This is a personal tool that I use myself. Others are free to use it if they like. I do not propose its use in any sort of policy. Dpbsmith (talk) 22:11, 20 May 2005 (UTC)
BEEFSTEW
Basic Education Evaluation Form and Standardized Test for Evaluating Worthiness
For use on articles on high schools, particularly those listed on AfD. This scoring system represents my personal opinion and nothing more. I will be using it in future in order to make sure that my own evaluations of high school articles are as objective and consistent as possible
Each yes answer counts one point.
A) Is the article more than two sentences long?
B) Does the article contain at least one coherent paragraph of text (other than list items)?
C) Is the article more than 2000 bytes long?
D) Does the article contain at least three facts that are not on the following list:
- The school's name, address, telephone number, website.
- The school's current enrollment
- The name of the school's principal.
- The school district or athletic conference/league to which it belongs.
- The school colors, school mascot, and name of one athletic team.
E) Does the article include a photograph of the school?
F) Does the article list at least one alumnus notable enough to be the subject of a Wikipedia article?
G) Does the article mention a regional or national news story that mentions the school? (Not descriptions of athletic events in local media)
H) Besides F and G, does the article make a serious effort to establish the school's notability and describe some distinct things about it that distinguish it from other schools?
I) Would an alumnus of the school, reading the article, be pleased at how knowledgeable the article was?
J) Could a teacher learn anything relevant to a job search by reading this article (other than basic contact information)?
Scoring examples:
Westview High School is a large high school of 2,300 students, located in Beaverton, Oregon, a suburb of Portland.
External link: Westview High School
- Score 0
Early version of Dr. Michael H. Krop High School
- Score 3 (items A, B, D)
Improved version of Dr. Michael H. Krop High School
- Score 7 (items A, B, C, D, H, I, J)
Montgomery Bell Academy
Specific revision: Montgomery Bell Academy
- Score 8 (items A, B, C, D, G ("Dead Poets Society"), H, I, J)
Moanalua High School
Specific revision: Moanalua High School
- Score 9 (items A, B, C, D, E, F, H, I, J)
- The lighthearted acronym is intended to suggest that this should not be taken too seriously.
- The scoring system is related to my own personal agenda, as follows:
- Stubs have no value unless they grow into articles. The contributor of a stub is issuing an open invitation to others to jump in and work on the article before the contributor gets around to working on it. But the contributor of a stub has a responsibility to work on the stub and expand it if nobody else does.
- High schools have such limited interest that stubs are not likely to grow.
- Stubby high school articles are useless because a simple Google search on the web almost always provides better and more up-to-date information.
- Stubby high school articles do not provide a headstart on future articles. Someone who wants to write a decent article about a high school is just as well off starting from zero as starting from a stubby article.
- I am personally willing to tolerate good articles about non-notable high schools.
- This scoring system tries to define what I think is "good enough."
- The bar is set deliberately low.
- I'm trying for a quick, easy discrimination between bad articles and acceptable articles, not a way of distinguishing fair, good and superb articles.
I don't believe elementary schools, middle schools, junior high schools, etc. belong in Wikipedia unless they are truly, genuinely, notable on a level of national importance. I would not expect more than a handful of schools to be this notable. Froebel's own kindergarten would meet this standard; so would the first Montessori school in the United States; things like that. If I were going to formalize BEEFSTEW I suppose I would deduct three points for a junior high or middle school, six points for an elementary school, or something like that...
I think this approach actually collapses 2 issues into one. Very short stubs aren't always helful, but they are hardly confined to schools. In general (not just with schools) then we have to assume that if a subject is inherently notable then the stub will probably grow. I can see these guidelines being the subject of endless arguments. Although I am not always a drastic inclusionist, I propose to treat all secondary schools as inherently notable, as this encourages young people to get involved in Wikipedia. PatGallacher 10:46, 2005 May 20 (UTC)