Wikipedia:Peer review/Bowling Green State University/archive1

Bowling Green State University

This peer review discussion has been closed.
I've listed this article for peer review because… the page has been improved, expanded, and updated over the past few months and weeks. Significant expansion of the article to become a comprehensive, well sourced and cited article close to GA status. Thanks, Bhockey10 (talk) 18:44, 29 February 2012 (UTC)

Ruhrfisch comments: Thanks for your work on this article - I have been on this campus (though I am by no means an expert on it). Here are some suggestions for improvement.

• A model article is useful for ideas and examples to follow. There are quite a few FAs on universities at Wikipedia:Featured_articles#Education
• Watch WP:OVERLINKing - for example the link to United States in the lead is not really necessary (as almost all readers will already know that the USA is).

Comment: I'm not too worried, I've seen "United States" linked and unlinked in other GAs and FA (probably close to 50-50. Since Wikipedia is a worldwide entity I'm inclined to leave it for users that want to find more information on the US.

• At the same time do link things that need links on the first use - for example normal school, which is now linked on its fourth appearance, should be linked on the first.

 Done

• I would also link Boys State in the lead

 Done

• I would probably include the fact that BGSU was founded as a normal school in the lead, and also provide a brief explanation (a teacher training college) somewhere (not sure that has to be in the lead). This is part of providing context to the reader - see WP:PCR

 Done

• Similarly spell out abbreviations like I-75 on first use (so "Interstate 75 (I-75)") per the MOS

 Done

• problem sentence "...and has a on-campus residential student population of 6,500 students.[4]
  • First off, since this is a number that will change with time, the date / year should be given (as of 2011).
  • Second, the infobox makes clear that the total student population is over 17,000, so I would include that number in the lead (as well as this).
  • Third, the lead should be a summary of the whole article and as such nothing should be in the lead only. However, this is only quoted in the lead and is not in the rest of the article that I can see (but it should be). See WP:LEAD
  • Fourth, most leads do not have references except for direct quotes and extraordinary claims (as the lead is a summery, the refs should be in the body of the article). It is OK to either cite the lead fully (just like the body) or almost not at all - this lead is an odd hybrid.
• Check the rest of the lead to make sure claims are not there only (like 85% of Bowling Green's total enrollment is made up of in-state students from Ohio.)

 Done I added the suggestions to the sentence, such as "as of 2011" and added a mention of the total student pop over 17,000. I trimmmed some of the student body statistics and references from the lead and moved the info and references to a more apporpriate section of the article (student life).

• Also make sure the lead is a summary of the whole article - my rule of thumb is to make sure that every header is in the lead somehow

 Done (see above comment)

• In History, I would identify Ohio University and Miami University (and not just the places they are).

 Done

• The article on the Lowry Act points out that Ohio State University had a Normal School by 1907, so that should be mentioned too

 Done

• This seems pretty well cited, but some places still need references like A campus plan was created and $150,000 was appropriated to develop the campus and construct the first buildings.

 Done

• The article can have one ref for a series of sentences all attributed to the same source(s) - so this all could be just one ref at the end SICSIC is an official spirit organization at BGSU that began in 1946 by President Frank J. Prout.[59] SICSIC routinely attends major BGSU sporting events and other campus activities promoting school spirit.[59] The organization is secret and contains six members, two each for sophomore, junior, and senior classes.[59]

 Done

• The references used are in large part from BGSU itself - while some such refs are OK and unavoidable, the article should strive for independent third-party reliable sources for as much of the material as possible. For SICSIC, for example, it would be much better if its notability could be established by reference to external reliable sources (and not just BGSU websites).

Comment: I agree and will continue looking for external sources, This artile is similar to others in the number of university-related sources, however.

• Prose is OK, but could use a copyedit in places - one example The school opened on September 15, 1914 as Bowling Green State Normal School in two temporary locations in Bowling Green at the Bowling Green Armory building on Wooster Street and a branch school in Toledo for the 1914-1915 academic year while construction of the first campus buildings.[14][12]

 Done (also will bring article to WP:COPYEDITORS)

• Headers need to follow WP:HEAD and avoid repeating the name of the article (or the parent header for subheaders) if at all possible. So for example section 2 (which seems like it should be called "Campuses" as there are two) could then have subheads "Main" and "BGSU Firelands"

 Done

• Nice photos.

Comment: Thanks!

• I noticed the unusual verb "eclipsed" and checked the reference. The article here has "...and by 1950 the number of students eclipsed 4,000.[11]" while the original source has "By 1950, the number of students had eclipsed 4,000." This is a copyright violation and should be rewritten - please see WP:COPYVIO

 Done Paraphrased with "by 1950 enrollment grew to over 4,000"

• Please make sure that the existing text includes no copyright violations, plagiarism, or close paraphrasing. For more information on this please see Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2009-04-13/Dispatches. (This is a general warning given in all peer reviews, in view of previous problems that have risen over copyvios.)

 Done

Hope this helps. If my comments are useful, please consider peer reviewing an article, especially one at Wikipedia:Peer review/backlog (which is how I found this article). I do not watch peer reviews, so if you have questions or comments, please contact me on my talk page. Yours, Ruhrfisch _><>°^° 19:06, 9 April 2012 (UTC)

• Thanks for a compehensive and detailed peer preview. It seems like many of the suggestions were fairly small touchups, minor format changes, and other wording fixes. It's good there's not anything drastically wrong. If you have any more comments they are welcomed. I think this peer review was very helpful in the article's move towards GA status and I'm hopeful with some more work and TLC it will get there. Bhockey10 (talk) 22:47, 10 April 2012 (UTC)