Wikipedia talk:School and university projects

Anyone want to review a book about Wikipedia assignments?

See Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/Newsroom/Suggestions#Wikipedia_for_writing_assignments.--ragesoss (talk) 15:42, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

YuZheng

Ref User talk:YuZheng

School project; Chinese. Ran into probs with the articles, copyvio, all sorts. I've tried to contact them and sort it out, they've had an SUP template, various attempts made to help them, but I fear most of it has been lost in the noise on their talk (especially as they're not native English).

I wonder if you folk could have a good go at sorting it out. I haven't analysied it fully; I don't think they're blocked at the mmoment. Several accounts, messy articles; they've shown a lot of willing though, that's why I'd love to see it salvaged.

My suggestion: Move the talk to an archive, and in the blank one, put a HUGE easy message, for teacher to contact you. Maybe even block so they have to.

Check the articles; some have real potential. Needs some patience and willing to get it going. G'luck, let me know if there's anything I can do to help. --  Chzz  ►  14:03, 20 March 2009 (UTC)

Time to move some to archive

About half the page, i'd say. Johnbod (talk) 20:00, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Agreed, so be bold. I think all pre-2009 threads should be archived. :) --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 11:45, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

we can move the fall 2008-sections, imho. if there is no negative feedback, i will it on friday --Jan eissfeldt (talk) 14:11, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

Collaboration with GA

Please see my post here.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 19:15, 15 May 2009 (UTC)

Sysop/admin available as required

One of the contact people, User:Piotrus, is no longer available to perform administrative functions here after having resigned his adminship. If anyone needs anyone admin work done, please let me know. I have to say a lot of what you all do is probably over my head, but I can do the administrative functions that might be required somewhere if there is no one else around to do so. John Carter (talk) 19:22, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

yes, of course, you are welcome :), best regards --Jan eissfeldt (talk) 23:43, 12 December 2009 (UTC)

I am also able to provide administrative assistance to school projects upon request.·Maunus·ƛ· 13:23, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

you are wellcome Maunus :), best regards --Jan eissfeldt (talk) 15:05, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

Concerns about Union University/music article project

Concerns have been expressed by music editors over the editing of music history articles by Union University students, see here. --Kleinzach 00:45, 1 December 2009 (UTC)

thx, we will relaunch the central page to provide more support for UCPs and make sure, that every instructor knows how to manage such projects, best regards --Jan eissfeldt (talk) 23:40, 12 December 2009 (UTC)

Where is this project archived, if it is archived? Hyacinth (talk) 13:44, 27 December 2009 (UTC)

hi Hyacinth, the SUP-draft is archived here, beste regards --Jan eissfeldt (talk) 04:10, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

relaunch established for open betatest, best regards --Jan eissfeldt (talk) 23:23, 7 February 2010 (UTC)

Lingnan University class project?

Or that's my guess, based on recent edits I've seen to articles about various ethnic groups in Hong Kong. Participants seen so far:

1. Edith0322 (talk · contribs) (edited Thais in Hong Kong)
2. Group1.1 (talk · contribs) (created Indians in Hong Kong)
3. Cus214gp1.3 (talk · contribs) (created Nepalese in Hong Kong)

Based on the last username, I'm guessing this is related to the course OCUS214 [1] at Lingnan University. I'm trying to get in touch with the professor. A sizeable portion of the material is quite good, but the rest has issues with WP:OR (primarily citing examples and then making generalisations about them, or citing editor-conducted interviews with members of the ethnic groups in question). Appreciate any advice from those who have more experience in dealing with these kinds of projects. Thanks, cab (talk) 14:35, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

Certainly, try to get in touch with the professor and tell him about WP:SUP. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 15:30, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

Possible lists of selected topics?

