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Page of interest

Wikipedia:Ambassadors/Assignments might contain something valuable, but it's written to a certain audience. I like this page because it expects professors, Wikipedians, students, ambassadors and the curious will all read it. Biosthmors (talk) 18:05, 11 December 2012 (UTC)

Question about usernames

I know of at least one course where students were required to post their work under their real names. What is the feeling about this? Is it a good idea or a bad idea? Is there a policy about student usernames, or is it up to the individual professor? --MelanieN (talk) 00:25, 13 December 2012 (UTC)

Although it's a wall-o-text, there's considerable discussion of that at Wikipedia:Education noticeboard. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:35, 13 December 2012 (UTC)
Personally, I oppose students using, or even posting, their real names, for all the well-known privacy reasons. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:36, 13 December 2012 (UTC)
People are free to use their real name if they wish. It has pluses and minuses. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 23:44, 13 December 2012 (UTC)
(edit conflict) In general, true, of course. But we have to be concerned about cases where the professor, not understanding how things work here, tells students they all have to use their real names. Also, we need to make sure that students can understand the pluses and minuses before they make a choice that they might regret later. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:58, 13 December 2012 (UTC)

There's no policy related to whether or not students should post their work under their real name, because there are currently no policies that specifically govern the work of students on Wikipedia. In classes I am involved with, I typically explain the benefits and risks of both real names and pseudonyms and the professors typically let students pursue the path they prefer. In most cases, I would view this as a best practice. However, I don't think it would be appropriate to try to have a codified Wikipedia policy that says "Students must be allowed to use pseudonyms if they desire." If a professor thinks that requiring students to operate under their real names presents a pedagogical benefit important enough for the professor to make that choice, it should be their call - they are the professor, and making that sort of call is their job. All American universities have procedures in place that students can use if they feel a professors assignment is unethical, unfair, or otherwise fucked (and I'm guessing this is true pretty much everywhere else as well.) So I think we should strongly emphasize that educating students about the benefits of each option and letting them decide for themselves is best practice, but not try to make some sort of ironclad rule. Kevin Gorman (talk) 23:55, 13 December 2012 (UTC)

Consulting those of us who contributed to this essay

Currently, there is a link to the essay page edit history in the "Advice to students" section, suggesting that they can contact any of us individually if they feel that they are being coerced into making contributions. I am having difficulty coming up with a better suggestion, but I'm uncomfortable with doing it that way. Just as I (like many of us) don't want to be an unpaid TA, it never occurred to me that I would be signing up for that by making edits here. What if someone vandalizes the page and it gets reverted, but the student naively tries to contact the vandal? What if the student urgently contacts someone who is on Wiki-break, who fails to respond? Should we, instead, create a category of editors who want to take on that role, and link to the category page? Should we, instead, link to the address for e-mailing ArbCom, or OTRS? --Tryptofish (talk) 23:33, 13 December 2012 (UTC)

I'm struggling with the same concerns, but don't come up with a solution. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 23:35, 13 December 2012 (UTC)
I think I've got it ... ask them instead to post to this talk page. Theoretically, we'll all have it watchlisted? Alternatly, post to the ENB? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 23:41, 13 December 2012 (UTC)
Yes, both good ideas. Good point about inadvertently reaching out to the vandal. :) SlimVirgin (talk) 23:43, 13 December 2012 (UTC)
Thanks! Yes, this talk page seems like a workable option, although I think a case can be made for something more formal or where the editors who would respond would be more vetted (but what?). I'm ambivalent about the noticeboard, because it will look to the student like a place where lots of people are commenting, and we have to realize that such students will be very nervous about being found out by the instructor. Just imagine the concerns about retribution, and the desire to be able to talk to someone privately. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:55, 13 December 2012 (UTC)

Language regarding sandboxing

originally titled "I think this essay should avoid using language that seems to strongly suggest or mandate that students be given the option of existing only in a sandbox," which apparently breaks scrolling on some browsersKevin Gorman (talk) 01:29, 14 December 2012 (UTC), So, I can't provide an example that has come to fruition yet, because the class will be running next semester, but I see significant problems in stressing to students that they should/must be given the option of working solely in a sandbox in all cases. In discussions with professors, a decent number of them see the potential of their students having to interact with a pre-existing community, adapt to its social norms, and engage in discussion with other Wikipedians about their own edits, (including things like having to reach consensus about WP:NPOV issues with other editors) as an active benefit of using a Wikipedia-based assignment. Much of academia is about participating in communities of practice, but this is a skill that undergraduates rarely get any chance to develop. To me, I can definitely see how this could be considered an important aspect of a Wikipedia-based assignment.

I know that what I just described doesn't match up with the experiences most of you have had with education program classes in the past, especially those of you who have had excessively negative experiences. However, I think that if you think about this suggestion, most of you can probably see how that could in fact represent an important benefit to students of participating in a well-run Wikipedia-based assignment. Although I don't have a completed example of this sort of assignment to point to currently, I will be helping run a class at Berkeley next semester where the professor definitely very much sees this as a large part of the point of the assignment - she doesn't want her students in a walled garden, and probably wouldn't use a Wikipedia-based assignment if that somehow became a requirement. (And for reasons I'll elaborate on later, I think she is absolutely correct in her assessment of this for this particular class.)

