Wikipedia talk:Notable alumni

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Please comment on this proposed policy guideline. I hope it's helpful. Thesmothete 05:25, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

  • I think you have it backwards. We already have guidelines for people (WP:BIO, mostly) and anybody on whom we do not have an article is likely not a notable alumnus, and should not be listed in the school article. >Radiant< 12:27, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
    • The idea that we have articles on every notable person is just laughable. Red links for notable people are common. The test should remain "would qualify for an article in their own right". There should however be a reference supplied where there is no article capable of providing a reference for the alumnus status. -- zzuuzz (talk) 16:47, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
      • Missed this comment before entering mine below - I agree with ZZuuzz. Tvoz 20:25, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
        • I'd say we should write the articles on the people first, then add them to the school. If you add a link to a school's alumni list, the least you can do is provide a two-or-three-line stub. Otherwise we can hardly know the alumnus was notable in the fisrt place, and not simply somebody adding his own name to a list of "famous" people. >Radiant< 12:56, 25 December 2006 (UTC)

Contents

[edit] Comment

Redlinks among lists of "Notable anybody" should be deleted anyway: half the time it's a prankster's buddy. Guidelines never substitute for missing common sense: instead they get rigorously enforced by people from authoritarian cultural backgrounds. --Wetman 06:25, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
I'm not sure that this should be its own guideline - we have too many separate and overlapping guidelines already. The nutshell version, however, should definitely be policy SOMEWHERE.. it would be good to have it clarified front and center. Perel 06:31, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
You don't need a guideline for notable alumni. We already have several guidelines that determine the notability of people for having their own article. If your goal is to define who should be listed as notable alumni, we already have that covered. They have an artivle. Being an alumni is not a reason to have an article, in most cases anyway. Vegaswikian 06:36, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
  • (moved from the pump) >Radiant< 12:28, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Continuation from Village Pump

Vegaswikian, I don't think I agree that "we already have that covered". As far as I know, there is no current guideline or policy to address the situation where a person does not have their own article, but is listed as a "notable alumnus". Also, I agree that being an alumnus is not a reason to have one's own article, and the proposed guideline does not suggest that. This guideline is only about who should be put in a list of "notable alumni", it is not meant to affect who does and does not get their own article. Thesmothete 16:43, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] This policy is needed IF it's stronger

I think that if the policy were strengthened, it would be clearly useful, because it isn't covered anywhere else: A listing of notable alumni for a school 'cannot include anyone who does not already have a wikipedia article about that person. In other words, redlinks would not be allowed, nor would non-wikilinked names.

If the policy isn't strengthened, then I'd vote against having it at all, because, as noted above, there are likely to be a lot of discussions about whether a person is notable even if he/she doesn't have an article YET. Those are time-wasting. And if the policy isn't changed and a non-wikilinked person's name is deleted, with the policy cited, the next action is likely to be someone putting the name back with a redlink, then possibly making things up when the redlink is removed - in short, way too much time being spent on a single line in an article. John Broughton | Talk 16:19, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure it's actually necessary (since it's come up, perhaps it is), but I'd support such a stronger rule. This makes the rule very clearcut. No article, no list entry. I'd even make existence of an article a minimum criteria, i.e. I don't think there's any particular reason to necessarily list everyone who has an article as a "notable alumnus". -- Rick Block (talk) 17:16, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
Here is a compromise wording: "A person should be included as a "notable alumna or alumnus" only if that person is already the subject of a wikipedia article or if an article about that person would undoubtedly meet wikipedia's guidelines for notability." GabrielF 19:13, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Notable citizens

The same would apply for famous citizens - players on football teams. Personally I think the policies already are in place to police such list and this guideline is only needed if it goes beyond what is already policy. Agathoclea 17:31, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

What policies (or guidelines) are in place to polcie such lists? I am aware of policies/guidelines for notablitly as it pertains to an entire article, but not as it pertains to lists.Thesmothete 02:08, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Oppose

