Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/European Graduate School (3rd nomination): Difference between revisions

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European Graduate School

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Private educational organization. As the article history shows, there seems to be a longtime problem with promotionalism and COI editing (see also AN/I thread). This should lead us to reexamine the organization's notability, as the previous AfD is very old and seems to have had canvassing and socking issues too. To be sure, this apparently isn't a diploma mill but a real school with real faculty, and it is recognized by the Canton of Valais as a "private school of tertiary level" ([1]). But the many cited sources are mostly dead links, and what can be accessed seem to be mostly passing mentions (such as interviews with teachers in which it is mentioned that they are faculty there), or regurgitated press releases. If there is a reliable independent source that covers this school in sufficient detail (which may well exist), then we should keep the article, but as it is the sources appear rather thin. Sandstein 21:02, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Schools-related deletion discussions. North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 21:26, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Organizations-related deletion discussions. North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 21:26, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Switzerland-related deletion discussions. North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 21:26, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Europe-related deletion discussions. North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 21:27, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Education-related deletion discussions. North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 21:27, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Keep: dead links should be fixed whenever possible (and it's often possible) and anyway their being dead isn't really a reason to consider the article less notable than it would otherwise be. Similarly, COI editing and promotionalism may put in some doubt the genuineness of previous "keep" stances, but since it's WP:NOTVOTE, they would have been judged by their merits, not their count, by the discussion closer, and as such I wouldn't say they somehow influence the article's notability and right to exist. LjL (talk) 21:57, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. I think there are reliable sources to pass WP:GNG, here are two: [2][3]. Vanjagenije (talk) 22:52, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

The first source looks acceptable, but the other is just a reproduced press release - we'd need another. Sandstein 09:25, 26 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Delete per nom. In the 10 years since the last AfD (and the fact that this is the third go-round is telling), there should be more sources than the two cited by Vanjagenije that the school is trying to get accredited in Malta. Sources in the article are passing mentions or directory listings. Miniapolis 23:03, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Often, and logically, the fact that an article repeatedly passes AfDs as "keep" is only "telling" of the fact that the article has multiple confirmations that it should be kept. LjL (talk) 23:06, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

We accept public and private high schools even without much verification. Sandstein, why wouldn't we here? As long as the thing can be proven to exist, it can easily be argued that this is inherently notable. Thank you, Drmies (talk) 00:59, 26 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not aware of a guideline stipulating inherent notability for schools. In any case, such guidelines only offer a presumption of notability, which must still be tested through reliable sources if challenged. Sandstein 09:24, 26 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not necessarily in favor of deletion of this article (I lean towards keeping), but I find your argument strange: generally speaking, notability isn't the same as existence for Wikipedia's purposes, and I'm not sure why this would be different for schools, even if other schools exist. LjL (talk) 18:37, 26 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Keep - I don't think that the problems with the SPA and COI editing of the article indicates that it should be deleted, but that it should be semi-protected on a long-term basis. BMK (talk) 04:03, 26 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Keep - _ A balanced article about an educational institute that clearly exists and falls within our generally accepted practice for schools. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 12:19, 26 March 2016 (UTC)keep[reply]
Keep reluctantly. COI & SPA are not reasons to delete an article. And should be kept per WP:SCHOOLOUTCOMES. Joseph2302 (talk) 17:46, 26 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Delete, more toruble than it's worth. This is a school of no objectively provable merit and its SEO team are determined that we musthave a hagiography, making the beusiness of maintaning NPOV very tiresome. Guy (Help!) 22:19, 26 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Trouble vs worth is not a criterion for deletion; notability and verifiability are. Can we concentrate on those? A simple test: would we keep the article if it weren't for "the school's SEO team"? If yes, then is this a revenge? LjL (talk) 01:01, 27 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

User:LjL. We have deleted several articles where there was marginal notability at best and there was heavy promotional pressure, and the consensus was that the article was not worth keeping due to the volunteer effort it was taking to maintain the neutrality of the article. I am not saying that is the case here; it is just an increasingly common factor in deletions discussions. Jytdog (talk) 04:09, 27 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Well, I consider it a spurious one and not in the spirit of what guidelines about deletion recommend. Deletion is a very extreme measure since it's one of the few things that removes material from most editors' accessibility (since it cannot be retrieved from the history), and taking this route for petty reasons of revenge against disruptive editors or unwillingness to keep an article tidy is dangerous. I'm sure it has been done before, but I'm sure other silly stuff has been done before. LjL (talk) 18:34, 27 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

You can consider that as you may; it puts you outside the consensus that is developing. Do not mischaracterize it as "petty revenge"; it is a question of wise use of community resources in presenting the public with articles that provide summaries of accepted knowledge and keeping out abuse of Wikipedia for promotion -- all of that is in NOT; the policy and pillar. There is nothing petty or vengeful in it. Jytdog (talk) 21:00, 27 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

If articles are being deleted not on grounds of lack of notability of verifiability but due to the fact they're being disrupted, that is a self-evidently inappropriate use of the deletion process by my understanding of everything about Wikipedia, so that's how I am characterizing it. There is a discussion about actual notability being started below: that seems a much more worthwhile deletion debate than one based on fixing disruption by more disruption (which deletion of otherwise appropriate articles is). LjL (talk) 23:02, 27 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

