Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Schools/Archive 15

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Quality Scale Expansion

There are a few more article classifactions that we are not currently using which are:

• Redirect-Class - actually 2 pages are using this class at this time
• Image-Class
• Portal-Class
• NA-Class - actually is currently being used, but does not add to any category
• Needed-Class

See Template:Grading scheme#See also

I did not want to edit the main page without first finding some consensus as to what the project would like to do; so I copied the section here and added the additional items for reference and discussion only.

Quality scale

School articles and related pages are graded for quality or type according to the Wikipedia 1.0 Assessment Scale.

FA

FL

A

GA

B

C

Start

Stub

List

Disambig

Template

Category

Redirect

File

Portal

NA

Needed

???

The following values may be used for the class parameter to describe the quality of the article:

• FA - adds articles to Category:FA-Class school articles.
• FL - adds articles to Category:FL-Class school articles.
• A - adds articles to Category:A-Class school articles.
• GA - adds articles to Category:GA-Class school articles.
• B - adds articles to Category:B-Class school articles.
• C - adds articles to Category:C-Class school articles.
• Start - adds articles to Category:Start-Class school articles.
• Stub - adds articles to Category:Stub-Class school articles.
• List - adds articles to Category:List-Class school articles.
• Dab - adds [pages to Category:Disambig-Class school pages.
• Template - adds pages to Category:Template-Class school pages.
• Cat - adds pages to Category:Category-Class school pages.
• Redirect - adds pages to Category:Redirect-Class school pages.
• Image - adds pages to Category:Image-Class school pages.
• Portal - adds pages to Category:Portal-Class school pages.
• NA - adds pages to Category:NA-Class school pages. Note:currently does not add to any category
• Needed - adds articles to Category:Needed-Class school articles.
• If left blank, defaults to ??? and adds articles to Category:Unassessed school articles.

---

It is interesting to note that all of our current assessment categories already link to the 5 non-existent categories.

Note: I am not suggesting that these should be used, just asking the question do we want to use any of them. Dbiel ^(Talk) 01:26, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

Future isn't really need for schools, or is it? Should it be added if so? Calebrw (talk) 17:34, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

Archived

Ive archived all of July 2008's posts. Five Years 14:01, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

Category:Unassessed school articles

The backlog is now below 700 articles. Five Years 14:21, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

• Update: Below 600 articles. Five Years 17:23, 10 August 2008 (UTC)
• Update: Below 500 articles. Five Years 09:22, 11 August 2008 (UTC)
• Update: Below 400 articles. Five Years 15:35, 12 August 2008 (UTC)
• Update: Below 300 articles. Calebrw (talk) 17:32, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
• Update: Below 200 articles. Jh12 (talk) 05:02, 7 September 2008 (UTC)
• Update: Below 100 articles. Jh12 (talk) 07:16, 11 September 2008 (UTC)
• Update: Done. Calebrw (talk) 00:59, 23 September 2008 (UTC)
• This unassessed category only seems to relate to article quality. According to the most recent stats there are still 12,173 school articles which haven't yet been assessed for importance. Is there some way that these can easily be put in a category so that they can be easily found and dealt with? Dahliarose (talk) 08:14, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

  The unassessed articles should be under Category:Unassessed-importance school articles. It's also manually possible to cross-reference both quality and importance by going through the work lists --Jh12 (talk) 12:08, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

  Way to take the wind out of the "we're done" sails. Just kidding. I guess we just keep working. Calebrw (talk) 12:26, 24 September 2008 (UTC)

Sex scandals & notable faculty

Should teachers involved in sex scandals be included in school articles. At Port Charlotte High School, a user insists that a teacher needs to be added to the article. Is this necessary? Metros (talk) 01:26, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

It could use some more citations - the one it has just says he was accused of molestation and apparently killed himself. And the picture is definitely too much - save it for the article about him, if there ever is one. But if there are reliable sources for the sexual aspect, then yeah, it's at least notable for the time being. RossPatterson (talk) 03:58, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

If the event has enough reliable sources, I agree it should be mentioned in the article. Do use judgment as to how much weight the section has however. In the end, the article is about the school, not a teacher scandal. And if the section is taking up too much space, it's time to place the content into a separate article. Right now it's probably ok. --Jh12 (talk) 04:27, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

Im not quite convinced as to the notability of teacher sex scandals. I dont think that the scandals themselves will have any lasting impression on the school, and that, at the end of the day is what the article is about, the school. Five Years 17:27, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

Portal:Schools

Ok, so I need significant events that are closely related to schools to place under Portal:Schools/Selected_anniversaries. As a Chinese American, my knowledge of such events is obviously biased. Besides the ones listed under May, my mind jumps to the Little Rock Nine, Columbine High School massacre, and other events under Category:Disasters in schools. There are, of course, much more cheerful anniversary events, and I'm hoping to get some ideas. --Jh12 (talk) 04:37, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

Not sure axactly what you're looking for but here are a few important things that come to mind:

• Brown v. Board of Education
• Scopes Trial

Also if we're counting college happenings there's the Kent State shootings. Hope that helps. Adam McCormick (talk) 06:04, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

The Scopes Trial is a great one, thanks. The ideal events would probably be ones with close ties to a particular school, but I'm looking for pretty much anything of historical note that isn't post-secondary. --Jh12 (talk) 06:29, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

Not sure if you're looking for school-based stuff only, or whether you want to include wider school education things? In the UK:

28th Novemer 1966 saw the publication of the very influential Plowden Report into primary education

29th July 1988 saw the enactment of the Education Reform Act which introduced the National Curriculum in England & Wales

1st September 1968 saw the first UK Middle School open in Bradford, West Yorkshire

Britain's first comprehensive school opened in Wales on 21 September 1949 at Holyhead County School (now renamed Holyhead High School, and horrifyingly without article!)