Please see the discussion at least originated at WT:1.0#Possible lists of selected topics for Wikipedia:School and university projects?. John Carter (talk) 17:45, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

Public Policy Initiative courses for Fall 2010

Wikimedia's Public Policy Initiative has recruited (tentatively) 6 professors for Fall 2010 to do major Wikipedia assignments in their public policy courses. We're working on course materials and model assignments now that will try to take a lot of what seems to have been effective with earlier courses listed on this page, and transform that into assignments that a professor doesn't have to be a serious Wikipedian to run effectively. We're also looking for Wikipedians who want to help coordinate the student's editing over the course of the coming semester. For details, check out:

• Introducing the Public Policy Initiative - The Signpost
• WikiProject United States Public Policy - this will be the hub of activity for the courses
• Guide for teachers - (in progress, help welcome)

--Sross (Public Policy) (talk) 12:05, 30 June 2010 (UTC)

I'll post my presentation on teaching with Wikipedia slides online shortly; I'll drop a note here when I've done so. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 22:06, 30 June 2010 (UTC)

Wikipedia Online Ambassadors program now accepting applications

Related to the above, I want to invite editors interested in Wikipedia in the classroom to apply for the Wikipedia Online Ambassadors program. It's a program for helping new users through their early edits, and will focus on students who are assigned to edit Wikipedia in their courses; it's part of the Public Policy Initiative, and will hopefully be the basis for a longer-term effort at improving the way we nurture newbies.--Sross (Public Policy) (talk) 18:30, 19 July 2010 (UTC)

Sociology of the family

I think this article is being edited by some students; many IPs. So far, I received no reply to my inquiries about their purpose/course, and I am pretty certain that whoever is their course leader is not aware of SUP. The edits seem mostly constructive, though. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 16:25, 20 October 2010 (UTC)

Piotr, sorry for the delayed response, it's one of the Public Policy Initiative courses: Sociology of the Family. --Ldavis (Public Policy) (talk) 00:44, 10 November 2010 (UTC)

Heads up

User:LyfjahonnunGroup1 seems like it might be a school/teacher account. It's going to be blocked for username policy violations, so I figured I'd let you all know in case you wanted to make contact so they can do things the right way. Gigs (talk) 17:30, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

what is going on?

• There's a confusing rash of reverts etc. What's going on? • Ling.Nut (talk) 01:10, 10 November 2010 (UTC)
  • Seems to be a case of poor communication between the foundation and the community. See User talk:216.38.130.164 and its history. It seems that a foundation employee wants to redesign that page. I am of two minds on that; the tables "look" nicer but are less friendly to edit. The goal of this page is to list educational projects, I am afraid if we switch to table format, we may scare off some educators who don't have the wiki-table-jitsu :) Hopefully the foundation employee will respond here and talk about her/their plans with us. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 01:14, 10 November 2010 (UTC)
    • The editors who keep reverting those edits need to be encouraged to take things to the talk page. This is unhelpful; the edits were even labeled as "vandalism." • Ling.Nut (talk) 01:21, 10 November 2010 (UTC)

Edits to redesign the table for Current Projects

Community:

Sorry for the back and forth on the edits to the current projects table--clearly I need to get further clarification on precisely how I was to proceed with making the edits that I was asked to make and discuss what we are suggesting with you first. My sincere apologies for any irritation and thanks for the patience with this new user. Mgonzaleswmf (talk) 01:22, 10 November 2010 (UTC)Mishelle

• Your good faith edits were not handled appropriately. You have no need to apologize. • Ling.Nut (talk) 01:23, 10 November 2010 (UTC)
  • I second that, and I raised the issue on the other editor's talk page. Mishelle, I hope you'll remember to stay logged in now :) I'd recommend that before trying to help with this page, you spend few days around the project, editing various articles, taking part in the discussion and getting a feel for how it works (start with WP:TUTORIAL). Regarding the redesign of this page, see my comments in the section above. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 01:34, 10 November 2010 (UTC)

Account names - avoid multiple users

It might be useful for the point about Account names to include something on the lines of "Wikipedia user names are for individuals only, so even though your students may be working as a group they must each have their own user name and they are each responsible for their own editing." This seems not to be obvious - see User talk:Cs104group8 (the giveaway was the "holdon" text on their now-deleted stub where they said "we have permission..."). PamD (talk) 07:52, 20 November 2010 (UTC)

Please do. Group student accounts are not only against our rules, they also reduce the benefits of having a wiki assignment (as teachers cannot see what individual students in the group are doing). --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 16:03, 20 November 2010 (UTC)

I've added this sentence, with link to WP:NOSHARE. PamD (talk) 14:38, 21 November 2010 (UTC)

Another possible class/teacher account

User:Cis3400 Alternating from logged in to not logged in, appears to be a shared account of some sort, possibly being edited by multiple students. The content appeared entirely unrelated to content building, however. The apparent teacher left a snippy message on my userpage indicating that they have a regular wikipedia account, but they did not disclose it. Gigs (talk) 03:23, 2 December 2010 (UTC)

