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The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was no consensus. MBisanz talk 09:32, 17 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Math 55

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Math 55 (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) (delete) – (View log)

Articles about individual university courses are usually deemed non-notable. Does this ones claim to be the hardest make it notable? Sgroupace (talk) 10:54, 12 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

This seems to be a version of disfavored argument WP:INHERITED, arguing that a course can never be notable. Notability, however, is an objective, not a subjective, standard, and the fact remains that the course has been noted, and not just by the campus newspaper. THF (talk) 15:15, 12 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete Except for coverage from the Harvard Crimson (a student newspaper), there's little there that constitutes non-trivial coverage. The outside sources only give it a mention in the context of particular discussion topics. Thus, I conclude this fails WP:N. RayTalk 16:45, 12 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Weak delete Being widely reputed to be the hardest undergrad math course in the US would give it notability, but the source of the claim comes from the Harvard Crimson, hardly a neutral third-party source. I think this is more like a college rumor, as none of the sources discussing it on google are both independant and reliable, which is what's needed to ascertain notability. Themfromspace (talk) 17:20, 12 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
FWIW: "legendary among math prodigies" in The American. Also called "legendary" in the Richard Stallman biography. I've found four separate biographies in articles or books where "Math 55" is the only course mentioned; there may or may not be others. THF (talk) 18:01, 12 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I don't know. It probably is the hardest class at Harvard, but most major universities have weedout courses that are "legendary" only among people who contemplated a particular major at that school. Harvard grads being better than the average at being noticed, and promoting their background, this may have slipped over the bar. But what I see so far is mostly the memories of Harvard undergrads, and a few incidental mentions for promotional value in other articles. I'd really want to see more than we have here. RayTalk 18:22, 12 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete Some folks, including those at a Harvard paper think this is the hardest undergrad course in the country? Have they taken honors calculus at all the other leading colleges? Edison (talk) 19:07, 12 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
But forums aren't reliable sources...Themfromspace (talk) 21:51, 12 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
However, it is still a topic of discussion for many students. Prominent figures such as Bill Gates also gave mention to the course. Acceptable (talk) 22:01, 12 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
So is gossip, but that doesn't get a Wikipedia article. 129.105.19.151 (talk) 21:21, 16 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete I'm going to echo Ray's earlier comment and reiterate that every university has some "notorious" weedout class or hardass professor that gains some currency within the local culture (MIT's being any of 8.03, 6.003, or a variety of others), but whose notability doesn't extend beyond the confines of campus. To the extent that the class was referenced in self-congratulatory biopics of notable people or has received obligatory fawning coverage in the local student newspaper (although the Harvard Crimson is certainly no slouch in other realms), neither are reliable proxies for measuring notability. Read through the lens of the article hypothetically being spun out from the Harvard College article itself, I still would recommend deleting the passage there as there is no appropriate place to put it in any article or as a stand-alone article itself. Madcoverboy (talk) 00:15, 13 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Weak keep given the verifiable and reliable sources provided. Some of them are a bit of a stretch as they don't mention the subject at all but even removing them leaves several good references that are clearly applicable. Merging to an appropriate article would also be acceptable to me. I also take issue with many of the arguments presented above for deletion as they don't seem to be based in any policy or guideline but merely assertions of opinion (a fancy way of saying "I don't like it"). --ElKevbo (talk) 01:37, 13 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment 'Some of them are a bit of a stretch as they don't mention the subject at all' and others are a college newspaper. 'Merging to an appropriate article would also be acceptable to me.' It probably could warrant a mention in the Harvard article {Students at Harvard think Math 55 is the hardest class ever}. 'merely assertions of opinion (a fancy way of saying "I don't like it")' I think most people are saying 'I don't like it because it uses bad sourcing, basing most info on a biased college newspaper, including the statement of notability' which I guess does shorten down to 'I don't like it', but they do tend to cite guidelines that the article does not follow to back up their statements that the article kind of sucks. 129.105.19.151 (talk) 21:37, 16 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Weak keep echoing the comments of my fellow Wikipedians above, but secondary sources are found on this article, and there's nothing against it being a stub- I don't see the need for it to be deleted. Ks64q2 (talk) 02:32, 13 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment Does that really establish notability, a search result like that? Because if you actually read the results, only one of them is actually talking about the course. A good thing is that it's the most info I've seen on what the course actually covers {example of diff geometry of Banach manifolds is given}, but that makes me more wary about the 'four years of math in 1 year' claim. I would say it's only four years of material if you start from scratch in math somewhere else, but my friend started college as an English major, then switched to math and got to this level in three years, and I imagine most other math majors get there in two or less. But that has nothing to do with the article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.31.250.206 (talk) 03:34, 17 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • I certainly think so. I will freely admit I didn't pour through each of the 38 books on this search but the gaol of the AfD is to ascertain if concerns can be addressed and this seems to confirm that they can. -- Banjeboi 06:36, 17 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete Is a college newspaper really a good source to be using? I think not. "Classes frequently consist of former members of the International Mathematical Olympiad" Those IMO members are more likely to get into say, Harvard, MIT, etc, and this is the freshman math course, so obviously those people are going to be in this class. That's like saying that 'Top students in the country are in the freshman math class at Top University'. Not notable. "homework problem sets can take up to sixty hours to complete per week." Probably exaggeration for one, and also, why does this fact mean anything? Should the class with the longest problem set in the country get an article because of that? No. "Prominent Math 55 students include Bill Gates,[3] Richard Stallman,[4] and Brad DeLong.