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Schoolcruft (a portmanteau of School and cruft), is a term used when referring to editorial and policy issues often encountered in the course of maintaining articles relating to schools.

History

Originally, this essay started life as Aquinascruft, a term first coined by Hesperian in reference to Aquinas College, the core subject of a number of articles nominated for deletion at the time. This was one of many in a long string of similar deletion debates relating to the individual school, keeping a number of WikiElves of the WikiProject Western Australia busy for a long period of time.

What is Schoolcruft

Schoolcruft articles are usually created by editors of school age who, for the most part, have no education or understanding in the ways of the wiki. These editors have the passion for a particular school, generally one they are either a current or recent student of. Their passion more often than not is often brought on by the school's history and rivalries that are carefully shaped and fostered within the school environment.

The majority of Schoolcruft issues will arise in relation to private schools, but this is not to suggest that the problem doesn't cross into articles on or relating to state (i.e. public) schools, who too are not immune to such editorial problems.

Left unchecked, self-perpetuating walled gardens can spring up overnight with articles for the school's buildings, house system, association memberships and competitions, sporting achievements and staff past and present. Occasionally the sprawling vines within the garden jump the containment walls of mainspace, venturing into template creation, categories and even portals. Sometimes said categories are applied to articles which are only by the most tenuous and circuitous of logical reasonings connected to the school - even Featured Pictures aren't spared.

Ways to spot Schoolcruft

  1. Reproduction of the school song - a giveaway sign.
  2. Excessive citation of the school's student diary, website, or other resources published by the school as a purported reliable source.
  3. Detailed cataloguing of the school's, or school association's, sporting achievements, often in the form of lengthy manual tables.
  4. Excessive creation of redirects for unlikely reiterations and internally common abbreviations.
  5. Contributions about a favourite or preferred member of faculty or staff.
  6. Information about student timetables, extracurricular activities, or even names of the different lunch periods students can be assigned.
  7. Endless lists, divided annually, of duxes and other students who have achieved, academically.
  8. Entire sections devoted to small student-led organisations.
  9. Details of food available at the school or campus, sometimes even including personal evaluations of competing options.

Editorial and policy issues of Schoolcruft

Schoolcruft covers editorial and policy issues including:

Dealing with Schoolcruft

Schoolcruft articles can always be improved, but even longer term Wiki editors know where to draw the line. Users contributing Schoolcruft to Misplaced Pages need to be watched closely. If they are a registered user, gentle coaching and comments on their talk page from more experienced editors will usually pull them back from a self-induced death spiral. However, articles created by anonymous IP Schoolcruft editors are always the most difficult to deal with, and sometimes action through AN/I is the only appropriate path when it has been clearly demonstrated they have not learnt, nor will they listen to attempts or offers to learn why nobody likes what they're contributing.

References

  1. ^ Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Aquinas College Salter Point Campusdiff from 23:33, 15 March 2007
  2. Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Kevin Paull diff from 23:46, 27 March 2007 (UTC)
  3. Sample Schoolcruft incident from Trinity College, Perth diff
  4. For example, Glen Waverley Secondary College diff
  5. ^ Girls Sport Victoria (GSV) subpages
  6. PSA portal and Aquinas portal MfDs
  7. Salter Point, Western Australia suburb that includes the school this dif
  8. City of South Perth local Government area includes suburb that includes the school this diff
  9. Image:Redback frontal view.jpg this diff
  10. See this discussion, and this diff from Trinity College, Perth
  11. Aquinas College, Perth (23 February 2007), references 22 and 23.
  12. St. Mark's College (University of Adelaide) diff
  13. AfDs for PSA Athletics
  14. Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Girls Sport Victoria (GSV) Sports Champions
  15. ^ This version of Vivian Gaither High School
  16. Misplaced Pages:Redirects for discussion/Log/2007 March 3
  17. ^ Diff from Confey College
  18. Diff from Randallstown High School
  19. ^ These versions of Curtin University of Technology
  20. Diff Murdoch University.

See also

Other Wikipedians' commentaries on this area

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