So you're here as a teacher coordinating a class project to improve the HRVA Wiki, 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 the Wiki Guide. Then come back here - the advice on this page builds on that advice.

Why should you contribute to HRVA Wiki?

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 lots of ways high school, college and university classes can contribute to the HRVA Wiki in ways that are relevant to the class:

  • Political science classes can write about the politics of Hampton Roads (on the city, county, state or federal levels)
  • History classes can write about Hampton Roads history
  • Journalism classes can write about current events and issues
  • English classes can write about nearly anything
  • Photography classes can take photos of Hampton Roads 
  • ...and nearly any other class can find some aspect of Hampton Roads to write about for the wiki.

Suggestions for teachers

  1. Say hello to one of the site admins so they'll know your class will be editing pages, and so they can offer your students advice and guidance as they edit. (Use the Comments box on any user's page to contact them.) 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 the wiki for some other ideas of ways your class might want to contribute. Or if you don't want to pick a topic, you could have your students create some of the most in-demand pages.

  3. See the Usage Guide 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. Remind your students to check their user pages - that's how admins will communicate with them if students should be doing something a different way. (If someone leaves a comment on a student's user page, a yellow "Messages" notice will appear in the upper right corner of the screen, just below the student's user page link.)

  5. If you have questions/concerns/suggestions about the overall process of teachers and students contributing to HRVA Wiki, contact an admin to discuss it, and also leave some notes on the Talk Page.

  6. Encourage other teachers and professors to contribute, as well.

A few notes:

  • Once something is published to the HRVA Wiki, other editors (especially the admins) will 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 HRVA Wiki, 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.
  • HRVA Wiki is a public web presence which is indexed by search engines and freely accessible to all. WikiSpot (our wiki host) provides information within the wiki on the IP Address of each contribution to the wiki.
  • Any material you place on HRVA Wiki (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 Wiki Guide, but we've mentioned it again here because it's really important.

  2. See the Usage Guide for some advice on how to edit the wiki. Feel free to use the Comments box on one of the site admins' user pages if you have questions - the admin will be happy to answer them! (You'll need to check your own user page for replies.)

  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 HRVA Wiki. If you're not sure why someone is making certain edits to your page, leave a comment on an admin's page to ask for advice.

  4. If you have questions/concerns/suggestions about the overall process of teachers and students contributing to HRVA Wiki, contact an admin to discuss it, and also leave some notes on the Talk Page.

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

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