User:Academic Challenger

My name is Skylar. I have been totally blind since birth, and began editing Wikipedia at the age of 16 in 2003. My user name comes from the name of a high school TV game show I was on. I have been an administrator since 2004, and was very active until starting graduate school in 2009. Throughout that time, I created about 1000 articles, on subjects including American and world politics and political history, religion, literature, music, and blindness organizations/companies. I also improved the content of many other articles on those subjects. As an administrator, I was at one time among the most active New Page patrollers, speedily deleting thousands of pages which were indisputably inappropriate. I additionally reverted vandalism, and disciplined problematic users while mentoring new good contributors.

I have sporadically edited since 2009, and renewed my commitment to the free knowledge movement in 2019 when WikiBlind was founded. I and another blind administrator now seek to recruit new blind editors to Wikipedia and also improve the content of articles around blindness.

I have always exclusively used the Job Access With Speech software for editing.

I earned my BA from Saint Mary's College of California in 2009 and my Ph.D. in political science from the University of California, Santa Barbara in 2017. I taught college political science courses for nearly 10 years. Currently I work in the field of access technology, for the Braille Institute.

I live with my wife Theresa and son Peter in Santa Barbara, California. I enjoy playing and listening to music, having played piano since an early age, clarinet throughout middle and high school, and later singing in my Catholic church choir.


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This user is an administrator on the English Wikipedia. (verify)
This user has been on Wikipedia for 21 years and 10 days.
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