Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Swiss Finance Academy

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The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was Delete. Pastordavid (talk) 13:44, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Swiss Finance Academy

Swiss Finance Academy (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs) (delete) – (View log)

This is pure advertising, although it is unusually well done by the standards of Wikipedia spam (which is why I'm not speedy deleting it outright). Judging from the username, the article was created by the institute's president, giving rise to conflict of interest problems. Despite the article's claims of notability, I can find no substantial coverage by reliable third party sources that would make this institute notable, or the content even verifiable. There are no hits in the Google News archives, for instance. Sandstein (talk) 05:30, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

  • Keep. Response to the above by Gosiamadej:
We respectfully disagree with the above assessment. Swiss Finance Academy is a school of substantially larger size (as measured by student enrolment) than many other schools already listed in Wikipedia, and therefore it would be unfair to delete this entry. The school is also endorsed by a very large number of respectable educational institutions who send their students to the Academy. For example:
UK's Durham Business School: http://www.agora.org.uk/news/newsitem.asp?id=431
Carleton College: http://apps.carleton.edu/campus/career/news/?issue_id=100792&story_id=100804
Trinity College: http://internet2.trincoll.edu/TrinExchange/Default.aspx?tabindex=1&tabid=2&aid=8700
University of East London: http://www.uel.ac.uk/employability/latest_news.htm
I believe these qualify as independent verifiable sources. Further, the president of Swiss Finance Academy is also president of the Dartmouth Club of London, an alumni organization representing Dartmouth College in the UK:
http://www.dartmouth.org/clubs/dcle/
The Academy's website in itself is a rich source of information with photos of past programs, participating investment banks, and alumni careers: www.SwissFinanceAcademy.org. While this in itself may not be considered an independent source, it refers to other independent sources, and this is not uncommon for other private schools listed in Wikipedia as well.
I have noted the criticism and made the language of the article more neutral.
I'm sorry, but Wikipedia's primary criterium of notability is that the school must be covered in some detail by reliable sources, such as reviews in respectable publications. The links you provide read like press releases written by your school and reproduced on university websites. Due to the lack of substantial independent coverage, the school does not only appear non-notable, but the content of the article is also not independently verifiable, a much more substantial problem. As DGG says below, the background of the president does not really matter. It also does not matter that other articles may be similarly deficient, because we are not now discussing these. This is covered in some detail at WP:WAX. Sandstein (talk) 06:14, 19 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Delete It's not a college, or university, or business school. it offers no degrees. it's just a summer program. That the president of the place attended Dartmouth does not necessarily add much to the notability of the school he runs. An article needing such support is not about something notable. DGG (talk) 03:34, 19 April 2008 (UTC)
Keep(duplicate !vote stricken by Jerry). The argument that it should be deleted because it is a summer program does not make sense because Wikipedia has a host of summer camps listed which grant no degrees and are no more notable. Take International Astronomical Youth Camp for example. There is hardly any independent coverage about the camp, and there are dozens of others which offer even less notability. I have looked at Wikipedia entries for dozens of schools, including small private colleges, high schools and summer programs. Vast majority of the content on these pages seems to have been written by the schools themselves and is not independently verifiable. Swiss Finance Academy is a substantial organization in public domain that is even undergoing formal accreditation process so that attending students will be able to receive credit from their home universities towards a degree for the work completed at the Academy. To be fair, the same standards for inclusion across the board should be applied. Gosiamadej (talk) 10:26, 19 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Delete per DGG. Advert. Stifle (talk) 15:28, 19 April 2008 (UTC)
Keep(duplicate !vote stricken by Jerry). The purpose of inclusion is to offer information on the Academy in an encyclopedic manner. All entries in Wikipedia are supposed to be held to the same standards of inclusion or exclusion and administrators have a responsibility that they can not arbitrarily call some 'adverts' while include others that offer no more verifiable notability. Gosiamadej (talk) 15:38, 19 April 2008 (UTC)
Keep(duplicate !vote stricken by Jerry). Swiss Finance Academy has had a growth from approximately 40 students in 2004 to over 200 projected students in 2008. The school expects to continue to grow at this rate. This growth is unusually strong and certainly noteworthy. It shows the strong interest the Academy is attracting in its education niche. http://www.swissfinanceacademy.org/universitiesrepresented.htm.
Keep(duplicate !vote stricken by Jerry). Google search results in hundreds of hits, which in itself may not make the school notable as per Wikipedia criteria, but still warrants consideration.
Keep(duplicate !vote stricken by Jerry). The Academy has also held winter schools in London (2006) and Boston (2005), and so it is more than just a summer school. It's a professional school with international presence. http://www.swissfinanceacademy.org/photoalbum3.htm
Keep(duplicate !vote stricken by Jerry). The Academy also has a rapidly growing alumni community that receives continuing education benefits during the year, such as bootcamps in finance. Most recent one was held in Boston in March 2008. This indicates that the Academy is also a community of professionals, and therefore more than a summer school. http://www.swissfinanceacademy.org/newsandevents.htm
Keep(duplicate !vote stricken by Jerry). The school's faculty and advisors have meaningful affiliations with highly respected schools and have significant investment banking experience as well. For example, Prasad Jayanti is Chair of Computer Science department at Dartmouth College. http://dfd.dartmouth.edu/directory/show/351. His research and extensive contributions to the field of computer science certainly make him a notable individual. http://www.informatik.uni-trier.de/~ley/db/indices/a-tree/j/Jayanti:Prasad.html. The school is arguably an unusual and promising concept that benefits from investment banking and mathematical expertise of its founders and teachers. http://www.swissfinanceacademy.org/detailedprofiles.htm
Keep(duplicate !vote stricken by Jerry). Many students who have attended the Academy have received credit from their home universities, just as they would receive if they were to attend another university during an exchange program. This makes the Academy a recognized institute of higher learning and education. Gosiamadej (talk) 20:32, 19 April 2008 (UTC)

Delete No verifiable independent coverage affirming this topic's notability. Some of the sources listed on the article are dubious such as the Buisness Weekly link that never actually mentions the Swiss Finance Academy and the source citing wikipedia itself which is a big no no.Divinediscourse (talk) 21:44, 19 April 2008 (UTC)

  • The above is a criticism made in carelessness because if you read carefully, the Business Week link in the correct context was not intended to mention Swiss Finance Academy, but the MBA schools that present at Swiss Finance Academy.Gosiamadej (talk) 12:24, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Comment: This is rather well-done. In light of that, with the consideration that the article currently fails WP:V in lacking independent sources, might I suggest userifying the article? It's not beyond the pale that such sources could be found down the road. CRGreathouse (t | c) 20:38, 21 April 2008 (UTC)


The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.