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Hello, Ashleighpresnar, and welcome to Wikipedia! My name is Shalor and I work with the Wiki Education Foundation; I help support students who are editing as part of a class assignment.

I hope you enjoy editing here. If you haven't already done so, please check out the student training library, which introduces you to editing and Wikipedia's core principles. You may also want to check out the Teahouse, a community of Wikipedia editors dedicated to helping new users. Below are some resources to help you get started editing.

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  • You can find answers to many student questions on our Q&A site, ask.wikiedu.org

If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to contact me on my talk page. Shalor (Wiki Ed) (talk) 20:35, 23 January 2018 (UTC)Reply

School choice in Pennsylvania

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Hi! I've done some major editing of your article School choice in Pennsylvania to better conform with Wikipedia's policies. Don't worry - this isn't a criticism of you or your work and effort. Specifically much of the article had been about school choice more generally rather than what is happening in Pennsylvania. I have also tagged it with some sources being unreliable. Having reliable sources is an incredibly important part of Wikipedia. To be reliable sources generally need to be trusted secondary sources. If you have questions about any of this or might need some help please ping me here or leave a comment at my talk page (as I will not be watching this page). Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 14:53, 26 April 2018 (UTC)Reply

  • Thanks Barkeep49. I also want to echo that sourcing is incredibly important, as the source has to be reliable enough so that readers and other Wikipedians can trust that the information is correct. With sourcing, make sure that it undergoes editorial oversight and doesn't have any obvious bias that would keep them from taking a really thorough look at the topic. (IE, PETA's writings wouldn't make for a good citation in an article about fishing due to their strong feelings about fishing and eating any type of meat or animal product, as well as because there have been multiple claims of their work's accuracy.) The sourcing should be secondary as much as possible for two reasons: the first is that this helps show where the topic is notable - in other words, that it's an important enough topic to where people other than those immediately involved with the topic find it important. The second is the secondary sourcing helps verify claims and as they're not technically intimately involved with the proceedings/topic, they're more likely to be objective since they don't have a pony in the race, so to speak. Shalor (Wiki Ed) (talk) 18:51, 26 April 2018 (UTC)Reply
  • I noticed that you reverted my edits. I have restored my version. I know that this is for a class but wikipedia has different writing standards than traditional college essays. The good news is that you have a publishable article as is. This gives you a great platform to add the sources Shalor talks about above. 05:13, 28 April 2018 (UTC)
  • Hi Ashleigh, Barkeep49, I've reverted the article to Barkeep49's version since the prior version did have issues with tone and an essay format. Barkeep is correct that Wikipedia has different writing standards than an essay and I feel that the article has a better chance of retention in its pruned format. This isn't to mean that the content can't be re-added per se, just that it should be specifically about PA and shouldn't be re-added unless it can be worked in to show more specifically how this applies to the current and past history of school choice in the state. 16:17, 2 May 2018 (UTC)Reply