I oppose this altogether, but at very most it should be a suggestion, not even a guideline, let alone a policy. If we insist that everyone who is added already have an article here we are just reifying ourselves, and using circular reasoning. There are obviously many people who are notable but do not have wikipedia articles - it is ridiculous to say otherwise. Ideally, sure, we should have articles about all notable people but that's not realistic. I do think, of course, that someone's friend should be removed - it's very easy, really, to determine if someone is "worthy" of being listed as a notable alum of a school, by the usual methods. Wanting to include someone on a page doesn't mean one also wants to set up a page for that person. Sure, I try to go for a minimum of red links on these listings, and a minimum of black, but I also recognize that the level of information one gathers about a school might vary based on the nature of the school. So, for example, a school of mathematics might include someone who would be notable in that universe but may or may not have a page on wikipedia. But that person should certainly be included. We need to get over the idea that we already know everything in the world that there is to be known, and if we don't have it, it isn't worthy. That's juvenile thinking., Tvoz 20:21, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Needed, but with help

1. Doesn't this policy as written now essentially say that "notable people should be notable"? Isn't that kind of obvious?

In a way, it does, but since "notable" is a term of art for purposes of article creation, what this guideline is saying is that "notable" for purposes of a list is the same as "notable" for purposes of an article. Or, rather, "notable alumni" means Notable alumni and not merely Notable alumni. Thesmothete 08:04, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
Agreed. We are offering a consistent definition of "Notable" with respect to "Notable alumni" in Wikipedia articles, instead than leaving each group of editors to come up with their own definition. --Jdlh | Talk 20:48, 30 December 2006 (UTC)

2. We need an overall policy for "notable" lists in general, not just alumni. Articles include redlinks to names and provide no sources suggesting these people are notable. I would personally prefer a policy which simply prohibits redlinks in such cases where a person's name is given with no context. Fagstein 06:56, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

Makes sense to me. It hadn't occured to me before proposing the guideline that there are lists of "notable" people in articles that are not about schools. Are there any exceptions anyone can think of? Thesmothete 08:04, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
See Bellingham, Washington#Notable people from Bellingham or with ties to Bellingham. About 25 names, 20% red link, 80% blue link, 0% black text. --Jdlh | Talk 20:48, 30 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Summarizing the positions so far

It sounds like there are three emerging camps of views on this question (leaving aside for a moment the broadening issue to non-school articles):

  • Those who believe a list of notable alumni should contain only persons who DO have their own Wikipedia article.
  • Those who believe a list of notable alumni should contain only persons who do or COULD have their own article under WP:BIO.
    • In this category there is a question of whether the list should contain evidence that those who don't yet have an article could get one.
  • Those who believe a list of notable alumni can contain persons who are not eligible to have their own Wikipedia article.

Have I fairly summarized all the positions? Thesmothete 08:10, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

With respect, and I don't mean this to sound glib: I think another position is that we do not need to articulate a policy, guideline, or anything about this. It is all already covered under other policies and guidelines, and the energy spent pondering this point would be better spent actually improving and expanding Wikipedia. It is a non-issue. Tvoz 08:59, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
Respectfully, I am not aware of what policy or guideline covers this situation. Would it be possible to provide a citation to the policy or guideline you believe covers it? WP:BIO does not settle the matter, as it applies to pages, not lists. The reason I've proposed this guideline is because I've already seen edit wars on more than one page wherein time was wasted because there was apparently no policy or guideline. Thesmothete 13:31, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
Why not expand WP:Bio with "the same rules apply for listings of famous town citizens, famous alumni, famous players of team or similar lists. Agathoclea 16:38, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
OK: I don't think we need yet another guideline, policy, or anything about this, because both WP:N and WP:BIO more than adequately address the issue. So what if they are about pages not lists? Clearly it's the same thing. Agathoclea's suggestion is ok - it could just be "the same rules apply for listings of notable individuals". But I honestly do not think that it's needed.
Let's also remember that those two guidelines are far from completely accepted - and as guidelines they shouldn't be used to hit people over the head with - they are correctly subject to interpretation, depending on particular circumstances, and the consensus of the editors of a given article. Having yet another guideline is not going to stop those edit wars - it's still ultimately going to be a subjective determination.
Wikipedia is not about rigid rules anyway- we have only 5 absolutes, and a variety of other policies, etc. Everything does not have to be handled exactly the same way. And please, let's not allow this to devolve into another fiasco like WP:EL, which has taken a turn toward insane, if you ask me. Tvoz 08:46, 24 December 2006 (UTC)
If you encounter a situation like I described below, how would you have handled it? Tinlinkin 08:53, 24 December 2006 (UTC)
I just read it, and I added a comment there too - you handled it exactly right, and you didn't need yet another guideline or policy to help you out. What you did was correct, what you said about it was correct too. That was a totally POV edit on the part of the person who removed all of those names, and he/she essentially said so on the talk page. You might want to re-think a few of those names, even blue ones, by running the usual Google test and seeing just exactly who they are - but no one appeared egregiously wrong to have been included (not sure about the squash player, for example, but I didn't go any further than his wiki page so I could be wrong about that). I regularly monitor and edit several notable alumni lists here, and it's clear to me that the biggest nuisance is idiots adding their boyfriends' names, not the decisions that need to be made about whether or not a new name is legitimately notable - that turns out to be pretty easy. And again, consensus works, and nothing eliminates edit wars when a disruptive and/or juvenile editor insists on having his way - and that's where you can call for mediation if it were to get that far, which it likely wouldn't. Tvoz 10:34, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Notable by profession