Although this kind of class may currently be a rarity, I believe its frequency will be increasing - greatly - as the program begins to mature. I would encourage y'all, in developing this essay, to do so in a way that acknowledges (or at least doesn't try to explicitly forbid) the validity of this sort of assignment. I know it's not the kind of assignment that most of you have regularly seen in the education program so far, but I think it's going to be a fairly common form of educational assignment going forward, and I think it is one that has the potential to present a lot of good for all parties involved. I'm not going to edit parts of the essay related to this kind of thing myself without more discussion first, but I can tell you that if this ends up including strong language against this sort of assignment it, unfortunately, won't be a useful tool for this class next semester - or the many others like it that will eventually occur. I need to head out, but I'll drop by again later with more details about the class I mentioned, which will hopefully sway some opinions. Kevin Gorman (talk) 00:18, 14 December 2012 (UTC)

And also, to be clear, this particular class will be part of a wider program at my University where one of the explicit goals is having students conduct engaged scholarship and interact with non-University organizations. The ethical implications that this has here apply to almost every other course in the program equally, and have been cleared by the highest level of administration and faculty at my school. Students will have the option of opting out of this still, simply by choosing not to take the class (since the assignment will be introduced on the first day.) Kevin Gorman (talk) 00:22, 14 December 2012 (UTC)
Yes, I see the sandbox thing as a potentially desirable option, but not something we should require. I have, in fact, had some good experiences with students editing directly in article space, and I've seen students have good experiences interacting with other editors. I also agree that conscientious instructors sometimes specifically want the kind of interactions that only happen in regular editing, and they are right to want it. I'd rather figure out ways to avoid the bad experiences, without treating every class as a presumed bad experience in the making. --Tryptofish (talk) 00:27, 14 December 2012 (UTC)
In discussions with professors, a decent number of them see the potential of their students having to interact with a pre-existing community, adapt to its social norms, and engage in discussion with other Wikipedians about their own edits, ... Two problems: 1) a decent number of "us" are having problems with a decent number of "them" and their approach which is not working, and 2) in my experience the students are not interacting with the community and learning about collaborative editing anyway (that is one of the big problems); encouraging them to sandbox is unlikely to have any impact on how much they interact. They start editing a few days before term-end, and drop their article in just before it's due and they will be graded, and they rarely engage or respond on article talk or user talk. They have been working in and creating walled gardens anyway; if there had been any decent measure of interaction between EP participants and established editors, I might understand the concern. As it is, I am all in favor of having them a) edit in sandbox, while b) noticing the article talk page where they are editing in sandbox. Could you shorten your section heading? It scrolls across my screen making it hard for me to enter an edit summary. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:33, 14 December 2012 (UTC)
Only if they are spending significant time on Wikipedia and will actually engage with the community should they be working in the main space. Else, if the assignment is small and the engagement slight they should work in the sand box. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine)
Alright now class (Sandy), here is your reading assignment for today: User talk:FutureSocialNeuroscientist#Good work!. The problem is that this happens too infrequently, but in fact there are exceptions to the generalization. --Tryptofish (talk) 00:43, 14 December 2012 (UTC)
Oh, my, there's one of my problem profs. So, the term is over (syllabus says last assignment was 12/11), and this student has a GA nom up anyway, which could be a good sign; will the student stick around? Let's hope so. If so, that proves the point (they can move it out of sandbox after getting their grade if they want). And, we aren't saying they can't move things out of sandbox ever; just encouraging them to begin there and stay there if they choose. I hope you'll keep an eye on the GA nom, btw; isn't Wilhelmina Will a DYKer? Can we please shorten this section head? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:54, 14 December 2012 (UTC)
The decision today was to make the page a GA. My own independent opinion is to agree with that decision; please feel free to tar and feather me if you disagree. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:55, 14 December 2012 (UTC)

Sandy: I agree with you that a large number of classes that we've had so far have produced mediocre (or worse) results and involved little engagement with the community. Problems are especially bad in areas that involve medrs. However, I don't think that all classes are inherently doomed to mediocrity. I understand your concerns that working in the main space may present difficulties for other Wikipedians (and Wikipedia as a whole,) and agree with you that encouraging extensive use of sandboxes is generally desirable, especially in medical areas. I see absolutely no problem with incorporating strong wording encouraging the use of sandboxes, and would even consider supporting a policy covering medrs-specific areas that would require it until we figure out a better way to handle them - for the protection of Wikipedia. However, as this essay stands currently, it's not encouraging the use of sandboxes for the protection of Wikipedia. It is strongly implying that any option other than letting students exist exclusively in sandboxes is unethical because of concerns about the coercion of students. This language was added to this essay by Slim, who has elsewhere explicitly said that she considers requiring students to work in mainspace to present a categorical ethical issue. (I'm pointing out who added it just to show that I'm not reading in to the language something that isn't there.) For the reasons I outlined above, this is not the case. The appropriate place to include language encouraging students be given the option to, where appropriate, choose to only use sandboxes is not in a section directed to students - it's in a section directed to professors. And the appropriate way to frame it (at least if this is intended to be a mainstream essay, or one distributed to students) is not as an ethical issue involving the coercion of students. Kevin Gorman (talk) 01:46, 14 December 2012 (UTC)

