Talk:BEACH Act

This article is or was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Joanns2you, SavannaLumley (article contribs).

Howdy Joanne and Savannah, great progress! Here's a quick rundown of some thoughts: 1. reformat the summary, I rephrased it below. 2. Add a history section and merge the federal funding section 3. Add a one or two line introduction section to what your sections are about, such as the provisions and grant funding sections. 4. Axe the key term section.

1. Summary should be reformatted to to drive the main idea homes first (similar to how CWA/CAA and other laws are written on wiki). I tweeked some grammar:

The Beaches Environmental Assessment and Coastal Health Act of 2000, or BEACH Act, is a United States federal statute that sets national standards for recreational water testing and authorizes state grants to pay for beach monitoring programs. The Act was signed by President Bill Clinton and amended the Clean Water Act to require the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to set up criteria for testing, monitoring, and notifying public users of possible coastal recreation water problems. The act is greatest exercised during beach seasons, when bacteria levels become increasingly high (you should explain from what causes here). Bacteria, such as Escherichia coli (E.coli) (always provide full scientific name first), are pathogen indicates that affect water pollution levels (loads?). Agencies report and monitor the levels and post warning signs as necessary.

2. I would add a history section after the summary and the culminating contributions by the Surfrider Foundation to steer the Beach Bill (H.R. 999) prior to the BEACH Act. Your federal funding section could be incorporated here as it talks about the historical funding.

3. For your provisions and grant funding sections, I would introduce the main purpose of those sections first, i.e. various provisions to the BEACH Act were important as.....

4. You do not need a key term section, those terms should be incorporated and/or defined within the text of your other sections.

God job! Allen.Lau (talk) 07:25, 6 December 2016 (UTC)

Some thoughts on the article

Some feedback from an uninvolved Wikipedia editor: The article is not really written from a neutral point of view. I'd recommend copyediting to remedy this. The article could also benefit from improved sourcing. Right now the article mostly is sourced to the law itself and its implementing regulations. Since Surfrider is an advocacy organization, it should be used with care as a reference. And what makes Beachapedia reliable? It looks like a wiki. I would see if there are any reliable newspaper articles about the passage and impact of the BEACH Act. I think adding content from such sources would be the best way to improve the article. Calliopejen1 (talk) 21:59, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

Online Volunteer Comments

• Citations should not be placed on same line as section and subsection headings.
• Italics can be used for emphasis, boldface is normally not used for this purpose. Consider changing "states, territories, and tribes" to italics or removing emphasis.
• Overlinking -- Links to other Wikipedia articles are done the first time it is mentioned. The Clean Water Act and E.Coli should be linked once.
• Section "Concerns with Funding", should be written from a neutral point of view. Writing "Every year, the President Administration ..", might not make sense to someone reading this article in the year 2030.
• In the section on state implementation, what level would be considered "out of control."? Reconsider word choice here.

Wonderful job creating an article from scratch!

- Totranm (talk)

Hey Joan and Savannah,

This is amazing progress! You guys added such depth to all the sections - appears quite comprehensive now! Great work. If you guys were going to work on this some more, the only section that could use a tiny bit more work is "Post 2000 BEACH Act Movements" though it looks like you both put a lot of hard work and effort into this already and is great the way it is. I'd leave a bowl of cherries if I knew how. Cheers Allen.Lau (talk) 06:51, 13 December 2016 (UTC)