A school project

• BTW 261 — Technical and Scientific Communication
• User:Joegrohens
• User:Joegrohens/btw261-fall09-student-user-pages
• User:Joegrohens/btw261-fall10-student-user-pages

This project is not currently listed. It was added to the list in 2009, but for some unstated reason jan eissfeldt removed it, despite this apparently being an annual thing. Uncle G (talk) 00:20, 4 December 2010 (UTC)

Have you asked jan why he did so? --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 18:01, 8 December 2010 (UTC)

Creating accounts for students

Hello. Last year, I had my high school students working on a Wikipedia editing project for YA novels. I've added the project to the list of current projects (more official than I was last year), but I'm wondering if someone can help me navigate a problem I encountered last year: my school's IP address (206.211.69.253) is blocked, so students are not able to create their own accounts at school (and some do not have internet access/transportation to internet at home). Could I make accounts for my students? Or can my school's IP be unblocked for a certain period of time for account creation?

I asked this question after the fact last year, and here was the answer: "If you create an account, make a note on your userpage that your a teacher, then you can create accounts for your students as needed. If you have any other questions just let us know. Thanks for emailing unblock-en-l John"

Can someone help me make sure I have this privilege? Thanks! Roseclearfield (talk) 15:48, 6 February 2011 (UTC)

You're probably looking for Wikipedia:Account creator. Do you want to have this right? OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 22:18, 6 February 2011 (UTC)

I think that's what I was looking for. Request sent. Thank you! Roseclearfield (talk) 02:39, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

This is all resolved. Thanks, everyone. Roseclearfield (talk) 15:47, 15 February 2011 (UTC)

Vandalism as school assignment

Through wikisignpost's twitter feed, i read this blogpost:

my daughter (a sophomore in high school) was given an assignment to introduce errors into Wikipedia. Presumably, the intention was to demonstrate that entries could be 'unreliable'. Now, she chose a popular page, and had her changes corrected almost straightaway, to the extent that it was not possible to complete the assignment as given. In fact, she ended up being barred from editing pages as her behavior was seen as unacceptable.

Should we put up a note in the project page that such assignments are unwelcome?--Sodabottle (talk) 10:34, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

* Sigh * Yes, definitely! — SMUconlaw (talk) 16:34, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

Wonderful. Will the same teachers assign "Go and steal something from a shop" as an educational exercise in legal systems? PamD (talk) 10:42, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

That is awful! May I add that I am going to be asking my 9th grade students to report vandalism to admins like vigilante policemen? Roseclearfield (talk) 18:15, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

Can policemen even count as being vigilantes since they are government officials? I suppose if they're in a county that isn't under their jurisdiction. Silverseren^C 20:14, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

Please review seriousness v. proposed deletion as parody of new article Names of small numbers at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Names of small numbers

School and univeristy projects WikiProject members, this is being discussed at:

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Names of small numbers http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Names_of_small_numbers#Names_of_small_numbers

Please also consider what additional sections from binary and other numbering systems and from educationally, historically, linguistically and epistemologically significant concepts and works, including fractions and parts of wholes other than simple number-base exponential systems, including terms from currencies, agriculture, art media, and pre-modern English language names of small portions should be made to this topic as a kept article, especially subtopics which may not be generally known by Wikipedian editors in other particular fields. Etymology for some SI and Metric terms is included in their respective articles to which this one is linked; please consider what portions and extents of etymological information from those sources and what other sources are appropriate to add to this article as well.

Thank you. Pandelver (talk) 04:13, 12 March 2011 (UTC)

Semarang State University "Papat Limpad" competition

Not quite sure this is the correct place (if not, sorry about that), but there appears to be a competition being organized by Semarang State University called "Papat Limpad" that is causing a slew of students to create accounts and pretty much the same user page with their photo. For example:

• JV021Efendi (talk · contribs)
• JV087Wapistic (talk · contribs)
• JV042Juwita (talk · contribs)
• JV010ASIH (talk · contribs)

Unfortunately, some of these students are creating their user page using Indonesian, so they end up with Pengguna:JV042Juwita, Panganggo:JV009Asep, Panganggo:JV015Chafid, etc. I and a few other admins have moved these misplaced articles into their proper user space. I tried to reach out to a few of them, but my message appears to have been ignored. The competition appears to be this. Would somebody be willing to do some further investigation and contact the event organizer about getting these students to create proper user pages and, more importantly, possibly coordinate something with this project? Thanks. -- Gogo Dodo (talk) 05:44, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

If they're supposed to be writing articles in the Javanese language, why are they creating accounts here? Nil Einne (talk) 07:20, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

I have no idea. Perhaps poor instructions on the competition instructions? -- Gogo Dodo (talk) 12:40, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

You guys aware of this?