James Callaghan gave a speech at Ruskin College, Oxford, on 18th October 1976, now known as starting 'the Great Debate' which eventually led to the introduction of the National Curriculum

10th September 2002 saw the first Academy open in Great Britain at Business Academy Bexley

1st September 2000 saw the launch of the General Teaching Councils for England, Wales and Northern Ireland

Possibly this section could include information on when like "very notable" (Eton etc.) schools opened, or something along those lines. Five Years 17:19, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

For the UK you might like to include the Dunblane massacre on 13th March 1966. Dunblane Primary School could really do with its own article too if anyone has the time. There was also the murder of Philip Lawrence on 8th December 1996. Dahliarose (talk) 18:48, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

Yes, this is exactly the kind of stuff I'm looking for. Thank you Dahliarose and Tafkam! Also, I totally agree about distinguished school openings. The only issue is finding schools that have the exact date of their establishment. Or perhaps we should be less stringent about requiring actual days of the month. Again, the current archive is still a work in progress at Portal:Schools/Selected_anniversaries so it's really still up in the air. Anyone's free to completely change it if they want. Oddly, I haven't found anything for August so I don't actually know what it looks like on Portal:Schools --Jh12 (talk) 18:54, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

Notablility / References

Should school articles in which the only reference is to the school web site be tagged with Template:Unreferenced as a school web site does not meet minimum notability standards? Dbiel ^(Talk) 01:20, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

Yes, but because of their "auto-biographical" nature, not because of notability. Wikipedia doesn't care for self-published sources, and a school's web site qualifies as one. They're not forbidden as references, but they're also not "good" references. RossPatterson (talk) 20:49, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

Personally I find the "References" template to be a statement of the obvious - a bit like the "please expand" added to a 2 sentence stub. If you can spare the extra 10 seconds then find a reference and add it. It can show the "owners" what is required and it leaves wikipedia free of these boxes. Cheers Victuallers (talk) 22:52, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

I see it a little differently. I see {{Unreferenced}} as a more polite alternative to proposed deletion. I expect most folks who add {{Unreferenced}}, {{Fact}}, etc. are really thinking "I think this needs to go, but lets see if those who disagree can support their position". RossPatterson (talk) 23:57, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

Holyhead High School

This new article would be an ideal candidate for Did You Know on the front page if it can be suitably expanded with a few references. Is anyone up for the challenge? Dahliarose (talk) 09:20, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

Can someone check it? I have constructed it from 3rd party sources, but there must be some from the school's web site etc. Victuallers (talk) 15:35, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

School year dating

Hello, I am not part of the project but I need to know how to write school years. Would you write "1983 – 1984 school year", or would you write "1983–84 school year"? Thanks, Dabomb87 (talk) 00:20, 13 August 2008 (UTC)

I dont know of any guideline on this. I think the main thing is to be consistent, and use one way the entire way through the article. I think the latter is preferred by many editors though. Five Years 16:44, 13 August 2008 (UTC)

WP:DATE#Longer_periods seems to advocate writing as "1983–84". DoubleBlue (Talk) 17:23, 13 August 2008 (UTC)

To my knowledge this is the correct method. Calebrw (talk) 21:34, 13 August 2008 (UTC)

OK, thank you. Dabomb87 (talk) 22:54, 14 August 2008 (UTC)

Proposed grammar school merge

I have proposed merging Grammar schools in the United Kingdom into Grammar school. Please discuss at Talk:Grammar school#proposed merge. Kanguole (talk) 11:05, 17 August 2008 (UTC)

Canadian Schools and Category:Schools by country

For some reason, quite a few of Canada's primary and secondary schools have not been added to our project. This is in significant contrast to Wikipedia:WikiProject Education in Australia and school articles from every other country in the world. We need these articles to be tagged as WPSchools as well, especially since their assessment/importance rating is based on different standards. Canadian schools via Wikipedia:WikiProject Education in Canada use the WikiProject Canada banner and are assessed for importance based on total Canadian importance. None are assessed above mid importance.

I also noticed that a large number of schools under Category:Schools by country were not tagged by any project tags Category:Schools in Oman, Rwanda, Qatar, Peru, Paraguay, etc are some of the categories I've now added. Were these pages supposed to be tagged by Alanbly's bot? --Jh12 (talk) 17:46, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

WikiProject Schools and Wikipedia Release Version 0.7

Wikipedia has been gearing up for another Release Version, creating a DVD version of Wikipedia for release to, among others, school children. I was discussing with a Release Version member at Wikipedia_talk:Release_Version#WikiProject_Schools_and_Version_0.7 to include WPSchools, in particular because only two of our schools: Hopkins and Stuyvesant were initially listed. The selection bot will probably now select a few more using a formula, which partly includes the number of hitcounts the school page receives: see [1]. We'll probably also want to include a general list of Top, High, FA, and GA articles that are missed by the bot. And we may also want to provide specific area lists for special community releases depending on what the Release team requests: say all the schools under Category:Schools in Ontario. I don't think it will be too difficult since we already categorize schools by location and quality. Just wanted to give everyone a heads-up. --Jh12 (talk) 02:17, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

