User:Nick Moyes/Wiki SkillCheck

There has been recent discussion on its talk page as to the effectiveness of the WP:ORFA process (see also here]), with at least one administrator suggesting that the optional poll can be damaging for some candidates' chances at WP:RFA. In that discussion I repeated my view that it would be useful for anyone wanting to assess their chances at RfA if some form of self-assessment which could be done without any of the glare and attention of public scrutiny and criticism.

I was challenged to start a discussion on the subject, and so the notes below are an attempt to tease out my ideas, prior to launching that discussion.

Aims & objectives

Aims:

• To provide a means for any editor to self-assess their understanding of Wikipedia 's policies and guidelines, and especially their readiness for becoming an administrator, without the public exposure to criticism of an WP:ORFA.
• To encourage more editors to consider putting themselves forward for adminship
• To help any editor get a sense of how much/little they currently know, and to point towards resources to help them improve their knowledge,.

Objectives:

• Devise, develop and provide access to some form of easy-to-use quiz or multiple choice test of Wikipedia's key policies and guidelines.
• Provide some form of indicative scoring into different broad levels: e.g. 1) still quite a lot to learn; 2) fairly sound knowledge 3) good knowledge 4) excellent broad knowledge of all key guidelines.

Preliminary thoughts:

• This resource is only worth developing if there is a consensus that it could have a real purpose and value, and attracts input from others.
• It is not intended to be a replacement for WP:ORFA, but would offer an alternative method of self-assessment.
• Development will need broad support/input/question vetting from experienced editors and admins.
• Will undoubtedly take time to develop and test.
• Discussion could be advertised at WP:AN; Admin Newsletter, WT:RFA & ORFA
• Should it aim at potential admins and general editors with no current interest in adminship? (I think it should)
• Will probably be a lengthy/wordy quiz. - is this a killer, or an advantage that would attact only committed editors?
• Will need a friendly Introduction, plus a simple means of score-tallying.
• Would be nice to have an automatic scoring count, and the ability to save and continue in two or more sessions.
• Answers and scoring should remain private, and not be identifiable to a given user.
• The ability to collate anonymised scoring might help us assess the usefulness/effectiveness of this self-assessment resource, and the level of overall experience of participants. This would add a significant level of complexity of the quiz (off en-wiki?), and might undermine faith in its confidentiality if participants have to be logged in.
• An off-wiki survey would have the advantage of nothing showing up in an editor's contribution history. Neither their strengths nor their weaknesses would be known to others.
• Guideline-related questions will probably need a lengthy text with links to be investigated, then three or more shorter alternative solutions to choose from.

Page title ideas

WikiQuiz

• WikiSelfTest
• Test Your Wiki-Knowledge
• Test Your Wiki-ski
• Check Your Wiki-skills
• Wiki SkillTest
• Admin Self-assessment
• Admin Readiness Test
• Admin Self-test
• Wiki SkillCheck -initially chosen

Mockup text

Wiki SkillCheck How well do you know how Wikipedia works? Test and score yourself!

Are you curious about how much you know about Wikipedia? Think you might one day want to help out by becoming an administrator here? If so, this Wiki-quiz will test your knowledge! Although designed to help experienced editors get a feel whether they might be ready to take on the role of Administrator, absolutely any editor can use it to test their knowledge. There is no rush, so there's no time limit to how long you spend doing this quiz. Just answer questions honestly (with/without(?) referring to our guidance pages), and tally up the points to gain an idea of how much you understand about Wikipedia. For complete confidentiality, there's no requirement for you to answer on-wiki. So, you might want a pen and paper to keep track of your score as you work through all (xxx) questions.

But remember: Being given administrator rights is not purely about how much you understand of our policies and guidelines, or how well you can answer a simple quiz. It will depend upon you gaining the trust of the editing community by the quality and depth of your past editing, and by your answers at RFA. It matters not whether you score well in this quiz - but it might help you understand any strengths or weaknesses. Some editors might still want to go for an Optional RFA where experienced editors can give you their own views of your chances of a successful RfA.

Don't put any store on these answers - even they are a mockup.