[5]" Same thing as saying, these famous smart people took math classes at Harvard. Adds nothing. "Gates said the experience of taking a class "where everybody had an 800 on their SAT and 5 on their AP" taught him that there were people smarter than him." Bet he would say the same thing of most other top college's intro-higher-level-math classes. No. "John Bates Clark Medal-winning economist Andrei Shleifer has said that the course made him realize he was not destined to be a mathematician." Same thing I said about Gates applies here. "As of 2006, only seventeen women have graduated from the course." I bet I could say the same thing about many other math classes. "Gender disparity controversy" That whole section just seems to be talking about general 'girls can't do math' stuff, and providing examples of when it happened in this class. You could do the same thing about many other similar classes. Overall, this article could be summed as 'People who went to Harvard think this class is hard. People who go to Harvard are smart. This class must be really hard.' For the life of me I can't see how this is notable. 129.105.19.151 (talk) 21:21, 16 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Addition Mark it a stub. There's definitely not enough to warrant an article, and people are opposed to deleting it, so make it a stub. From my understanding, that greatly reduces the requirements it has to meet. 75.31.250.206 (talk) 04:10, 17 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Comment While it is true that Harvard freshmen most likely have not taken classes at other top universities (maybe except MIT), no other freshmen math course at other universities compresses 4 years of undergraduate mathematics into one year. Graduates of this course can immediately pursue graduate-level mathematics studies; which other math course in the United States allows for this? Acceptable (talk) 22:31, 16 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Comment 'no other freshmen math course at other universities compresses 4 years of undergraduate mathematics into one year' Is that what this course is? Because the article doesn't mention that at all. The article says it's an Advanced Calculus and Linear Algebra course. That doesn't sound like a whole lot like '4 years of undergraduate mathematics into one year'. It sounds more like 'standard first year advanced math class'. Being a math major myself, I find some of these implications a little unclear. And there's the fact that this is not mentioned at all in the article. If this is such a big reason for why this is notable, why is it not mentioned? 75.31.250.206 (talk) 23:17, 16 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
MIT students visit Harvard to take this class. Perhaps Caltech or Stanford or Princeton has something equivalent, but I haven't seen any evidence of it. There wouldn't be another American school with the critical mass to offer this course. THF (talk) 22:41, 16 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Comment 'There wouldn't be another American school with the critical mass to offer this course.' Care to elaborate? I'm not sure what you're trying to say. 75.31.250.206 (talk) 23:17, 16 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Comment Just to point things out. If you exclude the School Newspaper sources (questionable due to WP:GNG-"Independent of the subject"), there are 5 sources.
1 - "Why Can’t a Woman Be More Like a Man? provides info for the 'Gender disparity controversy' section and mentions the course, referencing the course catelog and the college newspaper and presenting it in a sort of heresay-y way. It is the source for this sentence: 'Classes frequently consist of former members of the International Mathematical Olympiad and homework problem sets can take up to sixty hours to complete per week.' However, the article only says: 'It is leg­endary among high school math prodigies, who hear terrifying stories about it in their computer camps and at the Math Olympiads. Some go to Harvard just to have the opportunity to enroll in it.' which is not quite the same thing, although I don't really have a problem with that.
2 - Gates: how Microsoft's mogul reinvented an industry--and made himself the richest man in America. - Appears to just establish that Gates took the class.
3 - Free as in Freedom: Richard Stallman's Crusade for Free Software. - Same thing but with Stallman.
4 - 10 Questions For Bill Gates". Time. - Source of quotation where Gates says this is where he discovered that there are smarter people than him. I don't think this does much to establish 'hardest undergraduate course.
5 - No Break in the Storm Over Harvard President's Words - More info for the 'Gender disparity controversy' section, and mentions that Maud Levin took the class.
Hopefully this sums up a fair amount of what people have been saying about these sources. In short, they don't appear to establish the notability that other people claim they do. 75.31.250.206 (talk) 23:57, 16 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
As pointed out above other sources exist that seem to confirm this very short article. Ideally these would be integrated into the article so that our readers can see the verification as well, but this, in and of itself is a reason for clean-up, not deletion. -- Banjeboi 06:39, 17 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep. Fantastically interesting, satisfactorily sourced. --Skandha101 06:47, 17 March 2009 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Skandha101 (talk • contribs)
Comment Those who are arguing about the claim (yes, "reputed," not stated as fact) that this is a super-duper-hard class, or the hardest class in the universe, are missing the point. This has no bearing on notability. (It is of course possible to make any course arbitrarily 'hard,' and this is exactly not the point.) This is notable because of the institution, the importance of the subject to modern society's productions (quants who can crash stock markets, for instance), and the people involved. It happens to be a course at Harvard which has had a documented impact on people who (fair or not!) are themselves prima facie notable. --Skandha101 07:22, 17 March 2009 (UTC)
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.
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