The selection lists are currently being worked out by the bot; selected articles will appear at [2]. There will be around twenty pages for the whole project, starting with [page 1]. It may be down at the moment, but when I saw the list, there were already some page 1 finds like Raffles Institution, Victoria Institution, and Hwa Chong Institution. note: The Chinese High School merged to form Hwa Chong, which was assessed low importance. You can sort the selections by importance, etc. by clicking the labels at the top. I also saw some articles that I'll be removing from our project: like Pocatello, Idaho, Damien: Omen II, and St. John's College, U.S. --Jh12 (talk) 03:28, 14 September 2008 (UTC)

It's interesting having a third-party check on our assessments, and the bot has highlighted some potentially interesting articles which we've previously overlooked. It's disappointing that only a small selection of school articles have so far been selected with a strong Anglo-centric bias. I hope they decide to add a few more. It's good to see that articles we've highlighted as being of top and high importance do at least get picked up by the bot for review by the team. I've started to re-assess some of the articles highlighted by the bot. The importance of some of these articles seems to have been completely overlooked. Dahliarose (talk) 12:11, 14 September 2008 (UTC)

Hit count and importance

This is more for curiosity rather than utility, but I just realized that we can use the hit count of school articles via http://stats.grok.se/ to help determine relative importance. There are a great many reasons why it is unreliable. After Sarah Palin was selected as a vice-presidential candidate in America, Wasilla High School received 17000+ hits in 5 days. An active editor, being a GA-article, being listed for review, etc. But if examining two similar schools, it could be another tool to use. Take the selective public magnet schools in New York City; page views and our importance rating in August 2008
Stuyvesant High School has been viewed 14122 High
Bronx High School of Science has been viewed 5406 High
Brooklyn Technical High_School has been viewed 3953 High
Hunter College High School has been viewed 3469 Mid

Compared to other Newsweek Public Elites:
Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology has been viewed 3921 High
Bergen County Academies has been viewed 1544 High
Benjamin Franklin High School (New_Orleans, Louisiana) has been viewed 1497 Mid
Illinois Mathematics and_Science_Academy has been viewed 1258 High
North Carolina School of_Science_and_Mathematics has been viewed 1244 High
Northwood High School (Irvine, California) has been viewed 819 High
Whitney High School (Cerritos, California) has been viewed 796 High

Compared to Top-importance schools:
Phillips Exeter Academy has been viewed 14140 Top
Phillips Academy has been viewed 9517 Top
Eton College has been viewed 25868 Top

It seems to fall in line with how we assessed, although now I think if any public school in the US is assessed Top importance, it should be Stuyvesant High School with 14,122 page views in August. --Jh12 (talk) 02:17, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

Many thanks for alerting us to this useful tool. It's an interesting exercise comparing viewing stats. As you say the stats could be distorted for various reasons and are potentially open to manipulation, but in combination with other more reliable factors (eg, published sources, alumni) then the hit counter provides a useful comparison and could potentially highlight previously overlooked articles. I do hope they manage to get the counter up and running so that we can get the stats within individual projects. It would be interesting to know which are our most viewed school articles. I agree that Stuyvesant High School should be top importance. The stats are convincing but the article is even more so - lots of notable alumni (including four Nobel prize winners), loads of books written about the school, masses of media coverage, and of course the Frank McCourt connection. I've upgraded the school, and added it to our list on the WPSchools page. If anyone has any time and would like a challenge how about a List of Nobel prize winners by school article... Dahliarose (talk) 12:14, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

Don't forget to archive your web sources

One last thing, I've been archiving more and more of the web pages I use as sources using WebCite. I highly recommend doing this, because you never know when the webpages might disappear on you and not all pages are archived by the Internet Archive --Jh12 (talk) 02:33, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

I never do this, but I know I should. Maybe one day when I get more ambitious. :) Calebrw (talk) 13:08, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

Assessment requests

When users respond to assessment requests at WP:WPSCH/A#R can I kindly request that any detailed comments on the assessment are left in the assessment summaries section rather than (or as well as) the assessment requests as the assessment summaries section is archived, the assessment requests are not. Also please strike off assessments you have done so it is easier for me and others to go through assessment requests. Camaron | Chris (talk) 14:48, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

Jh12 (talk · contribs): apprentice to experienced

Would anybody object if I added Jh12 to the experienced section at assessments, as he seems to have the experience now to be in this group. Camaron | Chris (talk) 19:29, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

I have added him to experienced given that there appears to be no problems. Camaron | Chris (talk) 11:05, 21 September 2008 (UTC)

Support the move. Five Years 01:58, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Support per above. Calebrw (talk) 12:27, 24 September 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia 0.7 articles have been selected for WikiProject Schools

Wikipedia 0.7 is a collection of English Wikipedia articles due to be released on DVD, and available for free download, later this year. The Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team has made an automated selection of articles for Version 0.7.

We would like to ask you to review the articles selected from this project. These were chosen from the articles with this project's talk page tag, based on the rated importance and quality. If there are any specific articles that should be removed, please let us know at Wikipedia talk:Version 0.7. You can also nominate additional articles for release, following the procedure at Wikipedia:Release Version Nominations.

