Biomedical Engineering Volunteers Participate in 'Wikithon' for Black History Month

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Zhexi Zhu

In mid-February, volunteers from the U of A, Boston University, Louisiana Tech University, Northwestern University and the University of Florida participated in a "Wikithon" in partnership with the BOLD (Bioengineering Organizations Leading Diversity) initiative of the Biomedical Engineering Society and Alpha Eta Mu Beta, the National Biomedical Engineering Honor Society. The goal was to update Wikipedia pages of underrepresented minority researchers in biomedical engineering as a service project for Black History Month. Volunteers included graduate students, postdocs, faculty and staff members representing the different departments.

The U of A had three volunteers: Peg Hart, research coordinator; Zhexi Zhu, graduate student and a Justice, Equity, Diversity and Inclusion department scholar; and Raj Rao, department head of biomedical engineering. Zhu wanted to participate in this Black History Month project to help working professionals improve their representation on the Wikipedia platform.

"Often, underrepresented researchers haven't received support in adding to their Wikipedia pages," Zhu said. "This is a chance to help busy engineering professionals have more of their accomplishments — lab research and accompanying publications — added to their Wiki pages. We want to help them improve their pages to spread the word on the work they are doing."

Peg Hart

A list of underrepresented minority researchers working in the biomedical engineering field was provided to the teams by the BOLD committee. Teams selected pages and added information about a person's research activities, honors, awards and publications. According to Teresa A. Murray, an associate professor at Louisiana Tech and the coordinator of the BOLD initiative, the project completed 40 edits and improved approximately 12 Wiki pages.

"Black History Month projects are an excellent opportunity to show our support and highlight underrepresented researchers in our field," Rao said. "By involving volunteers from many races, we demonstrate how we can work together to improve the system for all, providing a diverse and inclusive environment in which young professionals can succeed."

Raj Rao

The event, originally scheduled for one day, was extended to provide more time for teams to work around busy schedules. Pre and post-event meetings were held to provide training and to ascertain problems. The post-event meeting discussed what worked well and ways to improve the project for next year. The project is expected to become an annual event for the Biomedical Engineering Society and for the Department of Biomedical Engineering at the U of A.

Click here to learn more about biomedical student organizations.

About the U of A Biomedical Engineering: The Department of Biomedical Engineering has established itself as one of the premier research departments on campus that is committed to training undergraduate and graduate students to become leaders in the field of biomedical engineering. More information can be found at can be found at biomedical-engineering.uark.edu.