Wikipedia in

education in Spain
Role of Wikimedia in the era of Open science
(Barcelona 2018)
Dr. Ángel Obregón Sierra
Access

❖ The English version receives more than 5 million visits every hour.
❖ The Spanish version more than 600,000 visits every hour.
❖ The Catalan version has more than 15,000 visits per hour.
Quantitative analysis

❖ Only 5.4% of students don’t use Wikipedia at all.

❖ 91.4% say that they have never been explained how to use Wikipedia.
❖ 5% used Wikipedia a lot, but they didn’t know that one could edit in it.
❖ 97.3% of students who always use Wikipedia, use it at the beginning of
the research, and 15.1% continue to consult it at the end of the
investigation.
❖ Students visit Wikipedia to find the meaning of terms and because it
contains understandable explanations and is easy to use.
Qualitative analysis

❖ They often consult Wikipedia

❖ They don’t know how it works
❖ They were not certain whether the information is reliable
❖ Neither are they aware of the existence of filters
❖ They find it positive that anyone can edit in it
❖ The best (reliable, transparency, summaries and references)
❖ They have never edited in it(Wikipedia's role)
In conclusion

❖ To explain licenses and plagiarism problems

❖ Importance of qualification
❖ Selection of motivating articles
❖ Importance of references
❖ Bilingual, very positive
❖ No difference between genders
❖ Differences between age ranges
❖ They have never returned to edit