CUNY research may soon hit the Wikipedia pages, as CUNY partners with Wikimedia New York City and Richard Knipel to announce a Wikimedian-in-Residence pilot program, aiming to expand the accessibility of CUNY research.

The two-year pilot program, funded by Craigslist founder and namesake of the Newmark Grad-uate School of Journalism, Craig Newmark, is an effort to promote CUNY research and archival material by improving its accessibility to the public, as well as adding to the Wikimedia websites to advance projects like Wikipedia.

With Wikipedia’s 48.8 million registered users, the program will expand the reach of CUNY research and archives to a broader audience.

Additionally, it will allow CUNY’s archival materials to be a widely used resource and overall support open knowledge and free access to information.

The program is set to be headed by Knipel, who is no beginner to this.

He worked in the same role for the Museum of Modern Art, the Guggenheim Museum and the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Wikimedia New York City, a part of the larger Wikimedia Foundation, serves the New York metropolitan area not only in its promotion of free access to the world’s knowledge, but also in the development of free culture through various educational initiatives.

Based in the CUNY Office of Library Services, Knipel will work in collaboration with CUNY’s faculty, students and staff.

He will also be working along-side a part-time documentarian to monitor the success of the program for its two-year duration.

CUNY faculty, students and staff will be trained in how to not only incorporate their research into Wikimedia projects suite but to also utilize their knowledge of a particular area of expertise to contribute to the Wikipedia plat-form.

Knipel’s past work at The Met aimed to support the museum’s online presence by integrating its collection into Wikipedia and Wikimedia.

In November 2017, images from The Met’s collection received 10.5 million views.

Other large institutions that have held in-residence programs include the Smithsonian Institu-tion, UC Berkeley, The British Museum, Columbia University and many more.

The announcement of the pilot program sustains the university’s efforts to increase public access to research, as LaGuardia Community College previously held four Wikipedia Translatathon events to translate Wikipedia articles into various languages.

A three-year project in collaboration with the Mellon Foundation is in progress specifically for the archival material at CUNY