We have two separate issues here, and we ought to treat them separately on the essay page. One is the ethical issue of students giving informed consent to contributing under Wikipedia's terms of use. In my opinion, this is a genuine ethical issue, but we don't solve it by telling students that they have to write in a sandbox, or by telling students to figure it out themselves. The other issue is the one about whether to write in a sandbox or in article space (and I already said what I think about that), but that's really a separate issue from informed consent. --Tryptofish (talk) 01:58, 14 December 2012 (UTC)
But I think you are exactly correct: the right place to discuss sandboxes is under advice to instructors. It should be a teaching decision, not a student-by-student one. As for informed consent, I'd like there to be something for students (as opposed to instructors) to be able to indicate that they do not give consent, if that's the way that they feel – and instructors need to be able to figure out a way to deal with that if it happens. (In other words, it's between the instructor and the student, and Wikipedia should not insert itself by taking the instructor's side.) --Tryptofish (talk) 02:03, 14 December 2012 (UTC)
I pretty much agree with you. We should, somewhere in the instructor section, insert language about sandboxes that encourages instructors to allow their use where possible and desired by students. We should also, somewhere in the instructor section, insert language talking about the possibility of students objecting to participation in a Wikipedia-based assignment and encouraging them to plan their response ahead of time, before a student actually does so. (And their response could be in the form of an alternate assignment, an agreement to use sandboxen only, or pretty much whatever else they see fit. If the instructor's response doesn't satisfy the student, the issue becomes between the student and the instructor, or if they can't reach a satisfactory resolution, the student and whatever grievance process their school has set up. Not between us and the instructor or us and the student.) We should, somewhere in the student section, insert language that clearly explains what contributing to Wikipedia will involve (re: license, etc,) that encourages them to talk to their instructor if they have a problem participating in the assignment, but doesn't imply that such an assignment is somehow categorically unethical. Kevin Gorman (talk) 02:13, 14 December 2012 (UTC)
The essay doesn't say students must work exclusively in sandboxes, but that they must be given the option, because all Wikipedians have that option. It means they can ask that their work be deleted once they're done with it, which all Wikipedians have the right to do. If we don't offer the option, then the issue of whether they've given free and informed consent to the releases kicks in, and if they haven't the releases are arguably invalid.
I think that advice needs to be in the student section to make sure they see it, though if we want to repeat it in the instructors' section that's fine. I like Tryptofish's idea of the students signing consent forms. SlimVirgin (talk) 16:18, 14 December 2012 (UTC)
Students participating in educational assignments have two different sets of expectations - and requirements - placed upon them. One set of standards is placed upon them by us, and one set of standards is placed upon them by the institution they are attending. We can - and should - make sure that the same standards applied to other Wikipedians are applied to them. And we should make clear to students what these expectations are. (I know we generally frown on welcoming bots, but maybe we should even do this with a bot that posts a standardized message on the talk pages of all users who sign up for a class via the education extension?) But we cannot - and should not - try to dictate the set of standards that is applied to them by the institution they attend; that's between them and their institution. We can tell them that if they have a problem with the expectations we have of them as Wikipedians that they should bring it up with their instructor - and we can tell even explicitly mention that if they can't reach an acceptable resolution with their instructor that they can pursue whatever grievance process their school has set up. But we can't go further than that.
Students are also not the only people who have standards placed upon them when editing Wikipedia that go beyond what the basic standards of being a Wikipedian - and in no other situation does Wikipedia try to intervene in dictating what those standards are allowed to be. I think I'm currently actively covered by five different non-disclosure agreements related to various things - which means there is a lot of information I cannot post on Wikipedia that a Wikipedian not covered by those could. A Wikipedian on active duty in the US military can't post certain political opinions. A Wikipedian in Saudi Arabia can't post pornographic images. A Wikipedian in Germany can't make a post denying that the Holocaust occurred from my understanding of it, anyway. In none of these other situations does Wikipedia try to intervene and dictate what the second set of standards is allowed to be, and we shouldn't try to do so here, either. The issue is between the Wikipedian and the group issuing the second set of standards.
In terms of license release issues, I would suggest that that's an appropriate issue for the WMF's legal team to consider - not us. I will explicitly ping someone at WMF directing them towards this concern. I can see how that's a potentially valid concern, but that's why WMF has a legal department. Kevin Gorman (talk) 02:39, 15 December 2012 (UTC)
Correct me if I'm out of place, or if I misunderstood something, but I signed up to be an ambassador so that I could discuss changes to the grading rubric used by the professor's class I've helped. Is having this sort of conversation with the professor "out of place" for average Wikipedians? I'd think not, as long as they are super polite about it. Biosthmors (talk) 02:57, 15 December 2012 (UTC)
I like Kevin's idea of asking WMF Counsel for an opinion about consent forms and license release. I'm happy to withhold further judgment of my own until we hear back from them. Perhaps it's true that if an instructor wants a student to contribute against the student's wishes, the student's concerns must be worked out with the educational institution and not with Wikipedia. Perhaps Wikipedia's prerogatives in the matter are limited to enforcing our own policies and guidelines, and perhaps the message that appears near the save button for edits is as far as that goes – but I do not know whether that changes if there are outside pressures to hit the save button.
As for Biosthmors' question, the way I see it is that you are free to do it if you want to, but if other editors prefer not to, they cannot be expected or compelled to do so, and we ought to be clear that it is never compulsory. Likewise, any input that Wikipedians give to instructors about grading is not binding upon the educational institution.
As for sandbox editing, I prefer to have the advice in the section for instructors, because we should not be setting up a situation where we seem to encourage a student to dispute class requirements. We can only preclude class requirements that violate Wikipedia policies and guidelines (and we presently have no policies requiring other users to work only in sandbox space), so we can offer students ways to seek help if they are being forced to edit against policy, and we definitely should explain to instructors how they should keep classes within policy. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:14, 15 December 2012 (UTC)
@Bio - I agree with Trypto's answer to your question: we can give feedback on stuff like instructional design, we just can't mandate anything. And as a note, I did send off a ping re: the license question, although admittedly a few days after I last posted. Given the season, I'd expect some time for a response. Kevin Gorman (talk) 18:20, 24 December 2012 (UTC)
True but I'll just add that the education program has and can develop requirements/mandates. Biosthmors (talk) 01:46, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