A list of selected articles with cleanup tags, sorted by project, is available. The list is automatically updated each hour when it is loaded. Please try to fix any urgent problems in the selected articles. A team of copyeditors has agreed to help with copyediting requests, although you should try to fix simple issues on your own if possible.

We would also appreciate your help in identifying the version of each article that you think we should use, to help avoid vandalism or POV issues. These versions can be recorded at this project's subpage of User:SelectionBot/0.7. We are planning to release the selection for the holiday season, so we ask you to select the revisions before October 20. At that time, we will use an automatic process to identify which version of each article to release, if no version has been manually selected. Thanks! For the Wikipedia 1.0 Editorial team, SelectionBot 22:57, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Oasis Academy Coulsdon

Can someone please re assess Oasis Academy Coulsdon please. I have expanded it greatly, it has six or seven references and its about three times its original length. I think it also might be a good candidate for 'Did You Know?' if an appropriate and/or interesting fact can be found. Cheers. The Flying Spaghetti Monster! 20:49, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Scratch that I have found the request review section and listed it there. Sorry for not looking carefully before. The Flying Spaghetti Monster! 20:54, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Appropriate edit?

Would the following edit found in Queen of Apostles School be consider acceptable for Wikipedia?

Queen of Apostles recently bought a 30 student school bus to try and offset the high rising prices of diesel fuel. the bus runs on unleaded and is used for thee Sussex Bus route which services about 20 students at the max.

It does not appear encyclopedic to me. But then, I am still learning what is acceptable and what is not. Dbiel ^(Talk) 23:37, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

I'd say no. A good test is the "does anyone really care". its just plain trivia. Five Years 02:03, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

I'd have to agree on both counts (trivia & non-encyclopedic), unless it was a particularly innovative program they came up with that attracted media acclaim... – Zedla (talk) 02:48, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

QEMS

I would like to upload the image from the QEMS website: http://qems.org.uk/files/images/tour/001.jpg but cannot get my head round the licensing, can anyone help? ATMarsden^{Talk · {Semi-Retired}} 18:33, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, also, it's for use on QEMS ATMarsden^{Talk · {Semi-Retired}} 18:34, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

Unless they give permission, I'm afraid WP can't use it. But can't you take a photo of the same exterior view yourself? Kanguole (talk) 11:21, 21 September 2008 (UTC)

If you feel like navigating the process for obtaining permission, WP:COPYREQ is the relevant page to look at. If you can, taking a picture yourself or finding another editor who might be willing to go take a picture would be easier. – Zedla (talk) 02:45, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Yes, it's easiest to simply take a picture yourself. If that's not possible, I wrote a draft image request for a different school at User:Jh12/Draft2. You can e-mail the request with the necessary changes and if successful: upload the image to an appropriate name with the corresponding GFDL or Creative Commons license and then forward the image request and response with the Wikipedia image location to "permissions-en AT wikimedia DOT org". --Jh12 (talk) 21:42, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

somewhat unusual afd

[3] Possibly better sourcing than usual. DGG (talk) 04:27, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Some school importance changes

I thought I'd just quickly mention that I've gone through Africa Almanac and WSJ-US for High-Top importance school articles for the U.S. and Africa, and it's clear that the school articles just haven't caught up to the quality of the schools. That said, I may be changing some more importances around and listing them at Assessment summaries. Please question, change, or discuss any of them at will. I'll start with upgrading Groton School to Top importance. Thanks, --Jh12 (talk) 12:38, 24 September 2008 (UTC)

Request Help Using Infobox

I'm trying to use Template:Infobox School District (as this project suggests) in my sandbox, where I am creating an article about my local school district. Unfortunately I am having trouble. Right now I have the box sitting at the bottom of the page. If I move it anywhere else, it ends up screwing something up (including contents or references in the box, removing spaces between internal wikilinks in the opening, etc). This is my first article written from scratch, so I expected problems. If somebody has some time to fix this (it should be quick), I would greatly appreciate it. Thanks! ~ Wadester16 (talk) 19:22, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

I'll take a look. --Jh12 (talk) 19:40, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

I went ahead and replaced the infobox with {{Infobox School}}, which has several more features and is more visually attractive. Note that you don't have to code the template onto every page, you just transclude the infobox using the parameters provided such as Template:Infobox_School#Fields. Best, --Jh12 (talk) 19:54, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

Thanks! That looks much better. I had preferred the easier code layout but was unsure if I was "allowed" to use it under the circumstances. That will make my life easier and the article more appealing. Thanks again for your help Jh12. ~ Wadester16 (talk) 19:56, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

Experienced editor needed!!

Hi I've just looked at the article Ripley St. Thomas Church of England High School most of it seems to be original research or just totally unencyclopaedic . It is a bit of a mess I don't really know the policies on this but it looks like a lot needs to be removed.Could someone more experienced have a go at sorting it. Thanks 安東尼 TALKies 12:35, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

Gymnasium Carolinum (Osnabrück)

I've just created a new article on the Gymnasium Carolinum (Osnabrück) having discovered that we are missing an article on this very old and notable school. It's possibly a DYK nomination. ...Did you know that the Gymnasium Carolinum in Osnabrück, Germany, was founded in 804 by Charlemagne, king of the Franks?... There's a long article in German but I'm struggling to find English-language sources, though there are plentiful sources in German. Can anyone help? I've also asked for help on the talk page of the German article. Dahliarose (talk) 15:09, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

If you happen to know German, feel free to use German sources, those are acceptable - if you don't, well, that's much more of a problem, and one I cannot unfortunately help with. matt91486 (talk) 04:45, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

