Making Women Visible: My Role in AWA’s International Women’s Day Initiative

Introduction to Wikipedia training session

I participated in a Project under the Africa Wikipedia Alliance EmpowerHer Project to celebrate International Women’s Day, which focused on improving the representation of women on Wikimedia platforms. The training equipped participants with practical skills in Wikipedia editing and Wikidata contributions.

AWA EmpowerHer Introduction to Wikidata Training session Flyer

I also had the opportunity to lead the Wikidata training session, guiding participants on how to contribute structured data effectively. Under the leadership of Taleed Mariam, we worked on articles highlighting notable women from Somalia, Cameroon, and Sudan.

Key activities

I was able to create over 10 Wikidata items as seen in the list below. I also improved 11 Wikidata items, and improved 11 Wikipedia articles such as Josephine Napwon Cosmas, Shahd Ashraf, and Catarina Zenab by adding infoboxes and adding more content to the articles.

• https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q138673704
• https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q138719999
• https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q138720066
• https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q138732563
• https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q138774289
• https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q138774456
• https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q138774487
• https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q138774569
• https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q138774599
• https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q138774708

The experience strengthened my skills, leadership capacity, and commitment to closing the gender gap by making women more visible online.