Looking back at 2021

As 2021 is coming to an end, it is time to look back at the year that was. 2021 was a challenging year for the world due to the continued spread of the COVID-19 pandemic. However, despite all the challenges, the WordPress Foundation was able to make excellent progress in its mission of educating the public about open source software and serving the public good – thanks to our global team of spirited volunteers and contributors.

Read on to find out about our various programs in 2021.

do_action charity hackathons

One of our focuses this year was to revamp our do_action program. Thanks to our hard work, do_action organizers now have a dedicated location@doaction.org email ID powered by Google Workspace for Non profits, which will help them in their initiatives. We also kick-started discussions to organize a global do_action charity hackathon held fully online, and we are all set to execute this idea in 2022. We also announced the return of in-person do_action hackathons after nearly 18 months of online events!

We had two do_action charity hackathons planned this year: do_action Karnataka and do_action Nigeria. do_action Karnataka was held in August 2021, where 12 volunteers worked hand-in-hand to create websites for three non profits. You can read more about the event here:

do_action Karnataka 2021: A report

While do_action Nigeria had to be canceled due to unforeseen circumstances, the local WordPress community – led by WordPress Community Deputy Mary Job, is doing a phenomenal job on the ground by uplifting women and children through their own charitable initiatives using WordPress.

Introduction to Open source workshops

Last year, during the COVID-19 pandemic, we brought back our Introduction to Open source workshops as a way to re-engage the community and to reinforce our core mission of promoting open source software to the community. At the start of this year, we announced our plans to continue these workshops in 2021.

At the time of writing this post, we have had 11 Global Introduction to Open source workshops, which have had a total of 233 RSVPs so far. We also have our final Introduction to Open source workshop for the year scheduled for tomorrow (December 31) as well!

Learn WordPress

Learn WordPress (learn.wordpress.org) – a cross-team initiative led by the Make WordPress Training team was launched in December 2020. The initiative serves to democratize and support WordPress learning by providing high-quality WordPress learning content in different formats. At the time of publishing this post, the platform had published the following content in 2021 alone:

The contributor teams working on this project have some amazing plans for the project, and the WordPress Foundation will continue to support their work in the best way possible.

Several individuals contributed generously to the WordPress foundation this year. We would like to extend our heartfelt gratitude to all our donors who supported us in sustaining the foundation this year. Special mention to the following individuals who went above and beyond in supporting us in 2021:

Sustainer – $1000 per year

  • 10up
  • Human Made
  • Jetpack
  • Matt Mullenweg
  • Multidots, Inc
  • Sujay Pawar
  • Wordfence
  • InMotion Hosting

Sustainer – $200 per year

  • Donavon Guyot
  • Eric Kuznacic
  • Ellen and Karl Olinger
  • Pippin Williamson
  • W4
  • René Hermenau / WP Staging

The WordPress Foundation has several ambitious plans for 2022, none of which would be possible without your help. If you would like to support the WordPress Foundation and contribute to our mission of serving the public good and educating the public about open source software, please consider donating to the WordPress Foundation. Your donation goes a long way in keeping the web open. Please use the link below to donate.

Donate

Thank you for your continued support of the WordPress Foundation. Here’s wishing you all an excellent holiday season and a happy 2022!

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