A user edited out some alumni from the State University of New York at Stony Brook article because the user didn't feel their professions were worthy enough to be mentioned. (see here and here). I figured it was that user's bias against certain occupations or levels of notability. I and another user disagreed with that user, citing WP:BIO and WP:N. The deletions were reverted by me, anyway. This proposed guideline would be helpful to formally determine who should be in an alumni list, and maybe to prevent someone from imposing bias on the list. I'm neutral as to if it should be stated explicitly as a guideline when the same interpretation could be deduced through other guidelines or an essay, though. Tinlinkin 08:22, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

  • It may be useful to use a category instead, since the list is getting rather long. >Radiant< 12:56, 25 December 2006 (UTC)
Yes, that's a good suggestion, but that wasn't the problem - the problem was an individual editor making a very POV edit to the list that had been posted - and the evidence of its POVness is in that editor's own comment on the talk page. Tinlinkin's reinstatement was correct. The notability guidelines in effect on wikipedia apply here as well, so in my opinion, there is no need for additional guidelines. Tvoz 18:56, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Honorary Degress

I agree with this point, but don't think it should be in the nutshell. Also, if we expand this guideline to "famous residents" it would be inapplicable. Thesmothete 15:54, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

I can imagine situations in which awarding an honorary degree would be notable. For example, if controversy ensued after the degree was granted or perhaps if it was the first honorary degree that someone who would later achieve notability received. Another example might be the first honorary degree awarded by an Ivy League school to a woman or an African-American. I would prefer to weaken the honorary degree criteria to something like "Individuals receiving honorary degrees should not be included unless the award was itself significant. (For example...)" GabrielF 18:59, 26 December 2006 (UTC)
If it's notable enough to be that notable it should be part of the text, not part of a list. I cannot think of an honorary degree notable to be part of a list that's not also enough to be part of the text - can you? Hipocrite - «Talk» 19:10, 26 December 2006 (UTC)
Sorry, but it doesn't really matter if you or I can think of an example that works - this should be left to the editors of each individual page, which often do have different reasons for inclusion. I tweaked the wording as a suggestion - I do certainly agree that honorary degrees should be distinguished from earned degrees as they are in the real world, but I do not think this "guideline", if we approve it, should be a rulebook about what can or cannot be included in some absolute sense. GabrielF's example is a good one, and we shoudl not be trying to prejudge notability here any more thn anywhere else on Wikipedia. Tvoz 19:16, 26 December 2006 (UTC)
Hipocrite - did you not see the edit summary note "see talk" before reverting the suggestion I made to the text? I think the appropriate thing to do is actually see talk and respond, not just revert without any consideration of what I was getting at. Tvoz 19:33, 26 December 2006 (UTC)
I saw talk. The only comment was GabrielF's, and I thought it was without merit with respect to inclusion of individuals on a list. Should Harvard University be able to claim Bill Clinton as a graduate because they awarded him an honorary degree, even with an asterix? Absolutly not! GF's example is one where the person would certainly be included in the text, but not worthy of inclusion on a list. Hipocrite - «Talk» 19:40, 26 December 2006 (UTC)
Nonetheless, reverting a change wholesale is not helpful. There is a difference of opinion here about whether there are circumstances where honorary degrees might be listed, and you can't think of them all nor can I, so we should not have such absolutes in a guideline. My suggested text attempted to address that - you just reverted with "no deal" which is insulting. Tvoz 19:55, 26 December 2006 (UTC)
The wording I suggested, that was reverted with "No deal" as the summary, was as follows. I'm sure it can be improved, but it is a place to start , coming from a different angle than that which was there:
If individuals receiving honorary degrees are included, they should be identified as such - perhaps on a separate list.

