2025-08-08 –, KISUMU (Ballroom 3) 🌐 💬
Language: English
During this year's Wikimania scholarship review process, reviewers noticed that some applications used artificial intelligence (e.g. ChatGPT) to answer scholarship questions.
This raises many questions:
Is it acceptable to use AI to answer these questions? Where do we draw the line for using it? Are AI-generated response considered to be genuine? Why do the applicants think they need to use this tool? Will it create an arms race between those who use and those who don't? Will it create an uneven playing field between applicants who can afford to pay to use paid-version of AI and those who cannot pay and have to use the free version?
In this panel discussion, we have representatives who reviewed scholarships from different regions to share their thoughts on the use of AI tools to answer Wikimania scholarship questions.
The era for using artificial intelligence to answer Wikimania scholarship application questions has arrived. It raises legal, governance, ethical, moral and fairness questions over the usage. We will have a panel discussion on how AI affects the work of the scholarship committee.
Currently there is no official policy that governs the usage of AI tools to assist in answering questions on the Wikimania scholarship application. They are typically noticed when very similar responses were provided by different applicants. Those responses often lack specific examples or metrics and may misunderstand homonyms (e.g. AI misinterpreted the question with the keyword "sustainability" to mean the extraction of natural resources, energy consumption and waste disposal at the event, not the longevity of the movement). There is also no standard for handling answers that are suspected to be entirely written by AI, leading to inconsistent scoring for these applications.
With panelists from different Wikimedia regions, we hope that this discussion kickstarts a formal policy around the use of AI in scholarship response that supports non-native English speakers' participation in regional/global conferences. Wikimania participants will gain a deeper insight towards the challenges that scholarship committee members faced when reviewing and scoring Wikimania scholarships.
- What other themes or topics does your session fit into? Please choose from the list of tags below.
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Events, Conferences
- How does your session relate to the event theme: Wikimania@20: Inclusivity. Impact. Sustainability?
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As scholarship committee members are volunteers, there is a risk of burnout from reviewing large amount of answers that are suspected to be written by AI, threatening the sustainability of this group of volunteers. A balancing act is required to ensure genuine answers without penalizing non-native English speakers to ensure their inclusion and participation in the Wikimedia movement through travel scholarship. This issue will continue to persist until the rules governing AI usage in scholarship application is introduced.
- What is the experience level needed for the audience for your session?
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Everyone can participate in this session
- How do you plan to deliver this session? You will be asked to confirm this closer to the date in case of changes to the format.
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Hybrid, with some speakers in Nairobi and others dialing in remotely
- Should your session be selected for the program, do you agree to release your session and supporting materials on-wiki and on the eventyay platform under CC BY-SA 4.0?
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I agree
I am a Wikipedian since 2005. I hold administrator rights on English Wikipedia and English Wikivoyage, and bureaucrat rights on Wikispecies. I focus on Education and Wikipedia. I am the editor-in-chief for WikiJournal of Science, currently hosted in Wikiversity.
I am the Executive Director of Wikimedia South Africa
Over the last 2 years I have worked within the chapter to implement the 2024-2027 strategy.
I believe in the goals of the chapter and the overarching Movements Goals.
From a personal perspective I am a man of great faith and believe completely in doing everything with excellence.
"What you do reflects whose you are"
Donatien Kangah est un Wikimédien ivoirien. En 2012, il co-fonde le Groupe d'utilisateurs Wikimédia Côte d'Ivoire. Il collabore également avec plusieurs communautés africaines et organise la Wikiconvention francophone 2023 à Abidjan, rassemblant 130 participants. Contributeur actif sur Wikipédia en français, sa philosophie repose sur l'apprentissage par le partage et le leadership comme service à la communauté. Il œuvre pour la durabilité du mouvement en Afrique, en se concentrant sur la transition générationnelle et la gestion des conflits, tout en promouvant l'inclusion linguistique dans le mouvement Wikimédia.