Talk:DePauw University

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I have changed both the quality and importance rating, upgrading the former and downgrading the latter. The positive bit first: this article is better than "start" quality. It has a detailed infobox and multiple subheadings, along with a balanced distribution of focus--history, stats, campus, etc. There's still work to be done, but the groundwork is there. I'm bumping it up to "B." However, I do not think that this article merits a "high" importance rating. The applicable benchmark for a "high" rating is a "major university," as which I do not think DePauw qualifies. Large state schools are more in line with the "high" guidelines; "mid" seems more appropriate for a smaller school. --Ewok 18:28, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
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    [edit] Recent Delta Zeta Incident

    The New York Times reports that 23 women were asked to leave the Delta Zeta sorority. The allegation is that the ousted women, of which included every overweight and non-white sorority sister, were targeted for not conforming to a certain image.

    This should be included in the article, no? Blamblamblam 07:37, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

    [edit] "Let us be manly"

    ... is not the University's motto. That phrase is the translation for what is transcribed on the boulder, which is quite different. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 70.236.13.183 (talk • contribs) 18:50, July 19, 2006.

    I added the "manly" part on the assumption that "Andrizometha" was the university's motto. According to this website, Andrizometha means "let us be manly". So, either the motto does mean the manly thing, or Andrizometha is not the official motto. To be honest, I've never heard "Anrizometha", and "let us be manly" seems anachronistic (to say the least) at a co-ed school. The only thing I've ever heard that sounds like a motto is "Uncommon Success" or something like that. I'm going to put up "citation needed" by Andrizometha and leave out "let us be manly" for now. If someone can definitively find out what the motto is and provide a reference, it would help put this matter to rest. Imaginaryoctopus(talk) 15:02, 20 July 2006 (UTC)
    That [link] you provide says that "Andrizometha" was the motto of the class of 1877. Still odd, considering that this was after going co-ed. Ah, well, perhaps the ladies were a rougher sort back then. I just saw the untranslated motto whilst paging through the site and summoned up my meager Greek to translate it. Not being a Danny myself, I just took it as writ that this actually was the school's motto. As such, I've replaced it with "Uncommon Success," pending correction by someone more knowledgable.
    By the by, the "Harvard of the Midwest" line has got to go. Who called it that? When? I've heard at least a dozen schools referred to as the "HotM;" DPU doesn't seem to have any better claim to the title than any of them. Googling the phrase, DePauw isn't in the first fifty hits. I'm tossing it. Ewok 02:40, 21 July 2006 (UTC)
    Yeah, it's probably a good call getting rid of Andrizometha. I'm still putting {{cn}} next to "Uncommon Success", though. I really should know the school's motto (I'm a student there), but I guess that sort of thing doesn't matter to me.
    About the "Harvard of the Midwest" bit — I've heard the phrase mentioned at times, but only while at DePauw; I've never seen it in writing anywhere. I think you're right — every school likes to think of itself as the greatest one around. Maybe I'll see the phrase in a notable source sometime, but until then it should go. Imaginaryoctopus(talk) 23:20, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

    [edit] "Glambi" Merger

    I'm a neophyte here at Wikipedia, so I don't know much about how this whole merging process works. It seems silly to me for the DePauw article to have a huge section about the deer when every other section has about four lines. So do we significantly shorten the Glambi article or what? Any advice would be appreciated. Imaginaryoctopus 22:15, 19 November 2005 (UTC)