User:LjL again you are not responding to what I am actually saying. What I said was where there was marginal notability at best. If an article is a slamdunk "keep" based on NOTABILITY this argument has not been at play in the past. It has only been used if an article is borderline. If you are at all experienced in Wikipedia, you know that there are quite a few marginal articles. Jytdog (talk) 22:29, 30 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Note - I went through the history of the article last night and listed all the SPA and conflicted editors who had multiple edits in a connected contributors template - there were many IP addresses with one or two edits that were clearly promoting EGS/removing criticisms that I didn't list. But there are about 40 there. See Talk:European_Graduate_School. Jytdog (talk) 21:02, 27 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Can anyone show that this meets WP:N? We've got COI editors causing problems and trying to make the place look good. And _that_ has caused our article to turn nearly into a platform for attacking it instead (the accreditation section at the moment has had it's actually verified accreditation removed and nothing but largely irrelevant negative stuff in its place--all done/maintained by admins under full protection). Frankly it's an embarrassment and if this doesn't meet our notability requirements we'd be best off deleting it. I'm leaning toward delete based on WP:N, though if sources show up that count toward WP:N then I'd have to move away from that point. Also, we are almost to the point WP:CSD#G10 applies. Hobit (talk) 22:53, 27 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Delete per nom - school seems unaccredited as well. SQL^{Query me!} 10:39, 28 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
- Actually, it is accredited. That it appears not to be is part of the problem with our article. Hobit (talk) 12:26, 28 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Delete I don't see any way to ever trust the NPOV of this article unless the "SEO team" leaves it alone, which won't happen. Since WP:NPOV takes precedence over WP:Notability and since the topic is barely notable at best, and we don't seem to have any way to noindex it, toss it. 173.228.123.101 (talk) 04:57, 30 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

What you say is completely and dangerously wrong: NPOV does not take precedence over notability in a deletion discussion. Saying that an article's topic is notable yet the article itself is currently WP:RUBBISH is specifically an argument that needs to be avoided in deletion discussions. The article is non-neutral? So fix it, don't cut off pieces of an encyclopedia. WP:AFD itself mentions The argument "non-neutral point of view" (violates WP:NPOV) is often used, but often such articles can be salvaged, so this is not a very strong reason for deletion either, and surely, an article about a school is not intrinsically POV and can be salvaged. Really, I am starting to be appalled at how many of the deletion arguments here are based on WP:IAR and WP:IDONTLIKEIT rather than grounded in policy. LjL (talk) 12:14, 30 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Actually NPOV beats notability everywhere on Wikipedia because it is one of the five pillars. Inability to cover a subject neutrally is why lack of sources (i.e. failing GNG) is a reason to delete, for example. Guy (Help!) 13:17, 30 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Hi LjL, I agree that if an article has fixable NPOV problems, it's usually better to fix the problems than delete the article. For this article, I gave my reasons for believing the NPOV problems are not fixable in practice (I'm not interested in abstract theoretical possibilities). Since I don't think we should be willing to keep such an article permanently, that leaves deletion. Deletion is not irreversible: if someone later manages to write a version that meets our standard of neutrality, there's a few different ways to undo the deletion. This happens sometimes, usually because new sources became available after the deletion that are good enough to support a neutral article. 173.228.123.101 (talk) 19:18, 30 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Agree with the above, and struck my previous vote. This version is never going to be neutral and spam-free, and WP:NPOV trumps WP:GNG. Therefore, I believe we should delete, with no prejudice to a non-conflicted editor writing a neutral tone article in the future. Joseph2302 (talk) 19:30, 30 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

@@ Line 28: / Line 28: @@
 ::::::You can consider that as you may; it puts you outside the consensus that is developing.  Do '''not''' mischaracterize it as "petty revenge"; it is a question of wise use of community resources in presenting the public with articles that provide summaries of accepted knowledge and keeping out abuse of Wikipedia for promotion -- all of that is in NOT; the policy and pillar.  There is nothing petty or vengeful in it.  [[User:Jytdog|Jytdog]] ([[User talk:Jytdog|talk]]) 21:00, 27 March 2016 (UTC)
 :::::::''If'' articles are being deleted ''not'' on grounds of lack of notability of verifiability but due to the fact they're being disrupted, that is a self-evidently inappropriate use of the deletion process by my understanding of everything about Wikipedia, so that's how I am characterizing it. There is a discussion about actual notability being started below: that seems a much more worthwhile deletion debate than one based on fixing disruption by more disruption (which deletion of otherwise appropriate articles is). [[User:LjL|LjL]] ([[User talk:LjL|talk]]) 23:02, 27 March 2016 (UTC)
-:::::::: again you are not responding to what I am actually saying.  What I said was '''where there was marginal notability at best'''.  If an article is a slamdunk "keep" based on NOTABILITY this has not at play in the past.  It has only been used if an article is borderline.  If you are at all experienced in Wikipedia, you know that there are quite a few marginal articles. [[User:Jytdog|Jytdog]] ([[User talk:Jytdog|talk]]) 22:28, 30 March 2016 (UTC)
+:::::::: [[User:LjL]] again you are not responding to what I am actually saying.  What I said was '''where there was marginal notability at best'''.  If an article is a slamdunk "keep" based on NOTABILITY this argument has not been at play in the past.  It has only been used if an article is borderline.  If you are at all experienced in Wikipedia, you know that there are quite a few marginal articles. [[User:Jytdog|Jytdog]] ([[User talk:Jytdog|talk]]) 22:29, 30 March 2016 (UTC)
 * Note - I went through the history of the article last night and listed all the SPA and conflicted editors who had multiple edits in a connected contributors template - there were many IP addresses with one or two edits that were clearly promoting EGS/removing criticisms that I didn't list.  But there are about 40 there. See [[Talk:European_Graduate_School]]. [[User:Jytdog|Jytdog]] ([[User talk:Jytdog|talk]]) 21:02, 27 March 2016 (UTC)