information within the wiki on the IP Address of each contribution to the wiki.

  • Any material you place on SkokieWiki (even user pages) is automatically available to everyone under the Creative Commons licensing.

 

Suggestions for students

  1. Create your user page - there are more details about this you should read back on the Welcome to the Wiki page, but we've mentioned it again here because it's really important.

  2. See the help edit the wiki page for some advice on how to edit the wiki. If you have questions contact the admin, we will be happy to answer them!  

  3. If someone edits a page you worked on, please don't interpret that is anything other than someone else trying to improve the page you're working on. If you want to create a completely new page and don't want someone making changes to it before you're finished, work on the page offline before putting it on SkokieWiki. 

  4. If you have questions/concerns/suggestions about the overall process of teachers and students contributing to SkokieWiki, contact an admin to discuss it.

  5. Keep on contributing to the SkokieWiki even once your assignment is over - there are lots of things you know about Skokie that other people would probably love to know!

 

Adapted from Raleigh Wiki and Sac Wiki.

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