User talk:Harlemacademy

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Contents 1 Harlemacademy 2 Adoption 3 Your recent edits 4 Hello 5 Your question at the help desk 6 Your article 7 Re:HarlemAcademy user page

[edit] Harlemacademy

A tag has been placed on Harlemacademy, requesting that it be speedily deleted from Wikipedia. This has been done under the criteria for speedy deletion, because the article seems to be blatant advertising which only promotes a company, product, group, service or person and would need to be fundamentally rewritten in order to become an encyclopedia article. Please read the general criteria for speedy deletion, particularly item 11, as well as the guidelines on spam.

If you can indicate why the subject of this article is not blatant advertising, you may contest the tagging. To do this, please add {{hangon}} on the top of the article and leave a note on the article's talk page explaining your position. Please do not remove the speedy deletion tag yourself, but don't hesitate to add information to the article that would help make it encyclopedic, as well as adding any citations from reliable sources to ensure that the article will be verifiable. Feel free to leave a note on my talk page if you have any questions about this. Endless Dan 15:02, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Adoption

Being new to Wikipedia, I would encourage you to look into reading the information above & maybe look into Wikipedia:Adopt-a-User. Wikipedia is great place, but you there are guidelines to be followed. I placed a speedy deletion request on your school's page because it was incomplete - and then you blanked the page. This is noted as the deletion reason by the administator who deleted your page. --Endless Dan 19:57, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Your recent edits

Hi, there. In case you didn't know, when you add content to talk pages and Wikipedia pages that have open discussion, you should sign your posts by typing four tildes ( ~~~~ ) at the end of your comment. On many keyboards, the tilde is entered by holding the Shift key, and pressing the key with the tilde pictured. You may also click on the signature button located above the edit window. This will automatically insert a signature with your name and the time you posted the comment. This information is useful because other editors will be able to tell who said what, and when. Thank you! --SineBot 02:47, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Hello

According to the administrator who deleted your user page, your page violated WP:CSD#G11. I'm not the best person to approach when it comes to explanations, as I am fairly new to Wikipedia myself. Try out the 'Help Desk'. You can post questions they and friendly veteran users will answer your question.

Also, the person who 'adopted' me is looking to adopt more users. He is very patient and has helped me greatly. I'd recommend him. Just leave a message on his user page. He typically will respond within 24 hours. In the mean time, if you need anything else - don't hesitate to ask me. --Endless Dan 13:06, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

No, not a problem! I don't want you to get the wrong impression of Wikipedia or Wikipedians. If you need help, don't hesitate to ask me. At the very least I can try to point you in the right direction. --Endless Dan 14:11, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Your question at the help desk

The bottom line is that you shouldn't be creating a Wikipedia article about the school for the purpose of providing a place where your "students can research and create documents on wiki". Wikipedia has very strict requirements for inclusion. Just be cause Wikipedia is the only wiki most people have heard of doesn't make it the best choice for what you need. I would recommend another wiki, or perhaps starting a school wiki. See list of wikis. Leebo ^T/C 14:51, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Dear User:Harlemacademy, please see the essay I just wrote: User:Teratornis/Tips for teachers. --Teratornis 20:25, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Your article

Hi,

I got asked to give an independent look at the deleted article and your edits on it, to give a comment that was separate from the administrator who removed it. Since it looks like you're relatively new to editing Wikipedia, I might write a bit more, to try and be helpful :)

First, good marks to you, you have done most things right. You've edited politely, sensibly, you have asked an experienced editor to help you, and when your article was removed you asked why and handled by checking. That's good, and much respected! Thanks :)

Now, this is some background on Wikipedia, so you have a better understanding how it works on this sort of thing, then I'll explain how your article was removed and what you can do to fix it. With what I have seen so far, i'm sure you'll be glad to have a go.