Tvoz 20:00, 26 December 2006 (UTC

By the way, no I don't think Harvard should list Bill Clinton as a graduate. If it were deemed appropriate - and I'm not weighing in here on whether I think it is or is not because I'm not editing that page right now - then he should be listed as the recipient of an honorary degree, not as a graduate. And it doesn't have to be with an asterisk at all - there's plenty of room for a few words about each alum as it is, so there's no problem with saying "honorary". And I'd favor a sub-list or section anyway - if honoraries are included on any given page. We should not and cannot try to figure out all possibilities - it's impossible to do so.

By the way, many schools here include "notable former students" - folks who attended but did not graduate. That is also totally acceptable, in my view, as long as they are identified as such. Again we do not need a guideline for this either.

At this time I'm still opposed to this being a guideline but I'm leaning toward thinking an essay on the subject would be acceptable and helpful. Tvoz 20:55, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps I've missed something -- is there some source that says that individuals receiving honorary degrees ARE classified as alumni? Because I've always assumed they are NOT. John Broughton | Talk 01:57, 27 December 2006 (UTC)
OK, I think we're losing our way slightly here - right, holders of honorary degrees are not alumni, neither are students who don't graduate. No one is claiming that they are. But the editors of some articles might choose to include either or both of these groups on their pages for whatever reasons they have. So I think we here should not be saying that they can't do that - but it is reasonable for us to recommend that they meet the notability standard we're talking about, which is that the individuals have or could have an article here, by the usual standards. --tvoz | talk 05:53, 27 December 2006 (UTC)
I asked because the title is "Notable alumni" - if the guideline also covers honorary degrees, then shouldn't it be retitled? (And, by the way, a student who attends a school but does not graduate is STILL an alumni; if we want to change the guideline to cover only "Notable graduates", that's something else.) John Broughton | Talk 20:33, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Thank you

This is a very good proposal. I've seen plenty of cases where ip users or users with almost no contributions will add an entirely non-notable name to a list of alumni. I generally get the impression that this is spam from people who don't quite grasp what wikipedia is about. It will be good to have a short but definitive policy to point to. GabrielF 19:01, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

We already do have such guidelines - just point to WP:N. I do a lot of monitoring of these lists and indeed most of these add-ons are obvious vandalism and the posters - most often IP addresses - should get a vandal warning on their user talk pages. I believe in assuming good faith, for the most part, but sometimes a vandal is just a vandal and an explanation isn;'t what's needed. Tvoz 19:11, 26 December 2006 (UTC)
Where in WP:N does it talk about criteria for alumni lists? I can't find it. Thesmothete 20:34, 26 December 2006 (UTC)
If I implied that it was there specifically, I apologize - that's not what I meant to say. I was answering a comment that said it would be good to have a policy to point to regarding the adding of a clearly unnotable name - actuallly vandalism - and I replied that WP:N serves the purpose of explaining what "notability" is in general, and that actually the situation GabrielF is referring to doesn't call for an explanation, but a removal and a vandalism warning. Tvoz 00:18, 27 December 2006 (UTC)
Isn't WP:N only supposed to be used with regard to decisions about Articles for Deletion? Thesmothete 06:18, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

Tvoz, I'm wondering about your concern that we shouldn't have a guideline about this, but should leave it to the individual editors. But, leaving it to the discretion of individual editors seems consistent with the description of "guideline" in WP:POL.