Wall of text

Kevin, the copyedits here are generally good as is the tone (my prose stinks), but you've minimized, deleted or left out what is a critical point (to me, at least). It's that wall of text dropping in, just a few days before term-end, in one or two edits, typically just at Thanksgiving vacation, and requiring all at once up to 20 hours to review that is overwhelming and leads to despair (since we know WMF staff is more concerned about its promotional goals than the effect on us). It's that, if we knew in advance ... could you please work back in some of my wording to that effect? Also that they put the wrong text in wrong articles! If we knew in advance, we'd guide them to the right article. I spent five hours yesterday removing from Jumping Frenchmen of Maine text that belonged at startle response or George Miller Beard (I've now written that article myself, so a problematic prof can point to it and claim it as one of his students). Please work some of those issues back in? (Thanks for shortening the section heading-- it made it very hard for me to enter an edit summary.) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 02:19, 14 December 2012 (UTC)

I agree with Kevin's approach and, after all, the essay shouldn't sound like we hate student projects, so watch out! I wonder whether the Advice to Editors section gets at some of the issues Sandy is concerned about. I sure don't want anyone to be in a state of despair! --Tryptofish (talk) 02:23, 14 December 2012 (UTC)
I just want to make sure we cover the issue that they (always in my experience) drop in poorly written, poorly sourced text to the wrong article! Even if it were well written and sourced, it's often duplicated in another article. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 02:24, 14 December 2012 (UTC)
I think I agree with Trypto that it would be better to cover more of the specific issues in the advice to students section. Most of my edits to the intro were because I was worried it sounded more like the start of a "holy shit we hate student editing assignments" essay than the start of a "so, you're a student or instructor or wikipedian here wondering about student editing assignments" essay. I'm running out to dinner in the near future, but if no one else beats me to it, I'll make sure it's eventually incorporated somewhere.Also, haha, I clicked on to this section expecting it to be a complaint about me being verbose. Kevin Gorman (talk) 02:45, 14 December 2012 (UTC)
It also occurs to me that we should also cover it in the advice to instructors section, since this issue could be prevented or at least mitigated by good instructional design. Kevin Gorman (talk) 02:49, 14 December 2012 (UTC)
I think we have a better chance of reaching students than profs (at least the ones I've encountered). OK, I tried to add something, but it will need repair. Slim is a good copyeditor; maybe she'll go over the whole thing. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 02:53, 14 December 2012 (UTC)
To be clear, I was suggesting covering it in both sections, not that we should do it only in the advice to instructors section. Even if it is listened to by more students than instructors, we'll hopefully get it through to some fraction of instructors as well that way. I'll add something to that section later. Kevin Gorman (talk) 03:06, 14 December 2012 (UTC)
Maybe we just need a general editing section, then? Feel free to butcher fix what I wrote or move it whereever; I've just tired of students writing the wrong article in "my" articles :) Because then I have to remove it all to another talk page, like Talk:Startle response! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 04:58, 14 December 2012 (UTC)
  • We don't want to overdo the optimistic, soft, approach, which I think much of the instructional stuff up around this project does. Then students and profs are unprepared and surprised when an editor faced with 20 crap rewrites on his watchlist within 24 hours just starts reverting whole sets of changes. Johnbod (talk) 12:54, 14 December 2012 (UTC)

Userspace drafts

The advice in this essay:

Consider creating your article instead in a personal sandbox on a user subpage, and asking that it be graded there. If you're editing an existing article, copy and paste it over to your sandbox and develop it from there. When the course is over, you can request that the sandbox be deleted, or you can choose to move your work over to the encyclopaedia, assuming you feel it is policy-compliant and something you want to share. If you are told you must add your work to the encyclopaedia, please alert your online ambassador or any of the Wikipedians who have written this essay.

breaks our Wikipedia:User pages guideline, our licence conditions and our mission. Draft articles in user space must be for the temporary purpose of creating something for mainspace. Every guideline and policy that applies to mainspace articles also applies to drafts in userspace, and additionally there are some other restrictions such as no non-free images. Students cannot write copyright-infringing material on the draft, for example. The advice gives the impression that students can exert control over the text they add to the userspace draft -- for example that they don't actually indend it to go public or that they don't wish to freely licence it for use and reuse. This is not the case. The text in such a draft could be incoporated into mainspace against the student's wishes. Essentially, students must write policy-compliant and sharable text even in their drafts. If they have no intention of writing article material for namespace, they should not be editing on Wikipedia.

This advice also creates a silo effect where students are working outside of any interaction with the community, perhaps with the intention of never interacting with the community. As Wikipedia is a collaboratively-built encyclopaedia, this is quite against our design ethos.

But fundamentally, we are here to build an encyclopaedia. We're not an editing environment in cloud space for students to write their homework and get their prof to grade it. If Wikipedia:User pages doesn't make that clear, then perhaps the guideline needs to have "Not homework" added to it too. Colin°Talk 16:39, 14 December 2012 (UTC)

It's true that everything we write on WP is released, including user subpages, but in practice we allow editors to request deletion of personal sandboxes, and even articles in mainspace if they're the only editors. Students can interact with the community even when working in a sandbox -- by asking questions on the article's talk page, for example. (But they don't as a matter of fact interact much anyway.) The point is that they shouldn't be forced to add their work to the encyclopaedia. They can write it in a sandbox, have it graded, then when the pressure is off decide whether it's good enough to add to mainspace. All Wikipedians are allowed to work that way. SlimVirgin (talk) 16:59, 14 December 2012 (UTC)
Everything you submit to anywhere on Wikipedia is under a licence that allows anyone to do whatever they want with it. Your point (that they shouldn't be forced to add their work to the encyclopaedia) is valid but addressed by them not editing Wikipedia. Anywhere. Colin°Talk 11:47, 7 January 2013 (UTC)
Someone who stumbled upon this project initially thought AfC was a great place for student drafts. I'll notify them of this thread/page. Biosthmors (talk) 19:40, 14 December 2012 (UTC)