Wikipedia

Wikipedia is unusual. Its a reference encyclopedia, not just a reference site. That means we have criteria, which help us decide what belongs and what doesn't. A lot of stuff people haven't heard of might belong (like the name of some ancient king of England), and a lot of stuff people have heard of might not. We have policies to sum up how we decide this, and to guide people in their editing, and you might enjoy finding out about some of the main ones - the knowledge will help you edit better and avoid "beginners mistakes". Each policy or guideline also has an abbreviation starting with "WP", so we can discuss it easily. See Wikipedia:Policies and guidelines and Wikipedia:Simplified ruleset for a good starting point.

Articles

Articles are allowed to exist in Wikipedia if the subject matter meets some conditions:

• It must be suitable for Wikipedia. The main policy on this is Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not (WP:NOT), that lists a lot of the sort of things that are not really what Wikipedia is for. Read that one very carefully.
• It must be "notable". This means that it must have been noticed (non-trivially) by "outsiders", enough that uninvolved people have decided to write about and comment on it. The Empire State Building has been written about, and so has the Moon, but my back garden and the youth club I used to go to, have not. The degree of notability needed varies, as with any encyclopedia (all presidents are notable, but not all footballers). The main guidelines here is Wikipedia:Notability (WP:N).
• It has to be possible to write a balanced article in the first place. So we need to be sure there is enough good quality information out there. Policies like Wikipedia:Verifiability (WP:V) and also Wikipedia:Reliable sources (WP:RS) mostly cover this.
• Articles should cite ("show") their sources, to show where the information comes from. "I know it" or "everyone knows it" is not enough for actual facts. Once you have written the article with verifiable reliable sources, the policy Wikipedia:Cite your sources (WP:CITE) says to note these in the article, and explains how to do so.
• If the person creating an article is not neutral, but has some special connection with the subject, that can be fine, but they have to expect a higher standard of scrutiny and checking. That's so that Wikipedia doesn't get filled up with people writing about stuff they want to promote, like their business or club. This is called a "conflict of interest" (COI) and is covered by Wikipedia:Conflict of interest (WP:COI).

What happened with your article

Assuming you have skimmed the above (and especially read through WP:NOT), you will have a good idea what went on. This is what the problems were. Some you can resolve, others you'll have to think about whether your school meets the criteria or not -- ask advice if needed of course!

1. Wikipedia is not there to promote ones own stuff (WP:NOT, WP:COI). So while an article on a school may be fine, a higher level of scrutiny applies to check if its a school that genuinely meets criteria for an article, or a school that doesn't.
2. The article drafted was a "promotion piece" (WP:NOT, WP:COI). It was written not as a neutral encyclopedia page, but to advertize the school. Thats a matter of tone and style, and can be fixed, but it was the immediate reason why the page was deleted.
3. The article didn't show any evidence the school was "notable" -- that is, that others wrote or discussed it, that it was important, etc. So you need to look at WP:NOT and WP:N again and ask yourself "does my school meet these criteria? If so, how and why?" That shouldn't be hard, as many schools do.
4. The article didn't cite any sources (WP:CITE), so it was just "the authors view". Not a proper encyclopedia piece.
5. Last, although not the reason the article was deleted, Wikipedia doesn't allow "group accounts". So a user account for "all the school" doesn't work. You need to create an account just for you, that isn't used by anyone else. (If you do ever want to change your username, see Wikipedia:Changing username.)

A simple example of a school article can be found here: North East Wales Institute of Higher Education. That might give you an idea what to aim for. Notice it's very factual and so on.

Hope this helps!!

FT2 ^{(Talk | email)} 15:10, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Re:HarlemAcademy user page

Hi there, I just received your message (I wasn't on recently). I would be happy to adopt if you would like :). As for the deleted article, it seems that it was deleted because of the conflict of interest policy and the fact that it had no sources. What FT2 said above pretty much sums it up. Hopefully you aren't disheartened by this and continue to contribute here. Reply back if you have any questions :) --Hdt83 ^Chat 01:04, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

Hello, I've adopted you! If you have any difficulties you can ask me or at the help desk. So the problem you had was that you created a page for your school which was deleted. I'm assuming its http://www.harlemacademy.org/index.cfm right? --Hdt83 ^Chat 00:11, 2 October 2007 (UTC)