I'm having difficulty finding English-language sources as well. If no one can help at the German Wikipedia or at another project, someone could try one of the loose translation services at babel fish or google

High school conferences

I can't remember if I've asked this here before or not - is there a general consensus on whether high school sports conferences fall under the jurisdiction of WP:SCHOOLS? If not, there is not a natural WikiProject. It's definitely related, but I just wasn't sure if it fit in. I've personally done some work with them, but there is little standardization, and it would just be nice to set some guidelines/links to templates somewhere. Maybe a task force or something? I don't know. matt91486 (talk) 04:34, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

Yes, high school athletic conferences fall under this WikiProject (e.g. Category:High school sports associations in the United States), although I'm not sure we have any set guidelines or standards yet. --Jh12 (talk) 05:00, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

Alright. I'd be interested in trying to set up some guidelines/a structured page to writing about them. There seems to be a very little rhyme or reason between the existing articles, and it would be good to get some standardization. matt91486 (talk) 21:41, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

Attendace Zone Maps for Public Schools

I posted this topic on the last (archived) talk page, but it was archived before anybody responded, so I am going to post it again. I think it would be really cool to have a map of the school's attendance zone for public schools. This would give readers a visual representation of the area that that school covers in relation to other schools, similar to the maps we have on Wikipedia for cities that show a county with a portion of it highlighted that show the city boundaries. This would be especially cool for high schools, since they're very competitive with adjacent high schools and can be very representative of communities, yet people never see their districts in relation to others.

These maps can easily be found on the web site for most school systems. Given that I live in Metro Atlanta, I have found the maps for most of the school systems around metro Atlanta, but they need to be reformatted so that only one section is highlighted. I know little to nothing about image editing, so it would be greatly appreciated if somebody who is good with a program like Photoshop could help me standardize these. The maps I have found are: Fulton County, Cobb County, Atlanta Public Schools, Gwinnett County, Cherokee County, and Forsyth County. I could not find a map of the attendance zones for DeKalb or Clayton Counties, but I did find a map of where the schools are themselves. Again, any help from somebody who is proficient in advanced image editing would be greatly appreciated. --Hippie Metalhead (talk) 03:58, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

I am concerned that these change too frequently. However, school-district are useful along with a link to the current attendance zones. If the school district boundaries are the city, county, state, or other legal entity with an easy-to-find boundary, then they don't need to be shown. Also, in many cases, boundaries can change suddenly, such as if a school closes mid-year due to a budget crisis, a suddenly-condemned building, or a sudden shift in student population like after Hurricane Katrina. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 04:27, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

Really, you think? In my experience that never happens unless they build a new school, in which case they take parts of the surrounding high school zones to make the zone for the new one. But other than that, they stay the same from year to year. Hurricane Katrina seems kind of like a rare case. --Hippie Metalhead (talk) 00:51, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

Our local 20,000 student school district makes minor adjustments every year to the extent that a physical map of attendance zones is usually not prepared. I'm pretty sure this happens in most urban/suburban areas, but it only makes the news when a long-standing border line moves or a new high school splits up a very loyal area. I agree that this would be pretty cool to have on Wikipedia, but it's very hard to do at the school level. District boundaries, however, are pretty permanent (and there are a lot less of them) so that might be an interesting experiment to try before approaching the idea of school boundaries... --Hebisddave (talk) 16:51, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Proposing splitting Delhi Public School Society. Any suggestions?

I currently find myself involved into the above article, mainly due to encountering it while being on Vandalism patrol. The article is in a very sorry state; It reads like a brochure, has no sources, contains little indication of notability and is in essence a single article for a grand total of 26 different schools, rendering it quite unreadable. I already removed the worst parts of advertising from it, but doing so left the article in a bit of a mangled state as some subsections were virtually nothing but pure spam.

The next step i would like to take is splitting the schools out of the article in separate stubs; The focus of the article should be the organization, not an entire myriad of schools that exists in that organization. Doing so would make it (In my opinion) easier to maintain the article, and would at the same time improve readability. However i think that might prove difficult; The individual schools might not all be notable (Some certainly are, some might be, but some are almost certainly not). At the same time the complete lack of references will make it quite hard to create stubs out of the article.

To be honest, i am not sure where to begin due to the articles sorry state. I am pretty sure the non de-adverted version would not have survived a CSD, and i assume that even the cleaned up version would have a hard time at an AFD. Any suggestion/help with these problems? Excirial ^{(Contact me,Contribs)} 16:23, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

These are some of the most prestigious schools in India. Two of the schools were recently named as the first and third most respected schools in India [4]. The Delhi Public School Society also has branches in other countries, and is hugely influential.I would guess that all of the schools are sufficiently notable to merit their own articles. There will be plenty of references as Indian newspapers are published in English. I've discovered three DPS schools with pre-existing articles which weren't linked into the main parent page. I've now linked these in, and have had a go at tidying the article up. It would be a huge job to write proper articles for all these schools. It's probably best to leave the schools in the parent page article until people are ready to tackle the new articles. Dahliarose (talk) 10:48, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

Henry Abbott Technical High School

Just wanted to get some feed back before deleting the following major section of article Henry Abbott Technical High School which is only a list of instructors which as I read the instructions, should not be included in the article. see: Henry Abbott Technical High School#Trades Dbiel ^(Talk) 20:00, 14 October 2008 (UTC)