Training guidelines

There are also Wikipedia:Training/For educators and Wikipedia:Training/For students/Resources. It occurs to me (a little belatedly, sorry) that we should also consider how this essay interacts with those. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:15, 16 December 2012 (UTC)

recommendation re: using wikipedia article classes

I'm going to snip out the recommendation to use Wikiproject quality grades in any sort of grading system. From my experience, it doesn't work well. I believe (though can't 100% remember) that other peoples experiences with negative enough that the USEP people at WMF started recommending against it as well.

Tl;dr summary of the problems with it: article quality grades aren't maintained in a systematic by Wikiprojects and are thus often out of date (or alternately not regraded in time,) Wikiproject grades can be changed by anyone and generally don't get much scrutiny (so students could bump their own grade,) Wikiproject rubrics don't always conform well to educational goals, and, similar to the problem with DYKs, using Wikiproject quality grades as a way to assess students puts the workload on Wikipedians, not on professors/TA's.

Sorry for my recent absence... busy month. Kevin Gorman (talk) 07:08, 7 January 2013 (UTC)

I think you are right about the deletion, if for no other reason than WP:CREEP. --Tryptofish (talk) 00:56, 8 January 2013 (UTC)
Shouldn't we at least mention it to the professors so they know how we look at articles? Biosthmors (talk) 05:41, 8 January 2013 (UTC)

Guideline?

Seeing some of the discussions at the education noticeboard has been making me think about whether we should start thinking about whether this essay sufficiently reflects community consensus that it should be upgraded from an essay to a guideline. I'm just floating the idea in a very preliminary way here, not making a proposal. What should we do, in terms of improvements to the essay, in order to work towards making it guideline-eligible? --Tryptofish (talk) 23:38, 26 March 2013 (UTC)

I'm guessing that no one is recoiling at the idea of making it a guideline. I'm going to wait a few more days, particularly to give anyone a chance to either point out an objection, or to point out something that should be changed on the page before it could become a guideline. If the crickets continue to chirp, I'll then initiate a formal proposal process. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:08, 30 March 2013 (UTC)
I know peer review is normally used for articles, but why not submit this page for peer review and say we're thinking about the possibility of promoting to a guideline and we'd like some feedback? Biosthmors (talk) 22:10, 30 March 2013 (UTC)
That's an interesting thought. Another possibility would be to post a short comment at the Village Pump, asking the same thing. And I guess a third possibility would be to just go for it. I don't really think there is anything wrong with the page as it is (but just wanted to see if someone would raise an issue). I would guess that what could go negative in a formal RfC would be either something specific about one part of the page, which would probably be no big deal because it could be fixed, or sentiment that we don't want to create a guideline like this (maybe as instruction creep). If it's the latter, then that's that, and really no big deal, as it would remain as an essay. We probably won't find that out until the whole community has a go at it, so I might lean against putting too much effort into responding to reviews from just one or two people. Anyway, I'm just thinking out loud here. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:21, 30 March 2013 (UTC)

I'm having some second thoughts (and may well yet have third thoughts...). As I see how the discussion is going at the ed noticeboard, I increasingly think that this page, in its current form, works well as an essay, but that it just needs to be more widely linked and recommended. On the other hand, I think a more succinct guideline or policy could be devised by extracting direct, rather than discoursive, statements about proper or improper conduct. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:25, 1 April 2013 (UTC)

I'd definitely support this information page being bumped up to a guideline, considering that guidelines and policies carry more weight. On the other hand, some of our essays, such as WP:BRD, are pretty much treated as guidelines. Flyer22 (talk) 19:18, 3 April 2013 (UTC)
Thanks. I'm going around and around in my head about this. I definitely think we need a guideline or even a policy, no question. What I'm unsure about is the right way to write it, but I tend to think it should focus less on information, the way this page does, and more on what I'll describe as "do this, don't do that". Please see also WT:Assignments. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:31, 3 April 2013 (UTC)
A short, sweet (separate) guideline would be helpful. One that wasn't simply defensive, but said "here are the right ways to get started, to get feedback, and to follow up after contributing." – SJ + 17:28, 8 April 2013 (UTC)
Do you feel that the page, as it is now, is too "defensive"? --Tryptofish (talk) 20:24, 8 April 2013 (UTC)
I feel that it is defensive in the sense that it rationalizes its assertions, when in fact there ought to be a guideline which dictates authoritatively without explaining itself. I would be in favor of there being a much shortened mandate which got guideline status and which linked to this page a supplemental rationale with more weight than a personal essay. Blue Rasberry (talk) 20:53, 8 April 2013 (UTC)
Thanks, that's helpful in terms of what I've been trying to figure out. So this could be an information page that goes into why we do things the way that we do, whereas a guideline should be more like what SJ calls "here are the right ways to....". Does that sound like the right approach? --Tryptofish (talk) 20:57, 8 April 2013 (UTC)

Student peer review

The strangest aspect of the two unfortunate UofT classes is that they seem to have no peer review component at all. (Even though this is something the professor is known for, and something he stated years ago he wanted to bring to his class projects.)

