digital skills to be lacking in some areas (Martzoukou et al., 2020). Educators have long expressed concern about levels of digital skills among the “Google Generation.” For example, Ercegovac (2008) reported that students possessed technical skills but lacked skills that would define them as information literate, such as approaches to information searching, evaluation, critical thinking, and using information ethically.
Wikipedia in Higher Education
Increasingly, Wikipedia has come to play a role in education as a free encyclopedia providing information with an error rate close to that of Britannica (Giles, 2005). Further, Wikipedia has become a household word among the general public as one of the most popular sources of information in multiple subject contexts. However, Wikipedia has another role to play in the development of digital literacies among students, offering a valuable learning environment in which to develop multiple competencies that lead to digital citizenship and social engagement (Fulton, 2019). While the appropriateness of using Wikipedia is often a source of debate in higher education, research has shown that both students and academics refer to the online encyclopedia for information (Knight & Pryke, 2012). Student editors are not commonplace in Wikipedia (Obregón-Sierra & González-Fernández, 2020). However, introducing students to a deeper engagement with the encyclopedia as editors and creators of content has significant potential for digital skills development. The relationship between student editors and Wikipedia also has reciprocal benefits. Student editing of Wikipedia can have a long-lasting impact on the encyclopedia itself with increased page views and editing activity in the Wikipedia community (Zhu et al., 2020). Ross (2020), a champion for the Wikipedia Education program, has applauded its Wikipedia Student Program for supporting this impact:
- The work students are doing isn’t just an “academic exercise;” it has an audience, and it matters enough that people are both reading it and building on it (para 4).
- Importantly, understanding this impact can increase the meaning of social participation for students.