Check out User:Jfenleybsu for a school project. Not sure if somebody was aware of it, so just notifying you here. Yoenit (talk) 07:52, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Concerns about these projects

Is there a place in this article where one can discuss matters not flattering to university faculty projects? Heresy, I realize. My experience with the School and university projects, at least the ones in Wiki-chemistry and related areas from univerisity of Michigan, have revealed some weaknesses in this program. My main concern is that Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, first and foremost, Wikipedia does not exist as a "scratch-pad" for students, who are forced to write essays by faculty. One consequence of student work is that other editors are stuck with the janitorial work. Janitorial work = reformatting, redoing artwork, and often correcting technical mistakes in content, finding better references. A persistent and unsolved problem is that students lack perspective. Consequently, they tend to cite primary sources, which are often newsy and usually US-oriented. If more involved, faculty supervisors could insist on general sources and help the students pursue this policy (per WP:SECONDARY). But apparently, faculty rank quality of these articles based on the number of references, not the depth of the explanations. I understand the basic laudable drivers for School-and-university-projects: nurture new editors and create new content. The former is not happening at least in Chemistry project, and the articles that are created are often, as I said above, mediocre because of their narrowness. --Smokefoot (talk) 15:22, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

Great example courses to highlight

I'm working on an education portal on Outreach wiki to introduce instructors to the possibilities of Wikipedia assignments. One section is for examples of other courses that have used Wikipedia effectively. There are a number of recent courses supported by the ambassador program, but I'm looking for some great examples independent of the ambassador program as well. Any suggestions? I have Murder, Madness, and Mayhem already. If anyone has other favorite courses that went well, please do let me know.--Sage Ross - Online Facilitator, Wikimedia Foundation (talk) 20:38, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

Are there two nearly identical projects pages running simultaneously?

I recently added my school project "Pasadena City College, Shatford Library: LIB 104, Technical Services, Spring 2011" to "Wikipedia:School and university projects/TITLE" at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:School_and_university_projects/TITLE . There is a nearly identical projects page with this title and URL: "Wikipedia:School and university projects" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:School_and_university_projects . Is this duplication of project pages intentional or a mistake? LIB104 (talk) 09:04, 19 May 2011 (UTC)LIB104LIB104 (talk) 09:04, 19 May 2011 (UTC)

It's a mistake resulting from editors not changing the default value of the form to add new projects. I've deleted it. Here's your contribution, so you can add it to the correct page. Feezo (send a signal | watch the sky) 09:20, 19 May 2011 (UTC)

=== [[Pasadena City College]], Shatford Library: LIB 104, Technical Services, Spring 2011. ===

The purpose of this research and writing assignment will be for the class to collectively contribute to the improvement and expansion of the Wikipedia stub entitled: [[Library technical services]]. The class will be divided into five groups, with each group assigned two topics from this list: 

1.      Acquisitions
2.      Authority Control
3.      Bindery
4.      Book Repair
5.      Cataloging
6.      Classification
7.      Computer Systems
8.      Interlibrary Loan
9.      Processing
10.     Serials & serial control

This project is managed by [[User:LIB104]]

Environment-related school project?

Based on these comments by an article's author, and the very recent spat of urban/environment-related articles with similar problems (WP:NOTESSAY, WP:OR, and WP:SYNTH) - some of which we have identified in Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Command and control regulation - I believe a school project is taking place where students have been directed to post their research essays on various urban/environmental topics. I tried to see if I could connect to the teacher through one of the students here, but I doubt that is going to work. Anyone here have any suggestions about how to deal with these? Myself and other new page patrollers have noticed a large number of them over the last few days... Additional information about the situation can be found at User talk:discospinster#Environment-related papers being posted to Wikipedia. Singularity42 (talk) 21:06, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

Possible proposal for possibly very broad based groups

OK, this is a bit complicated. First, I think it important to note that there is a very good encyclopedia of the Great Plains, which covers the plains in both the US and Canada. Having said that, there are not specific works dealing with many of the involved US states, although specific encyclopedias for British Columbia, Manitoba, and Saskatchewan have been published with significant academic and popular acclaim. There is also a critically-acclaimed Encyclopedia of New York State, which received $650,000 in state funding in exchange for 1,056 copies of the book, one for each of the state's libraries.