PART 1 ABOUT YOU (no. of edits/blocks/warnings/attitude/help & support/paid etc)

• Do you believe you have good familiarity with most of Wikipedia's key policies and guidelines YES/NO
• Have you been an active editor for at least the last 18 months (2 years?)
• Do you have over x thousand (10k?) edits to your name
• Have you created more than 10 new articles
• Have you made a major contribution to getting one or more pages to Good Article status?
• In the last year have you been given any warnings about your editing or edit warring?
• Have you been warned about the manner in which you interact with other editor(s)s?
• Have you received a block or ban of any sort in the last 18 months?
• Have editors come to your talk page to complain about your actions?
• Been the subject of an upheld complaint against you at ANI in the last 18 months?
• Have you ever evaded a block or operated more than one account at once? (i.e. it's best to be honest about 'skeletons in your editing closet')
• Received any Barnstars for good editing behaviour?
• Helped others at WP:TH WP:TH WP:HD IRC ?
• Contributed at WP:AFD?
• Contributed at ANI or elsewhere to help resolve a dispute?
• Made behind the scenes contributions at SPI/OTRS/????/????

PART 2 Topic sections (Multiple choice answers) (don't wikilink to shortcut abbreviations or full names of policy/guideline pages - makes it more of a challenge)

• Deletion processes
• Blocks and Vandalism
• Revdel and Copyright
• Involved
• Disputes and resolution
• Discretionary sanctions/1RR
• IAR

Rough demo question ideas

(This section would probably have between 25 and 50 multiple-choice questions)

• QUESTION 1: You encounter this article (needs link to an Israel-Palestine conflict topic) where one logged in editors and one IP user have twice reverted each other's edits in the last few hours, and seem set to continue. Q) What action do you take?

A) Do nothing as 3RR has not been breached.

B) Warn the last reverting editor not to do it again.

C) Report them to WP:ANI

D) Block them both indefinitely for edit warring.

E) Semi-protect the article?

F) Warn them both about Discretionary Sanctions etc etc

• QUESTION 2: You spot a new user account marked for CSD (use a wrong coding, like U2) in which a 15 year old Youtuber has written about themself and their wish to edit and improve Wikipedia (and has made a couple of typo corrections to school articles), but has also given their Kik, YouTube and email links on that page, and also in a reply on their talk page. What action do you take?

A) Remove the U2 template as this is clearly not a 'non-existent' user.

B) Delete just their user page under CSD U5.

C) Block the user indefinitely per WP:NOTHERE;

D) Some other course of action. (Would look for Csd U5 of user page, and/or deletion and revdel of all edits including personal details, plus an explanation on their Talk page, explaining both WP:NOTHERE and WP:YOUNG. Add to Watchlist)

• QUESTION 3: Use and credit J M Wolfson's recent school RFA question: An editor creates an article on an elementary school that entirely comprises material copied and pasted from that school's website. What criterion for speedy deletion applies, and in particular which criterion/a do(es) not apply?

• QUESTION 4: You come across a newly-created short, unsourced stub which simply states that INSERT REAL NAME is the CEO of INSERT REAL COMPANY NAME. Is CSD A7 a valid reason for deletion?

A) Yes

B) No.

• QUESTION 5: You come across a newly-created short, unsourced stub , entitled 'Ranunculus thora' which simply states: "Ranunculus thora is a lovely buttercup". Is CSD A7 a valid reason for deletion?

A) Yes, and why?

B) No, and why not?

• QUESTION 6: True or false? The difference between 'Substitution' and 'Transclusion' and is that Substitution puts a live copy of the template on the page, whereas Translation just pastes in a copy of the text of that template at the time it was added.

A) True

B) False

• QUESTION 7: True or false? A copyrighted image of a deceased person can be used in a Wikipedia article about that person under our 'fair use policy', providing no other more suitably licenced image is available.

A) True

B) False

• QUESTION 8: True or false?

A) True

B) False

• QUESTION 9: True or false? A short article has a PROD template added a f months ago, but someone removed it. Last week a PROD template was placed on it again, but this time it has't been removed in the eight days it has been there. It is now OK for the article to be deleted.

A) True

B) False

• QUESTION 10: Which description most closely fits the role of Oversight?

A) Oversight is a process where approved editors may permanently remove all trace of an edit and its history, even if already deleted by a normal adminstrator.

B) Oversight is a process whereby editors with an advanced permission are able to review newly-created articles and 'approve' them for release into Mainspace.

C) Oversight is a process in which a group of administrators with advanced permissions can consider complaints made against an administrator and, if necessary, enforce sanctions on them, which an individual administrator cannot do.

D) Oversight is an eye condition brought on by very prolonged periods of monitor use. The eye strain that results can be reduced by a period of zero editing of up to three weeks, known as an eye-ban.

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Notes and observations

Special:PrefixIndex/User:MBisanz/Qs/RfACandidate - might be of interest