I completely agree with removing the instructors, although optionally you may want to keep the trade types themselves like Automotive Collision Repair and Refinishing, Automotive Technology, etc. Although, even then it still badly needs references --Jh12 (talk) 09:12, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

help please

I'm to much of a chicken to edit this to add and don't know much about the school I know something that needs to be added to the filming on campus but no one seems to look on the talk page there Talk:Van Nuys High School I know for sure after seeing the video it leaked on a chinese site and after 2 months of waiting the temptation was too great they did a bit of fancy editing to make it look like the name of the school that the lead singer, bassist and camera guy went to and they used in the album title —Preceding unsigned comment added by Musicobsessed6 (talk • contribs) 23:28, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

Have replied on User talk:Musicobsessed6. --Jh12 (talk) 10:28, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

I never got a response of the page and issue number but MTV just posted a video that the first thing is William(the lead singer) saying that was where it was filmed the video Musicobsessed6 (talk) 02:12, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Good enough for me. I changed the sentence at Van_Nuys_High_School#Filming_on_the_Van_Nuys_High_School_campus slightly and added the reference. Best, --Jh12 (talk) 22:20, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Middle schools in China

I've just noticed that the article on Shanghai Hongqiao Middle School has been deleted via PROD. Middle schools in China and in some other communist countries are equivalent to secondary schools elsewhere (or high schools in America). I don't know if this PROD can now be contested and put through the proper channels. Chinese schools are already badly under-represented on Wikipedia. Is there some way that the PROD guidelines can be changed so that communist middle schools don't get mistakenly deleted in this way through what appears to be a misunderstanding of the usage of the term middle school in these countries? Dahliarose (talk) 12:24, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

All articles deleted under WP:PROD can be challenged at any time by any user, and can be restored on a reasonable request to any admin, I am taking this as one of these and I have restored the article. It will now require an AFD for deletion to happen. The PROD guidelines does not list specific articles circumstances of which articles should or should not be PRODed, but if there is a special precedent regarding Chinese articles perhaps it should be listed at WP:OUTCOMES. Camaron | Chris (talk) 12:43, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Thanks Camaron. I can see why the article was prodded as it's a very poor article, and I'm struggling to find any sources. We could really do with some help from some Chinese editors. Dahliarose (talk) 13:34, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Deletion and school projects

I see I posted this at the wrong wikiproject Deletion of teacher assigned projects Kopachuk Middle School...there has been a reply to whit that the student in order to meet his teacher's pre-requisite had to use user space rather than article space. Why invite teachers and students to learn and write articles on wikipedia if they are deleted? It seems moot. SriMesh | talk 16:51, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Here is another school project where the teacher has asked the kids to write about local Edmonton bands which got speedy deleted, and the kids are giving up and asking why bother with the teacher's assignment if they won't stay on wikipedia. band article deletion The articles created at this Unannoucned class project for the most part survived AFD, and they received help from various wikipedians about manual of style to help them through the AFD nominations. SriMesh | talk 23:05, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Wikiproject membership - Admins - coordinators

Can this Wikipedia talk:School and university projects talk page project page have membership and admins -perhaps through wikiproject Education or its child projects, Wikipedia:WikiProject Education in Australia, Wikipedia:WikiProject Education in Canada, Wikipedia:WikiProject Universities, Wikipedia:WikiProject Schools, Wikipedia:WikiProject School Years, Wikipedia:WikiProject Alternative education, Wikipedia:WikiProject Homeschooling... to help find articles which come onto wikipedia as is commented upon in the deletion section above and get deleted before it is discovered they are part of a class project, so that the teacher/students can be contacted about templates etc. This message also posted at the other wikiprojects as well. Kind Regards SriMesh | talk 23:20, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Found it ....Wikiproject Classroom coordination with coordinators, and instructions for students with contacts. Tis already made. SriMesh | talk 23:44, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Category Structure

Ok, I have done nothing around schools (admitted rookie in this realm), but found some vandalism recently; then side-tracked into the realm of categories. BUT, I came here looking for some idea of the "Structure" of categories and/or lists? (Admittedly US Centric, but the idea should apply) Schools by country, schools by state, ?Schools by District?, Schools by type, etc.
PolicyQ: When does "Education" split to "Type of institution"; University, High School, etc.
StandardsQ: Should "schools by country" actually be "US Schools" or "Schools in {Country}"
PolicyQ: Below the state (or other sub-country) level; should categories be by "city" or by "District"
Example: Bob's elementary school in [[Category:Elementary Schools in {District}]]
Then District in [[Category:Districts_(School) in {STATE}]]
These would then be subcategories of the STATE in question?
My thanks to any and all that have some guidance.Mjquin_id (talk) 17:08, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure this is written down anywhere. I can comment on what I believe is the current standard based on work at Category:Schools. The best way may be to explore that base category to get a better picture. Schools are categorized by geographic location first, so a private school that was both a Middle School and High school would be in Category:Middle schools in Random State and Category:High schools in Random State. "Bob's elementary school" would probably be in Category:Elementary schools in Random State. Subcategories for state and then city are only created when the base category becomes too large: see Category:High schools in New Jersey; if all of the New Jersey high schools were in the state category instead of the city, there would be well over 100 listings. Categorizing by city is what is currently done. School districts are too variable in size/geographic location, and it's likely some countries may not use "district". I think it is far better to have templates for district/school groupings: as in Delsea Regional School District and Jesuit High School (New Orleans). --Jh12 (talk) 22:52, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