I have been considering contacting the state librarians of the Dakotas, Wyoming, and Montana, and suggesting the possibility that, perhaps, the states might want to consider the possibility of maybe requesting their citizens to develop relevant encyclopedic content here for the purpose of having the articles serve as the basis for at least a state encyclopedia, with perhaps the possibility of state biographical encyclopedias, narrative history books, and maybe textbooks for state history for use in schools. Obviously, I think the encyclopedic works would be the first priority in terms of completion.

Specifically, the proposal might include having the state librarians create lists of articles they think such a work would need, maybe have the governor(s) make a statement supporting it and perhaps indicating when they would like to see the work completed (probably five to ten years, given the length such works seem to take in general) and actively requesting the input of the schools of the state and other interested individuals in developing relevant articles, probably emphasizing those listed by the state librarians. Then, at the end, the material could be edited down to a print version and published.

I think if successful, such an effort would probably encourage other states, cities, and areas as well. Unfortunately, I also think that, with probably at least 3,000 or so articles between the states, most of which are about topics most of the rest of us wouldn't know much about, finding existing editors who might be able to help might be particularly problematic. Anyway, I haven't made such proposals at all yet, and would welcome any input from others about whether they think it would be a good idea to make such proposals or not. Thanks for your attention. John Carter (talk) 18:50, 4 July 2011 (UTC)

Merger into Wikipedia:Ambassadors/Courses

I think that this page and Wikipedia:Ambassadors/Courses should be merged. It could be relatively simple. From this (SUP) page, we could keep the intro (which would be slightly rewritten), the guidelines, merge the past and present projects with those from the course page, keep see also and links. Contact person section would be obsolete, as the new real contact persons are the ambassadors. In the end, this page would be redirected to Wikipedia:Ambassadors/Courses. Thoughts? --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 20:48, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

I'm not following you. Doesn't this page list projects not associated with the ambassadors project or do I misunderstand the nature of this page? And doesn't the ambassadors page only list projects associated with that project? If so, it doesn't seem appropriate to merge these two pages as there should be a place to list, discuss, and help faculty who are assigning Wikipedia work without being affiliated with the ambassadors. ElKevbo (talk) 22:05, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

Valid point. No, we don't want to eliminate SUP, just to integrate it more with the quite active WP:AMBASSADOR program. SUP can mostly remain as it is, geared towards people who don't need/want ambassadors, but it would have more links to various goodies provided by the ambassador program (primarily, in the form of Template:Wikipedia Ambassadors navbox and the related tab template (see talk of that template for details). --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 18:40, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

Student user template?

I would find it helpful to know when I am responding to a student who is working on the project as part of their school program. If I know they have additional resources (at least an instructor) that most users don't have, I can refer them to those resources for help in addition to the normal help pages. Also, I would have more slack for someone who is repeatedly "vandalizing" a page or copying off the web, etc. if I knew they have been assigned an editing task but don't know how to do it. I think I am good about welcoming newcomers but I'd be extra helpful if I knew they were students on assignment. To that end I'd like to see students' talk pages deploy a template that explains their program and their role in it. Jojalozzo 05:04, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

There is {{WAP student}} over at WP:AMBASSADOR. I also made {{WAP psych student}} for my classes. Might be a good model. --MTHarden (talk) 14:57, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

Help

Over a month ago I tried to add my course to the list of SUP projects and thought I had figured it out. However, when I now access the educational assignment template it takes me to this page where my course is not listed and now I can't figure out how to edit again so that it is in included. Can anyone help me figure out what might have happened?Tatompki (talk) 19:47, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Unlisted project and concerns

This course Wikipedia:Canada Education Program/Courses/Intellectual Property: Copyright, Trademark and Patent (Ariel Katz) is not listed and is causing some concerns... See Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion... Presumption of validity; utility in patent law in Canada... with students being put "between a rock (their assignment) and a hard place (Wikipedia policy and processes)". --Edcolins (talk) 20:14, 6 December 2011 (UTC)