Part of a guideline for editors should say: if you are working with a group, a) review one another's work, and b) assign some part of the group to more extensive peer review (proofreading, citation style, media licensing, plagiarism checking). Even a bad editor can be a decent reviewer; and thinking like a reviewer - like teaching - makes your own work and thinking better.

A possible model:

  • Ask every student to go through an on-wiki tutorial - at the end of which they have auto-generated a userpage, corrected a typo, added an image, reverted a copyvio.
  • Assign one "moderator" for every 8 students asked to edit. The moderator's task: reviewing the edits of the others, helping them to meet editorial, copyright, and citation standards.
  • Assign one "meta-moderator" for every 8 students asked to moderate (and no fewer than 1). Their task: reviewing the moderators' work and activity, maintaining a project page describing the class's work & progress, responding to questions about it.

– SJ + 17:28, 8 April 2013 (UTC)

Some of that is very specifically proscriptive. I'm wondering whether a guideline should instead not specify things like 8 students (as opposed to 7 or 9). --Tryptofish (talk) 20:59, 8 April 2013 (UTC)
Right. This is just a very specific toy model to get a feel for something that could possibly work. I wouldn't include such specifics, or even a fixed # of layers of [meta]moderation, in a guideline. But indicating a rough proportion of total participants focused on moderation would be useful ("we've found that assigning roughly X% of a group to moderation improves the quality of the resulting work"). – SJ + 04:41, 9 April 2013 (UTC)
OK, got it. I'd like to here from anyone where on this page (ie, which section) would be the best place for this. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:11, 9 April 2013 (UTC)
I agree that peer review should be a recommended component. And those comments need addressing, so that would be another. I also like the idea of having some specialized reviewing tasks. Biosthmors (talk) 15:25, 10 April 2013 (UTC)
Is anyone aware of any professors using the approach SJ describes? Do any case studies use this approach? Thanks. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 14:01, 23 October 2013 (UTC)

In the news

For those who don't know, the student problem, specifically regarding psychology articles in this case, was mentioned in the news yesterday. As some of you know, the class the source talks about was reported at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents. Flyer22 (talk) 23:47, 10 April 2013 (UTC)

I just put a link to it at the education noticeboard, where news coverage from multiple sources has been discussed. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:49, 10 April 2013 (UTC)
Okay, good. I knew that someone very likely saw this in the news before I did minutes ago. You posted that link there at the same time I started a thread here about it. I take it you saw me mention that source at Lova Falk's talk page? Flyer22 (talk) 23:57, 10 April 2013 (UTC)
Exactly right. I've watchlisted her talk since the Wikibreak situation started. (Although I'd be happy to claim clairvoyance instead!) --Tryptofish (talk) 18:51, 11 April 2013 (UTC)

Top ten lists

I moved this to the talk page. I would rather not have the content on the information page where classes can see it, because it looks unfinished to me. I think we need to discuss the criteria for selection as the "top ten" – what are they? Also, I think any such lists, if we have them at all, should be lower on the page. I'm OK with giving examples of good practice, but this looks too preliminary to me. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:09, 6 October 2013 (UTC)

Under discussion here: Wikipedia:Education noticeboard/Archive5#Top 10 lists czar ♔ 22:59, 6 October 2013 (UTC)
That's a good point Tryptofish. I just made it boldly made it prose (sorry for the fragmented discussion). Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 08:04, 7 October 2013 (UTC)
You might want to check out outreachwiki:Education/Case Studies, which has detailed information about two of the professors' assignments you've already mentioned, and encourages other professors with good assignment ideas to create features on themselves as well with an easy template to help them do so. -- LiAnna Davis (WMF) (talk) 16:28, 7 October 2013 (UTC)
True true. Thanks for the link. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 20:24, 7 October 2013 (UTC)

Guideline

Should this page maybe become a guideline one day? Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 12:22, 22 October 2013 (UTC)