Every policy and guideline is listed in one of the following categories:

In light of these descriptions, can you clarify what you are concerned about? Thesmothete 20:34, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

Fair question, Thesmothete, and I understand indeed the subtle difference between guidelines and policies but unfortunately there are a lot of people on Wikipedia who don't seem to. I think we are being overrun with guidelines and pseudo-policies and have too many editors (and unfortunately a fair number of admins) who spend a great deal of time policing and looking for things to remove, and reverting when they're challenged, rather than actually contributing to the encyclopedia.
I don't want to hijack this conversation with a diatribe on this, so I'll just say this: we have WP:N and WP:BIO, both sound. I'm not vehemently opposed to having a guideline about this, I just think it is unnecessary and could give some people license to run amok, slashing and burning without considering the sense of the editors of a given page. Standardization is great, but it can be overdone. For example: the pages of some schools lend themselves more to long lists of notable alumni - like LaGuardia High School in NY (a specialized music and art h.s) with many blue names and a fair number of red names who appear to be notable in the arts community but may not (yet) have a wikipedia page. Other schools have much shorter lists, only going for extremely well-known alums, by consensus of editors, or maybe because no one else has cared enough to post more names. Just like not every school's page has a section on sports, for example, not every school's page needs a standardized alumni list. You are completely right that this is where a guideline is far better than a policy for this purpose, and I guess I',m just taking it a little looser and suggesting an essay. I might be ok with a guideline if it does not include words like "never" and instead says ""generally" or similar.
That seems like a reasonable suggestion, Tvoz. I agree that it should not be a policy, and that if it is a guideline (which I continue to support) that it should be phased like a guideline, and not phrased like a policy. I'm still a relatively new editor, and in making my proposal, I felt I had to go with what it said in the documentation, rather than my own perception of the culture. Respectfully, if some editors don't reat guidelines consistently with what WP:POL describes, I don't think that means we should stop new guidelines from being added (or be gettinging rid of old ones, for that matter). Perhaps your concern would be better directed to WP:POL, or, even better, we could consider creating (or adjusting) a standard template for guidelines that clearly sets out that guidelines are not policies, and what that means. Then each guideline could have it explained -- right there at the top. And, as a a last resort, we still have WP:IGNORE Thesmothete 06:18, 27 December 2006 (UTC)
But even right here on this project page, which I think was quite clearly and correctly set up to encourage discussion and trial wording, we have an instance of an editor (me) making a suggestion after an initial discussion on talk and asking for further discussion, and another editor summarily reverting it with "No deal". I have not seen any one else say to that editor that he or she was out of line doing that, nor have I received an apology. But I didn't revert back to my suggested wording - I came up with another version that I posted on the page to try to move things forward congenially. You see - if we have a guideline that sounds like a policy we are going to have editors like the one who reverted without discussion going around and blanket removing red names or whatever that editor's personal preference is. And I don't think that is the way this encyclopedia is run. Sorry for going on so long - I think you asked a fair question and I wanted to answer it fully. Tvoz 00:18, 27 December 2006 (UTC)
Let me say that I appreciate your contribution to the discussion, Tvoz. Sometimes, it's a fine line between an editor who is just being bold, and one who is trying to impose their will unfairly on others. In this case, I will Assume Good Faith on both sides. I believe Hipocrite's perspective, if brusquely put, also adds to our understanding of the issue. In fact, I think your second proposal is superior to either of the ones that went before. Thesmothete 06:18, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Reverting rather than discussing

Excuse me - I just made a suggestion on the article page with a summary that said "see talk" . This edit was reverted with "no deal" as the summary - I think the appropriate thing to do would be to accommodate another editor's idea rather than just reverting in that manner. FOr example, I didn't go and blank the page even though I personally don't think we need the guideline - I am trying to work with it and make it better. Reverting completely without acknowledging the point raised is not at all helpful and is out of line. Tvoz 19:27, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

Like I said - I saw talk, and responded to it. I don't think that there is any reason a list of notable alumns should include people who were given honarary degrees. Hipocrite - «Talk» 19:41, 26 December 2006 (UTC)
No, my edit summary said "see talk" where there is an ongoing discussion about honorary degrees. You don't think there there is any reason, but others might, so how about taking my suggested wording and editing it rather than pretending the idea of including honoraries isn;t still on the table? Tvoz 19:55, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Generalize