Notability, articles versus lists

User:DMacks and I are having a conversation at Talk:Towson High School about the notability of a certain Zack Merrick and whether he should be included on the notable alumni list for Towson High School. I've mentioned the proposal/conversation at Talk:List_of_Stuyvesant_High_School_people#Proposal which came out of Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Schools/Archive_14#Notable_alumni. If anyone wants to chime in over there about this either way it would be appreciated. Thanks – Zedla (talk) 04:27, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Tring School

Can anyone help with the article on Tring School? I have twice tried to remove unencyclopaedic information on the school uniform and names of the people in charge of the houses but a user has twice reinstated the information. I cannot now revert again because of the three revert rule. Dahliarose (talk) 11:08, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

I have left a note with the user and commented with a suggestion at Talk:Tring School. Camaron | Chris (talk) 12:04, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Wikiproject Palm Beach County Schools Proposals

Please comment at Proposals#Wikiproject Palm Beach County Schools. Thanks. -- Suntag ☼ 16:27, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

List of boarding schools

I checked the article about all of the boarding schools in the world, but i noticed that there isn't a Lithuania list. Could someone start it? I know that there are some of those in Lithuania. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.79.19.225 (talk) 11:56, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

An example of overcategorization

A new editor with whom I have been working has, in his enthusiasm, created a new category named Category:Continuation High schools in Kern County, California for one new article he has created. Clearly, this should be in the long-standing Category:High schools in Kern County, California and the new category should be deleted. I'm in an awkward situation here as this editor may react in a emotional fashion if I were to put the category up at CfD, no matter how strongly I feel it should be done, and most of his work has been quite useful to the project so if one of you folks could find a moment to nominate this category, I'd appreciate it. (Not mentioning me in the nom would also be appreciated.) Thanks. - Dravecky (talk) 14:07, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

Houston Independent School District - How best to organize this?

I started Houston Independent School District - But I'm not sure how best to organize this article? I started this article back in the early days of WP, but now I want to get this to at least GA status. How do I reorganize this article? WhisperToMe (talk) 22:37, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

Could Use a Disinterested Hand

I am hoping that I can find some assistance with the Marin Academy article, a private high school in California. I have been keeping an eye on the page (I am an alumni) and recently the article has been given several major changes by an unresponsive IP. Their edits have often introduced POV statements that I have tried to flag with citation tags, but I am a bit wary to intervene too aggressively as I have been heavily involved in the article and don't want to give an impression that it is "mine" to decide what does and doesn't belong (other editors have of course been involved in the page, but sadly few other than myself are present on the Talk page). The article itself could probably use a lot of improvements to bring it up to the standards of this WikiProject as well, so if there is any interest in providing impartial assistance it would be most welcome. Cuffeparade (talk) 06:21, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

I have added some references and cleaned up the tone of the article. However, some sections such as Marin Academy#Athletics need cleanup by more experienced editors. I've placed the page on my watchlist and will keep an eye for POV edits. Cheers, Cunard (talk) 07:52, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

Child porn, etc.

It's sad but true that many schools have had teachers or staff who have been arrested for possessing child pornography or molesting children. In instances where administrators were found to have had knowledge of the crimes or were otherwise accused of negligence, the cases would seem relevant to the schools' articles. But in cases where the administration had no knowledge, and where students weren't involved, is it still appropriate to mention these arrests? Here's a recent example, [5], but I've seen it come up with other schools (and camps). Thoughts? ·:· Will Beback ·:· 23:44, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

I would say "is this news?" If it is, it's too soon to tell, leave it in for a few weeks then re-evaluate but bear in mind that WP:BLP applies not just to biographical articles but to biographical content in non-biographical articles. "Is it of long-lasting importance that affected the school's external reputation for more than a few years, or is expected to do so? Did it result in a multi-million-dollar settlement, establish case law, or result in a notable reform?" If none of the above, then I would say take it out. If it's a current event, you may have an edit-war on your hands if you take it out, so you might want to wait a few months until it blows over in the press. Look at the edit history for Prestonwood Baptist Church in the months after a May, 2008 scandal. By this time next year, someone could probably delete all reference to that scandal and the removal might go unchallenged. In 5 years, probably a lot sooner, we'll know for certain if the scandal had any long-lasting impact and can judge it's "encylopediocity" then. 6 months on it's just too soon to tell.

By the way, this goes for all scandals, including cheating scandals, financial scandals, and other malfeasance.

In the particular example you cited, I would have removed the edit on the grounds that it's too fresh to know how the community will react. If the next mention in the press is "former teacher pleads guilty" and it's never mentioned in the press again, it was not encyclopedic. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 00:02, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

Good observations. Thanks for the feedback. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 00:53, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

County Templates

The Template:Schools in Hampshire recently became rather unmanageable simply due to the number of schools involved. After some discussion on Template talk:Schools in Hampshire the template was 'split' into its current form. However, User:Xn4 commented that this new form is a deviation from the rest of the templates (which were previously standardised). Just looking for some comments on this. -- Flutefluteflute ^{Talk Contributions} 16:38, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

