Wikipedia:Peer review/Gloucester County College/archive1

Gloucester County College

This peer review discussion has been closed.
I've listed this article for peer review because…

The article has been significantly expanded, but there are questions as to whether it should be expanded further - see its talk page, under "Expansions?". It also needs rerating (by anyone who's a member of the two WikiProjects involved, other than those heavily involved in its editing such as myself). Any suggestions for improvement would be greatly appreciated, as well.

Thanks very much, Allens (talk) 16:17, 19 January 2012 (UTC)

I would like to get this to GA status, BTW. Allens (talk) 14:49, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

Brianboulton comments: You have obviously spent time on this article. However, my first thought is that it has come to peer review too early, and needs rather a lot of work before it is ready for a detailed review. I have looked at a few college articles recently promoted to GA, and this does not yet approach their general standard.

Specific areas for further attention:-

• The tone seems less like that of a neutral encyclopedia article and more like that of the outline of a brochure. This might reflect your closeness to the institution; often this kind of article is better written from a distance.

• • The proportion of adjuncts should be compared to that of other, similar colleges, for instance - I'm pretty sure it's higher than average. Is editing on tone something the GOCE does? (And that's odd; I would not have thought I'd have been that much affected by only one semester of teaching plus two days there.)
    • I am not a fan of the GOCE. It's more a case, I think, of using judgement to ensure the account is neutrally presented. A stronger history section can help to take the balance away from the appearance of a profile of the college.Brianboulton (talk) 17:12, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

• General article structure: There are far too many very short sections and subsections, some only a single sentence in length. A single piece of information, e.g. that relating to KotoriCon, does not warrant a subsection to itself. Either expand the information or combine some of the short sections

• • OK. I can easily take some info from the KotoriCon article, for instance.

• The lead is short, and does not summarise the whole article

• • Oh? I had tried to make sure I inserted something from each section, which seemed to be what the University style guide was suggesting. I'll see about expanding it.
    • I think it will be easier to expand the lead when you have dealt with other points from this review. Brianboulton (talk) 17:12, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

• The History section is especially weak and uninformative, with no information whatever relating to the period between 1970 and 2011

• • I'll see if I can get access to some newspaper archives for the intervening time period (which may also help with the "third-party sources" problem in some cases). The college did recently have a 40th anniversary occasion, with a booklet to accompany it, but I was trying to avoid using something that's inevitably pretty promotional.

• In general, information needs to be presented much more clearly. For example, the detail in "Enrollments" is muddled and disorganised.

• • I'll check with the GOCE for some assistance. To me it seems crystal-clear, of course!

• Overlinking: common terms such as "co-educational", "nursing", "high school" etc do not require links.

• • OK. (I do disagree on Nursing - it wasn't actually until I was at GCC that I discovered that an RN is an associate's-level degree, not a bachelor's... and I grew up around nurses - my father's a physician!)

• Check the appropriateness of some links. For example, that on "President" links to "University President"

• • Well, otherwise it would be linking to country presidents as the primary meaning...
    • Why link it at all? People know what the office of college president is, especially in an article about a college. Brianboulton (talk) 17:12, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

• Overcitation, for example in the "Organization and administration" section, where a string of six citations supports routine factual information. Similar occurrences throughout the article

• • I'll take a look for other instances. That one is a special case - nobody that I've contacted seems quite sure exactly how the trustee appointment process works, with contradictory info from different places! I will try to make sure there isn't duplication of referencing, however. I was told by the person who changed it from Stub to Start-class that it needed more references, and I may have overreacted.

• Numerous "third-party source" tags need attention

• • I'm actually the one who put those in; I agree; also see above.

• The inclusion of geographical coordinates is unnecessary. People aren't going to use a compass to find this college!

• • Actually, the infobox for universities/colleges specifies geographic coordinates should be included. I find it weird myself...

• • • The infobox includes a coordinates field, but you don't have to fill it. An obsession with geographic coordinates swept Wikipedia a few years ago and I suspect this field is a result of that. If you think it's weird (as I do), don't include them and defend your action on commonsense grounds. The infobox does not make the rules. Brianboulton (talk) 17:12, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

I'm sorry if this reads rather depressingly, but I hope it helps you in deciding how best to work on the article in the future.

• • I was wanting feedback, and suspected I needed it, so you gave what I was looking for, don't worry. (Any comments on what's on the Talk page, BTW? Looks from the above like you'd say to work on those comments first, except where the Talk page material can be used to expand needed sections.)

Brianboulton (talk) 00:43, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

• • Thanks! After giving you a chance to reply to any of the above that you wish to (no obligation, of course), I'll archive the review. Allens (talk) 01:04, 29 January 2012 (UTC)