I'm all in favor of a policy which says that lists of alumni ought to only include those who are subjects of Wikipedia articles on their own. I also think that policy should be generalized to extend to all lists of notable people. There is room for some exceptions: certain lists would be lists of people who are notable enough for a Wikipedia article, by definition, even if nobody's yet written that article. For example, we may not have an article on every Emperor of Japan, or every Pharaoh of Egypt, but a page listing those should include every one. But lists like the list with which I am most familiar, the List of civil engineers, should be very strictly limited to bluelinks - if someone can't take the trouble to create a biographical stub, they shouldn't be on the list. Otherwise, the list will end up full of non-notable people promoting themselves. Argyriou (talk) 17:04, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

There is a list guideline in which nothing is said about notability. There is also an essay, Wikipedia:Lists in Wikipedia, which seems to say the contents of any list containing people would pass the notability test. Tinlinkin 17:51, 27 December 2006 (UTC
Argyriou, I agree completely that we don't want lists of non-notable people promoting themselves. But making the requirement be that a name has to be blue is, to me, too self-referential. We don't already know everything there is to know. Red links should be kept to a minimum, but they are there, I think, to encourage people to turn them into a blue link. Just like we have many, many, many people mentioned in articles who are not blue - they are either red or black - it seems wrong to me to require that a name on a list of alumni (or other lists of notable people) be blue, or even red (red suggesting that they are notable but do not yet have an article). I do agree that we should encourage people to make at least a short stub when adding a name to a list (someone said that above too), but I don't want to see it as an absolute requirement. Will we next say that any name that is mentioned in the text of an article has to be notable - has to be blue? I should say that the alumni lists I am thinking of in all of these discussions are the lists that are embedded in articles about schools, not separate stand-alone lists (I'd have to think that through before commenting on thjose standalones) and as I said, there can be different standards applied to different schools, and that is perfectly ok to my way of thinking. I also do agree with whoever said it above (sorry, it's late and I have only this section open on my edit screen so I can't find who said it) that notable alumni listed in articles, whatever the color of the names, ought to have a few words of identification attached to them. For example, I do a lot of work on the Bronx High School of Science page, including the notable alumni & former students list, and it has evolved such that the year of graduation is included wherever possible and a few words are included for each name, even famous people, so that a reader can see at a glance and doesn't have to click on the link to find out who these people are. Several, but not many, of our alums are red - they are notable, but pages haven't been done yet. If I have a moment I'll make stubs for them, but they are clearly identified and they are "notable enough" to warrant a page of their own, so I would strenuously object to their being removed, just because they are not blue. That's the culture of that page, and it works, and I don't want to see a guideline established that rules over the way the page has evolved. Other school pages that I have worked on have different standards, because the schools are different. This is why a policy is out of the question and even a guideline is not my preference - but if it is well-worded, I can probably live with it. Too many editors and admins around here see a guidleline and treat it as if it were gospel - and go from article to article removing what they think is offending material, without any consideration of the specific case at hand, and without discussion with the editors who work on that article. I don't want to start seeing WP:NA (or whatever it will be shorthanded as) appearing on multiple edit summaries as they mindlessly and slavishly follow the guideline and rid WIkipedia of these "offenses". I've seen it happen. Tvoz | talk 10:31, 28 December 2006 (UTC)
And one other thing - it is simply not that difficult to identify names that don't belong - at least that has been my experience - I google new non-blue names (on Science and on several other pages) that are added all the time and can see instantly if they should be removed. I doubt that there are any names that have remained that are not legitimately there. ANd believe me, I revert many that are clearly self-promotion of non-notable people. Tvoz | talk 10:38, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] WP:BIO

I've added a paragraph about notable alumni to WP:BIO. That may address your concerns? >Radiant< 17:27, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

