To celebrate Science Week Ireland 2024 Wikimedia Community Ireland held a Wikipedia Writing Contest aimed at closing the gender gap on Wikipedia and celebrating women in science. We are now delighted to announce our winners!
This year we had two esteemed judges on board. Dr. Ingeborg Birnie (University of Strathclyde) and Dr. Liz Coleman (University of Galway). Both of our judges are leading the way in science education in their fields.
Dr Birnie is also passionate about enhancing science-related content available in minority languages specifically Scots Gaelic. She leads the UNESCO International Decade of Indigenous Languages Ad-hoc Group 1 which looks at the provision of education and domains for Indigenous languages and is a member of the Council of Europe’s Advisory Committee on the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities.
Dr. Coleman is a lecturer and researcher in Physics, who has recently been focussed on scientific collaboration for the protection of the environment and effective science communication regarding environmental issues. She has led a number of events engaging diverse communities in the west of Ireland with complex issues related to environmental change – from the local to global scales, combining scientific knowledge and data with storytelling and music.
Evidently, we knew the judging process was in good hands! Thank you very much to our judges for getting involved and donating their time to our contest.
Without further ado, here are the winners:
1st Prize (€65): Brigitte Jockusch
Our judges thought that this article was comprehensive and well laid out with specific and relevant sections included. More information was added along with a photo and sources. This article was newly created by the winning user as part of Wiki Science Writing Contest Ireland 2024.
Brigitte Maria Jockusch (born Brigitte Schenk, 27 September 1939 Berlin ) is German Professor Emeritus of Zoology and Cell Biology. She was awarded the Lower Saxony Order of Merit, and Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany.
See the winning article here.
2nd Place (€45): Nuala Christina Johnson
Another article that was created as part of the contest, our judges saw that it included a comprehensive list of works and the information was gathered from a good like of publications. They thought that more details could be added to the introduction along with the creation of more sections. If anyone is up to the challenge to take this even further!
Nuala Christina Johnson is an Irish geographer. She is a member of the Royal Irish Academy. She was a lecturer at Loughborough University from 1990 to 1991, and University College London from 1991 to 1996. She is an Emeritus Professor at Queen’s University Belfast.
Read more here.
3rd Place (€25): Mary Jo Deegan
The judges noted that the article had a nice introduction that gave an overview of the scientist’s professional trajectory. They did note however that more information could have been included about her training, and education along with dates added to make it more comprehensive.
Mary Jo Deegan (November 27, 1946 Chicago – January 22, 2024 Saint Joseph) was an Irish-American sociologist. She researched the recovery of women’s participation in the history of sociology. She served as a professor of sociology at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and was a member of the American Sociological Association (ASA) and the International Sociological Association (ISA).
Read more here.
Thank you so much to everyone who participated! These contests help us to make Wikipedia a more inclusive and balanced source of freely accessible information.
WikiScience will be back in November 2025 with the return of the Science photography contest having taken a break in 2024. Find out more about the international campaign here.