    Honestly, I don't even think that Glambi should be mentioned at all. What we're talking about is a total non-issue and, as a DePauw student who's a member of a Greek House, I'm actually offended at the accusation that it was a sign of Greek homophobia on campus. While I can't speak for all fraternities on campus, there are several gay people in my house and the idea of anyone treating them with any less respect just because they happen to have a different sexual orientation sickens myself and every other brother in my house, straight or not. No one, and I mean NO ONE, that I know of on campus even knew that Glambi was meant to represent gay culture until our newspaper reported so after the act of vandalism took place. To say that it was an act of homophobia is ridiculous, because people literally did not know that it was meant to even represent anything remotely gay. Once more, the idea of a statue of a deer covered in rhinestone with its ass lifted in the air in such a fashion as to make one think that it was about to be mounted as a symbol of homosexual culture is downright offensive!
    Long story short, I'm going to delete the section on Glambi on the DePauw article. Simply put, it's just a single issue that happens to be a major news issue for a few weeks in a small college newspaper. That's all. Using the logic, there should be a mention of a fraternity on campus revently being severely punished due to hazing violations. There should be talk on the fact that a freshman went to the hospital after partying with a .42 blood alcohol concentration just a few weeks ago. There should be a mention that a student committed suicide in a sorority a decade back because of some reason or another. These are not mentioned however. That's because, as horrible as these events are, they are just single events that actually amount to little in the course of a school with a century and a half of history. There can't be any mention of such occurances because all college articles would be innundated with countless matters of trivia that have little to no meaning to people a few years after the fact. And, if you asked me, I feel a lot worse for the three events I listed above than for a deer being vandalized. But hey, that's just me. RPH 06:10, 22 November 2005 (UTC)
    I understand your view, RPH. However, I am afraid I disagree with you in some respects. First, in regard to the homophobia claim: I, too, am a student at DePauw, and I realize that any accuation of widespread Greek homophobia is completely unfounded. However, such accusations were made by some people during the deer ordeal, and the author of the article was merely reporting this fact (albeit, the wording could have been better.)
    Now, for the complete deletion of the Glambi section. I agree that this situation is trivial compared to other events that have transpired on campus. After all, it's just a deer, right? However, there is a difference between this situation and the others you have mentioned. While the hazing violations and .42 BAC are serious matters, they haven't created the uproar the deer has. (I can't speak for the suicide; as you say, it occurred ten years ago, and I know nothing of it.) The deer's installment and subsequent vandalization did not affect only a few members of the student body; it galvanized the entire campus community. You must remember - for a week, all anyone could talk about was the deer. Although the situation has died down (as of course it inevitably would,) it had a lasting impact on the school as a whole. Because of this, I don't think the issue is something to be completely swept under the rug.
    Hence, I have reintroduced a section about the deer. As you see, it is not the five-paragraph behemoth that it once was; I agree that that was a bit much. Hopefully you find what I have written to be fitting, or at least acceptable enough to withstand some editing. As Reejer said below, this incident is unique to the school, and I believe this section adds to the DePauw article.
    Perhaps an even better solution would be to set up some sort of "news event" section, to which situations that are deemed significant enough ( and only really significant ones) could be added as even smaller subsections. Glambi would fit in under such a category. Other stories could be added as they occur. This is merely an idea. I of course welcome and encourage any feedback, either about the "Fits and Starts" section or this new proposal. Imaginaryoctopus 04:51, 3 December 2005 (UTC)
    Addition: As I think about it, the best solution seems to be having a separate article for Glambi and putting a link to it on the DePauw page. However, that has already been tried and was apparently unsuccessful, so we have to make do with what we have. Imaginaryoctopus 05:09, 3 December 2005 (UTC)

    [edit] "Glambi" Merger

    I think the point of an encyclopedia is to contain comprehensive facts. The artwork and the facts and incidents surrounding it are unique to the school and indicative of its personality and eminence. I only wish other schools and institutions would provide details like "Glambi" to distinguish themselves. I do agree, though, that the other articles have a weak word count. Maybe someone else could help elaborate on Boulder Run, The Nature Park, or even the Arts Department. -Reejer