Yes, on a quick read I think the addition of that paragraph in WP:BIO may be more than sufficient for the aim of this guideline, and further renders this guideline unnecessary. I'll think it through, but this may do it. Anyone else? Tvoz | talk 01:24, 31 December 2006 (UTC)
I also think that the new paragraph at WP:BIO addresses at least 90% of the problem, making a separate guideline unnecessary, at least at the moment. John Broughton | Talk 04:21, 31 December 2006 (UTC)
I think this paragraph, polished a little, could be enough. Right now I find the wording a bit confusing. It goes from talking about a "list" to "such categories", as in "Editors who would like to add themselves to such categories". Maybe this should read "such lists". I'm tempted to add the example of a town with notable inhabitants, to show that this paragraph isn't solely applicable to articles on schools. And the language as it stands doesn't address my Verifiability issue, raised in the section below. But I think this is a good step, Radiant. --Jdlh | Talk 09:11, 31 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Verifiability of school attendance

Hi, folks. On the talk page of the Royal Grammar School, Newcastle article, we've been evolving our own Notable Alumni policy. One issue we had was, how do we fulfill the Wikipedia:Verifiability policy with respect to the claim that a given person attended a given school? Surely we should insist that Wikipedia somewhere cite some source that says person P attended school S in year Y. We experimented with hanging citations off the entries for that person in our Notable Alumni list. Then we moved to requiring that the person a) have an article already existing, and b) the article mention attendance at the school and cite it. I like that standard. Note that it puts us in the fairly hard-core "blue-links" only school of Notable Alumni inclusion. What are your thoughts on verifiability of school attendance? --Jdlh | Talk 20:39, 30 December 2006 (UTC)

  • That is an interesting point. It could well be the case that for a famous individual, some school would falsely claim him as an alumni (or perhaps he only went there for some months, or lived nearby, or somesuch). It would be reasonable to reiterate that if somebody disputes such a statement, the onus is on the people who to include the statement to find a suitable source for it. >Radiant< 00:10, 31 December 2006 (UTC)
Schools often have alumni databases that can be accessed if there is a question. I honestly have not come across any such problems - only an occasional question as to whether an individual attended and didn't graduate or actually graduated. I'd certainly leave this up to the editors of each school (town, etc)'s page rather than trying to codify it - is this really a problem? (And couldn't a person up to no good edit an individual's page to include a school, only so that they could be included on the school's list? Nah, I really doubt it. Assume good faith.) Tvoz | talk 10:21, 31 December 2006 (UTC)
Royal Grammar School, Newcastle has indeed had a bit of a problem with disputes about whether given people did or did not attend. I think our disputes all involved uncited claims. The question here is how to apply WP:V and WP:CITE for notable alumni. It's not whether verifiable sources, such as alumni databases, exist. If there's a policy statement that claims of alumni status need to be cited, and are subject to removal if not cited, it would help our situation. --Jdlh | Talk 04:58, 1 January 2007 (UTC)
  • There's no need to codify anything, but if it comes up a lot (and I'm not saying that it does) a clarifying statement may help. It is a simple consequence of policy that if users are in dispute about whether some person is in fact alumnus of some school, the people who claim that he is will have to provide factual verification, or the disputed statement will be removed from the article. >Radiant< 09:02, 2 January 2007 (UTC)
I think this is best posted on the talk page of the school itself or even as hidden text in the area of the notable alumni list, rather than as a separate Wikipedia guideline. Tvoz | talk 09:16, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Clarify that this article is abandoned and refer to WP:BIO

I take it that the consensus of the discussion here last month was that we don't need the text at Wikipedia:Notable alumni, and instead the text at WP:BIO#Lists_of_people is sufficient. However, I don't think that the disclaimer at the top of Notable alumni is clear enough. I propose changing it to make the point more clearly.

  • It now reads: "This is a work in progress. Editors are encouraged to improve it and discuss ideas on the talk page."
  • I propose to change it to: "This was a proposed policy that was discussed in December 2006. The result of the discussion was recorded in Wikipedia:Notability (people)#Lists of people. Please look there. This draft text is here only as a historical record." Note that the "currently inactive" at the top of the article already directs people to the Village Pump to make more comments.

What do people think? --Jdlh | Talk 21:26, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

I think that's fine, although I could imagine furhter developments in this area, so it might be useful to have a link back from WP:BIO to this discussion. Thesmothete 17:55, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

Implemented, here and in talk page of WP:BIO. --Jdlh | Talk 05:24, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

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