Thank you very much for airing this here, Flutefluteflute. We have had several discussions here at WikiProject Schools (and in the talk pages of some early templates) over the years to develop a suitable template with consistency (as well as flexibility). One of the more significant is archived at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Schools/Archive_7#Standardising UK county templates. Actually, I don't agree that the Template:Schools in Hampshire had become exactly "unmanageable". For what it's worth, my view is that I should prefer this approach to be the exception and not the rule. If it is to be adopted, I'm not convinced that in splitting a template up into several subsidiary templates, which then join together into something more collapsible, the basic structure of division should be changed from the general pattern. In particular, it seems to me to cause confusion to rename the Comprehensive schools division as Secondary schools, when most notable independent schools (and, of course, most of them which are included in the templates) are secondary schools; and when all Grammar schools, where they exist, are secondary schools. Also, as our regular county template format has a division for Former schools (where there are any notable ones to be included), I should prefer, for consistency's sake, that any multi-template approach, where deemed essential, should continue that approach, instead of the former schools being added into the new subsidiary templates they would belong in if they were not former schools. Both of these changes seem to me to make the navigation templates less useful. The general pattern isn't an arbitrary one, it was carefully thought out and developed by discussion... of course, we need to keep an open mind if there are ways of doing things which are really better. Xn4 (talk) 23:49, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

"Comprehensive" refers to the admissions policy of a school, not to the level of education provided nor to the funding stream. Primary schools can be comprehensive schools - in fact, most of them are. Therefore if the wording is to be "comprehensive schools" then all primary schools should also be listed in that section, which makes a nonsense of having a separate primary schools section. There's also nothing to stop an independent school having a comprehensive admissions policy; again, quite a few do (as long as the fees are paid, there are no exams to pass to gain entry etc.).

Whichever way we split the schools, the wording should be consistent. If it's down to funding streams, the split should be by LEA (in Hampshire's case, Hampshire, Porsmouth, Southampton) plus independent schools. If it's down to level of education, we have primary (possibly split into infant / junior), secondary, further. If it's admissions policy, there's comprehensive and non-comprehensive. But shoving "comprehensive" between "primary" and "further" is like categorising schools by the colour of their uniform and then adding a category for "English language" in the middle: it just doens't fit. waggers (talk) 09:59, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

I agree that we should endeavour to have consistent wording and a consistent style across all the templates. This makes navigation much easier for the reader. My understanding of the term comprehensive school (in the UK at least) is that it normally refers to the secondary school level of education and only to state schools. Independent schools by definition are not comprehensive because your child cannot go to such schools unless the parents have enough money to pay the fees. Some independent schools are "all-ability" schools but that is not the same thing as comprehensive. The changes to the Hampshire template are to my mind confusing. Secondary school covers all schools which educate children at the secondary level so it makes no sense to split independent secondary schools into a separate category. It makes sense to me to split secondary schools into sub-categories such as comprehensive, grammar, academy and independent. Former schools are better as a separate category. I'm also not at all keen on creating a separate template for primary schools in any county. Very few primary schools merit individual articles and such a template is not therefore warranted. It's only likely to encourage the creation of lots of non-notable primary school articles which will end up getting deleted. I'm also not keen on splitting schools into LEA areas, as the boundaries are often artificial and subject to frequent change. There might be a case for creating special templates for large urban areas such as Southampton and Portsmouth if there are sufficient schools to merit a split. I note that there is currently for instance a separate template for Milton Keynes. See Category:English education navboxes by county. I agree too that it is better to have all the schools listed in one template rather than split into lots of little templates. Dahliarose (talk) 17:33, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

As I have stated at Template talk:Schools in Hampshire I oppose the creation of massive templates, I think there size should be kept reasonable and that can be achieved by splits, even if there are disputes on how this would be done. If necessary, lists which are better to manage larger numbers can be created to compliment navboxes, with them being fully wikified. I have also pointed out on the template talk page that lists are split unevenly for Hampshire. Camaron | Chris (talk) 19:12, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

The wording is secondary; the classification is the important thing. The original grouping was:

• LA maintained primary schools
• LA maintained middle schools
• LA maintained secondary schools with comprehensive admissions policies
• LA maintained secondary schools with fully selective admissions
• non-selective LA maintained secondary schools in selective areas
• academies (and the 3 remaining CTCs)
• sixth-form colleges
• preparatory schools
• senior independent schools
• former schools

and that seems a very useful organization. We need short names for these to fit in navboxes, category names and the "type" field of the infobox. And while "comprehensive" and "grammar" both have a variety of meanings, the ones we've been using are at least widely accepted usages. I've never heard a primary or non-selective independent call themselves a comprehensive. But it might be a good idea for the project to write down the intended meaning of these abbreviated terms when used in these 3 places, to forestall local arguments. Kanguole (talk) 18:07, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

That seems like quite a lot of distinctions (I'm trying to avoid the word "category" so we don't get confused with WP categories) but it's certainly comprehensive (no pun intended) and makes perfect sense to me. A thread has been started below on the use of "former schools" so I'll reserve my comments on that for that thread. waggers (talk) 08:50, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

13 award-winning schools and districts need articles

There are 13 redlinks in New American High Schools. These are award-winning schools. I'll take them as I have time but please help me get the red out. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 03:35, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

I linked three of them. Two of them I linked to their home district. Personally, I'd prefer a thorough write up of a school district before one specific school gets one, but that's just me. One of the districts had no article so I created it. ~ Wadester16 (talk) 18:25, 6 December 2008 (UTC) (forgot to sign the first time) ~ Wadester16 (talk) 18:25, 6 December 2008 (UTC)