In my opinion, either this page or something like it should be. When we discussed the issue above, at #Guideline?, I think there was some consensus that this page should remain written as an information page, and that a guideline should be more focused on things are are somewhat enforceable. I think I agree with that, and I had been thinking about working on a page parallel to this one, that would serve as a proposed guideline. For personal reasons, my editing time has been rather limited lately, so this is one of a long list of things here where I've fallen behind. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:11, 22 October 2013 (UTC)
No worries at all. And thanks for all you do. I should revisit the older discussion with fresh eyes. Without looking, I tend to think we might not need separate pages because I think guidelines can have some content that is enforceable and some that isn't so enforceable. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 09:14, 23 October 2013 (UTC)
What, exactly, do you think should be an enforceable guideline? There's a lot of good advice on this page that is of the this is one good way to do it or you should probably do this variety, but most of that should not be upgraded to you must do this.--Sage Ross (WMF) (talk) 13:42, 23 October 2013 (UTC)
My answer to that question would be along the lines of dealing with situations such as that mega course from the Toronto area that caused so much aggravation not too long ago. That was a particularly egregious case, but it is inevitable that things like it will crop up from time to time. I believe that the community is moving in the direction of wanting to be able to codify some norms of conduct in such situations, and of course my "believing" that would be tested by a community discussion about whether to elevate whatever comes out of this to guideline status. By the way, I do realize that we are talking about a guideline and not a policy, but I think that a guideline is what we are looking for in this case. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:02, 23 October 2013 (UTC)
The Toronto mega course is certainly a type of problem I don't want to see again. What kind of rule do you think could prevent it, though? (I'm not against a guideline in principle, I'm just trying to pin down some specifics.)--Sage Ross (WMF) (talk) 20:15, 23 October 2013 (UTC)
Whereas a policy, in contrast, would be about "don't do this or you'll be blocked", my opinion is that a guideline can serve the purpose of being able to point someone to where it says: "this is what we generally expect of you, and we generally expect that you will not do that". If you remember the talks that Philippe had with the principals in that case, a lot of what he had to do was explain to them just those kinds of expectations, and it sort of sounded like those expectations came as a surprise. I believe it could save a lot of grief if we had an accepted way to tell users: "please look at (this link), and note what our expectations are". And as a corollary of that, users who chronically fail to work constructively with such pointers would be at risk of sanctions. An information page like this page focuses on "this is how we can help you", rather than on expectations. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:45, 23 October 2013 (UTC)
Might you be overstating things with the bold and italicized must? "Policies explain and describe standards that all users should normally follow, while guidelines are meant to outline best practices for following those standards in specific contexts", says Wikipedia:Policies and guidelines. Best. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 13:59, 23 October 2013 (UTC)
In practice, there is not much difference between a policy and a guideline; the enforceable aspects of a guideline essentially become the way everyone is expected to do things, with rare exceptions.--Sage Ross (WMF) (talk) 14:03, 23 October 2013 (UTC)
According to Smallbones: the "[q]uick and dirty difference [is that p]olicies can be enforced directly, [whereas] a guideline is only enforced if there is repeated disruption associated with ignoring it." Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 16:16, 23 October 2013 (UTC)
I agree that we need something with more teeth, so that the community can better deal with student editing in ways that need to happen and are not yet, but I do not see anything on the current version of this page that will help to that end (it started much stronger but got diluted), and see this page as more of a "helpful advice if we can get them to read and it", which they probably don't. We need something different that will help the community deal with the problems that arise. By the way, @Colin: is an excellent guideline writer (instrumental at WP:MEDRS) and is not in denial about the effects of student editing on other editors and article quality-- perhaps he will help. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:15, 23 October 2013 (UTC)
WP:Assignments was a first stab at this issue by Colin and Wikipedia talk:Assignments has some discussion from earlier in the year. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 15:35, 23 October 2013 (UTC)
Maybe we could submit this Wikipedia space draft up for peer review and ask for feedback and suggestions about developing it into a guideline, just to see what kind of comments we get. Although, I'm not sure WP:Peer review has templates, etc., that would allow that. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 15:37, 23 October 2013 (UTC)
Biosthmors, which essay are you suggesting be submitted for review? This page or the WP:Assignments one?
The WP:Assignments was designed to be a policy the community could agree to wrt all kinds of assigned-work. In particular it spelled out where the responsibility for the assignment lay and levels of experience and knowledge required by those running the assignment before they start. As you may see, this is out of alignment with the current education program practice, which regularly unleashes classes on us where the prof is unprepared, unable and unwilling to fully take responsibility for the mess their inappropriately designed assignment has created.
As for Wikipedia:Student assignments, I'm quite happy for it to be just regarded as essential reading / advice for those running student courses on WP, rather than worrying about it being a WP guideline. -- Colin°Talk 10:25, 25 October 2013 (UTC)
We could potentially submit this one for review, or the other. I don't mind either. We might also develop one policy and one guideline that are not yet written. Who knows! I'm just trying to judge which way the wind is blowing to see if we can get something going. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 15:59, 25 October 2013 (UTC)
Maybe we could develop a quiz based upon this page, the page you started, and the WP:Training for instructors. Then if professors don't pass, then they can be "policied" or "guidelined" out of editing Wikipedia. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 16:03, 25 October 2013 (UTC)
As for which way I'm blowing (????), I think a proper guideline will have to come from either creating a new page or massively revising the page that Colin started, because this page ought to remain as an information page and the other page has a long way to go before representing consensus. I doubt that a quiz would be enforceable, but there's a time-honored practice of admins acting after repeated non-adherence to guidelines, when that repeated non-adherence occurs after warnings. To block something preventatively, as soon as it shows up, there will have to be an existing community consensus as to when that would be justified. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:33, 25 October 2013 (UTC)

I think it is absurd the amount of time we are all having to spend trying to get water from a stone, and our efforts would be better expended in getting MEDRS elevated to BLP status, so we can stop trying to get the WMF or WEF or WEP or whatever they call themselves to pay attention to these issues, and instead work towards community solutions to the bad edits that are disproportionately hitting medical articles. The Education Program is not going to change, our time is increasingly taken with babysitting, and if we get MEDRS elevated to something closer to a shoot-the-bad-stuff-on-sight like with BLPs, content will improve, as will our satisfaction. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:58, 25 October 2013 (UTC)

