User:Reillybrooks

About me
Hello! My name is Reilly Brooks and I am a student at Rice University. I am majoring in Sociology and Policy Studies major and minoring in Poverty, Justice and Human Capabilities. Through Wikipedia, I hope to contribute to topics that are focused on gender inequality and education disparities for underrepresented, disadvantaged populations and how to create social change that will eliminate these disparities. I have contributed two complete articles through the PJHC program and hope to contribute more to pages about human development and social injustice topics. My goal on Wikipedia is to add insightful, meaningful and thought-provoking content that motivates readers to think more critically about the world and learn about global and local social issues. For me, Wikipedia is a medium to raise awareness on social injustices that perpetuate due to human actions and interactions and how to eradicate these disparities at an individual and institutional level.

Article contributions

 * 1) Education in Zimbabwe
 * 2) Gender inequality in Nepal

Articles Interested in Editing or creating

 * 1) Squatting in Developing Countries
 * 2) Women's Rights in Nepal
 * 3) Factors affecting Education in Kenya

Education In Zimbabwe
I expanded and contributed to the Wikipedia article on "Education in Zimbabwe." My revisions included citations to reliable and academic sources, expanding the knowledge provided on education and revising the material that has already been written in the article. The banner at the top of the article noted the need for additional citations; however, no one has resolved the issue since 2011. On the Talk Page, it was noted by WikiProject Zimbabwe, WikiProject Africa and WikiProject Education that this article was a Start-Class article and was of high or top-importance on the project’s priority scale.

Before I edited the page, the article lacks historical, demographic and structural information. Zimbabwe's education reform, structure and factors contributing to the success and challenges of national education are inexistent on the page. There is no mention of universities or early education in the article, narrowing the current scope to primary and secondary education. Based on the information provided on this page, it appeared that Zimbabwe does not have any universities, non-public schools or early education opportunities.These are all essential topics of information that needed to be added and expanded on in order to provide a holistic view of Zimbabwe's education system.

Through researching other articles that are focused on a nation's education, I discovered that many are insufficient, inaccurate or inexistent. Specifically, developing nations have inadequate information about their education systems on Wikipedia. I believe that there is a need for revitalizing articles on education because Wikipedia as an educational platform is focused to be an open-source with a wealth of knowledge available to everyone. However, limited contributing on developing country's article pages alludes to the disparities of knowledge and access that Wikipedia strives to overcome. My first contribution to Wikipedia aimed to share knowledge and academic material on a nation's educational systems and factors contributing to the current state of education.

You can find my past proposal, outline and a detailed list of references here.

Examples of references:

1. Chitiyo, Morgan, and John Wheeler. "The Development of Special Education Services in Zimbabwe." International Journal of Special Education 19.2 (2004): 46-52.

2. Chung, Fay. "Policies for primary and secondary education in Zimbabwe: alternatives to the World Bank perspective." Zimbabwe Journal of Educational Research 1.1 (1989): 22-42.

3. Csapo, Marg. "Zimbabwe: Emerging Problems of Education and Special Education." International Journal of Special Education 1.2 (1986): 141-60.

4. Kariwo, Michael Tonderai. "Widening access in higher education in Zimbabwe."Higher Education Policy 20.1 (2007): 45-59.

5. Mutepfa, Magen M., Elias Mpofu, and Tsitsi Chataika. "Inclusive education in Zimbabwe: Policy, curriculum, practice, family, and teacher education issues."Childhood Education 83.6 (2007): 342-346.

6. Pape, John. "Changing education for majority rule in Zimbabwe and South Africa." ''Comparative Education Review'' (1998): 253-266.