    Okay, folks, I removed the small "Fits and Starts" section due to the re-merging of the Glambi article. Now, once again, there is a huge section about the sculpture. I don't like DePauw page as it is at the moment. The amount of Glambi information is too much for me, but if there are no other objections I'm fine with it. I just think we need to decide once and for all what is to be done with this situation. Imaginaryoctopus 23:16, 22 December 2005 (UTC)
    I merged Glambi into this article because that was the concensus of the AFD discussion (ignoring brand new accounts: 2 Delete, 1 Merge or Keep, 4 Merge to this article). In general, if material is properly sourced, NPOV, and not a copyvio, it can't be removed without a consensus of the editors who are interested. The material can be edited for clarity, succinctness and Wiki style, and the Glambi material needs all of that. -- Dalbury(Talk) 23:34, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

    I put the "Glambi" section back. It's simple. You can't decide a) that a topic does not merit its own space and then b) that it doesn't deserve to share space within an entry either. Otherwise, the net effect is censorship of a significant, if not world-changing, incident.

    No its not. The net effect is nothing more than not including an event that was noteworthy on a small liberal arts college for a month and has remained nothing more than a joke for a semester. I just can't see the logic or the point in having so much as a single sentence covering a controversy that was blown out of proportion by a few professors and students in an article meant to provide a brief overview of DePauw's history and its current status as an educational institution and its current social status. For instance, if people suddenly stopped playing Campus Golf, if Boulder Runs were no longer done, if Marvin's went out of business, or if the Greek system up and died, would there really be any need to mention the basic rules of campus golf, what the Boulder Run was, the importance of a GCB, or how heavily Greek the school once was on this article? I think the answer would be an absolute, "no." And I can only hope that you're joking about the "significant, if not world-changing, incident" comment. If not, I can only wish that I existed in your rose-tinted world. RPH 04:14, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

    [edit] Highest per-capita Greek population?

    I came across this claim and immediately wanted to know what that figure was. Are 100% of students at DePauw Greeks? 95%? If somebody could track down the answer to this, we could also possibly source that claim, which is a pretty bold one to make and would do well to be sourced. I don't know anything about DePauw myself, but I'm curious as to whether this is actually true. Philthecow 00:50, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

    A webpageabout Greek life on the DePauw website says: "Today, 71% of DePauw students belong to a fraternity or sorority". Another page from the site says "US News also ranks DePauw 3rd in the nation for highest percentage of sorority members (70%); #4 for highest percentage of fraternity members (74%)". These numbers are large, but I'm not sure if they make the school #1 overall in terms of per-capita Greek population. Whoever added this fact to the article may have been using old information; from what I've read, the Greek population has actually gone down at DePauw in recent years - it used to be closer to %80.
    If you want a purely qualitative answer, I go to DePauw and can say that the Greek system really is huge. I could certainly see someone thinking the school has the highest per-capita Greek population, but I can't seem to find evidence to back up this claim. Imaginaryoctopus 05:55, 25 December 2005 (UTC)
    That does sound huge, especially since I go to a school with only two fraternities. I think I'm going to change it to the more specific US News statistics so as not to be misleading, does that sound like the best option? Philthecow 18:41, 25 December 2005 (UTC)
    Sounds good to me. Imaginaryoctopus 21:27, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

    [edit] Glambi Consensus, Please

    To be completely honest, I think that it's just stupid for this page to continue to have a reference to something like Glambi. For an article merely meant to give an overview of a liberal arts college, having an entire section on a trivial matter that involved a few people that was completely blown out of proportion for a month is ludicrous. No one's even talking about it anymore (especially the people that immediately blamed the Greek system and homophobia for what two female students did), it had no repercussions crossing into the current semester, and there are countless other instances that have occurred in the over 150-year school history that deserve much more attention then a story about a stupid lawn ornament. I won't delete it unless I hear other people backing me up on this, but all seems frivolous to me. RPH 17:56, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

    I concur. Old news, irrelevant, and doesn't rise to the level of something worth talking about at a university with almost 200 years of history. JHO, 11;16, 15 July 2006.

    [edit] Governor James E. Watson???

    For the information of a previous Wiki editor, James Eli Watson never served as Governor of Indiana ....

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