I don't think elevating MEDRS will help here. I don't want to go to war with students so a bigger gun doesn't help me. The problem is the the false concept that "anyone can edit == we can and must do nothing". It is flawed because that soundbite is not an axiom -- it doesn't stand up to scrutiny. If profs want to treat WP as an online homework exercise, WMF won't help and actually encourages it. When a prof, who knows nothing about WP decides to point 20 of their students on our most popular articles, they look forward to all these newbies. I don't think the WMF have the slightest clue how few people actually tend those medical pages, and how few of them actually have quality access to sources in order to defend them properly. Add to that the utterly meaningless research they keep producing to delude themselves it is all good. It is time the community answered back with a policy that says, no, actually students are not typical newbies. They are editors compelled to edit in a way that wouldn't have occurred to them normally, and who typically write stuff they don't understand, never mind what our readers will get from it, using sources they can barely follow about a subject they are only just learning. When in the history of education has the textbook ever been written by the clueless? Well it's happening on Wikipedia. The responsibility for this lies with the person running the assignment -- who is a new kind of creature Wikipedia has no policies for. Is that person clued-up and a Wikipedian in good standing with the community? No, they typically have no concept of how Wikipedia works -- a test edit with the Visual Editor -- is that a joke? I know the WEF are working to fix that for the profs they work with, but what about all the others? Have we not learned enough yet to say: unless you get proper training, please don't attempt to run classes on WP. It has worked a very few times in our history, but mostly it is a complete disaster. This is an encyclopaedia. I sometimes do wonder if the WMF have forgotten that. -- Colin°Talk 10:45, 26 October 2013 (UTC)
Yes, as always, you are right. Shoulda read this before my last post to WP:ENB (where I am at least relieved the Mike is on board). I would much rather be mentoring students than "reporting" their offenses, which always relate back to negligent profs who are encouraged by glowing press reports to teach students to do something they don't know how to do themselves. And often, pushing a POV, their personal research, or their pet theories into articles. I have been trying to do DSM5 updates for a month (since my busy summer ended). Yesterday afternoon, I logged on to hopefully finally focus on that, and was instead confronted with three new issues on three different articles, all of which needed to be researched before automatic revert, all of which took time. We need something with teeth, and it has to come from the community. Students are not "regular" newbies, and I'm still waiting for just one example of one of them becoming a long-term productive editor. I am additionally dealing with likely meatpuppetry at echolalia, but I don't even bother taking that to WP:ENB because a) the likely students haven't even responded to any talk queries, so b) they will say we don't know they are students, and c) no one there is equipped to help anyway. So I guess I'm going to have to either end up BITING, or just wait til the term ends to correct. I am pretty much giving up on working in here-- so let's get to work on promoting something to the community. The problem as I see it, though, is how well is this problem known outside of medical editors? Other content areas don't have serious sourcing guidelines, so are they letting the bad stuff slide? And are they checking for copyvio? The DSM5 does not take copyvio lightly, and I don't think the WMF can still pretend they do anything to address copyvio (that fort was held down almost exclusively by MRG, until she too became a staffer, focused on other issues-- sure hope we don't see User:Mike Christie go down that rabbit hole). SandyGeorgia (Talk) 14:19, 26 October 2013 (UTC)
About "anyone can edit": there is something that I have long thought about that phrase, without any particular association with student editing, but it occurs to me now that it applies particularly well in this context. It really is "anyone can edit, and anyone else can revert that edit". In my opinion, any reversion that is in conformance with WP:BURDEN is not a violation of WP:BITE. --Tryptofish (talk) 14:56, 26 October 2013 (UTC)
No battles please. This isn't about reverting stuff. You can't even know to revert edits because the best written ones turn out the be plagiarised from their textbook, to which you don't have access. This needs to be about prevention and about the prof taking responsibility for reverting. They shouldn't be running the classes with the assumption that wikigomes will revert the bad stuff -- because they aren't -- they need to fix the mess themselves -- either individually or in some kind of education-support-network. But my complained with that phrase is that it is used to say we can't prevent profs running courses -- they aren't editing!!!! they are just massively meatpuppeting. Colin°Talk 16:29, 26 October 2013 (UTC)
In fact, I very much agree with you. I'm not advocating battles, just advocating not feeling bad about reverting, not worrying that reverting is automatically bitey. It's absolutely clear to me that we are going to need a guideline with some teeth with respect to what the community expects of instructors. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:19, 26 October 2013 (UTC)

Argument

One interesting argument I've seen floating around I disagree with is that we should somehow compare students to new editors when evaluating quality. I happen to disagree with this approach. The training is there at WP:Training for students, ambassadors, and instructors. There are course pages, there are paid staff (with a current $150,000 grant), and their are how many volunteer ambassadors? The expectations should be much higher for the quality output of student assignments than newbies, in my opinion. Volunteer newbies get nothing. Student editors get "paid" with course credit. We should expect much more in return. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 11:22, 24 October 2013 (UTC)

Not to mention WP:MEAT (when their fellow classmates edit war for each other). SandyGeorgia (Talk) 12:44, 24 October 2013 (UTC)
I actually would just want that they not be at the low end of what we get from inexperienced users. The problem comes when mediocre or worse edits show up in large numbers over a short period of time. It's in the nature of class projects that they generate a lot of edits all at once, and I agree with you both, that it's a major aggravation when those edits are problematic. We need to recognize that the students don't get "paid" by us, but by the instructor. I think that's a compelling reason to work towards a guideline that sets expectations not only for the student editors, but for the person who sends them here and grades them. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:12, 24 October 2013 (UTC)
Like Wikipedia:Assignments. -- Colin°Talk 10:27, 25 October 2013 (UTC)
We should indeed look at both pages in this regard. A big part of what is worth continuing from earlier discussions is where WP:Assignments tends towards being a draft policy, there is also interest in developing a guideline and not a policy. --Tryptofish (talk) 15:21, 25 October 2013 (UTC)
For everyone, see also WP:PG#Role. --Tryptofish (talk) 15:24, 25 October 2013 (UTC)

Copy edits

I think we need more copy edits to the article, generally speaking. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 16:04, 1 November 2013 (UTC)

I've been away from active editing, but I'm getting back into the swing of things now, and I intend to give this information page some love in the near future. I'd like to draw attention to what User:Mike Christie said about half way down the thread at Wikipedia:Education noticeboard#Motor system as a test case for this board, about this page not working well as something that instructors will read. I'd appreciate any pointers from Mike or from anyone else about what specifically needs fixing. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:49, 20 November 2013 (UTC)
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