Talk:Epsom College/Archive 1

Archive 1

First

the syntax of this quote "main building had successfully lived through a lot during World War II" is atroctious- please rectify it. Also, I know the school lacks a huge amount of history, but the lacklustre description of its history is poorly executed and undetailed. A picture of the school also would be useful. All this acumulates to is a greater effort needed in writing this article

that part is rectified. It was appalling. Much else remains to be done here. The school deserves far more thant even the reasonable amount that has been addedFiddle Faddle 21:39, 5 April 2006 (UTC)

Loads of missing stuff

The list of headmasters is both incomplete and lacking a timeline. And much much more is needed here to make the article worthwile Fiddle Faddle 11:59, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

Needs work & Cleanup

There is a dearth of information for the general reader here, and too much information which is of dubious veracity. For example, info about how long housemasters have been in office needs to be related to a date. Also, it lacks focus in its structure - why does a detailed run-down of the houses (of dubious relevance to a general reader) come before achievements / notable alumni / place within national education structure? If I get a chance, I'll have a go Major Bloodnok 13:34, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

Further to the above, I have added the cleanup tag to the page. Major Bloodnok 15:12, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

Tidied the alumni and sport sections - sport and history need work though, as do the houses info. Major Bloodnok 11:10, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

Substantial re-write of the history section. More needs to be done though, especially to give a brief overview of the college currently, and what happened in 150 years. There are some typos to be fixed, and references added, and much work to be done to the sport section. There was a substantial amount of houses info merely taken from the College web-site.Major Bloodnok

medics

The intake of Epsom students who become medics is nothing special or noteworthy —Preceding unsigned comment added by 195.93.21.99 (talk • contribs)

That is original research. See WP:NOR. Unless this can be cited correctly it cannot be part of the article. You should be aware that statements that you have made above are an accusation in public media about the advertising the school makes, and are thus potentially libellous. Fiddle Faddle 10:03, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

ok fair enough, but can you at least cite yout reference to the statement: traditionally epsom college students become medics (or words to that extent)where did you get that info from —Preceding unsigned comment added by 195.93.21.99 (talk • contribs)

From the discounts available to the offspring of medics, the the history as The Royal Medical Benevolent College, from page 5 of the currently downladable prospectus, "Epsom’s results have for years been consistently judged amongst the ‘First Division’ in the league tables. Virtually all sixth form leavers go on to Degree courses, with around 10 to 15 annually going to Oxford or Cambridge, and 20 or so to the medical schools." From page 9 "Epsom’s medical strength has, over the years, helped to produce more doctors than any other school."

By the way it might be helpful if you got a wikipedia ID and signed your comments on talk pages. You might also want to ask an admin to expunge the potentially libellous remarks totally. They remain in the article history, you see.Fiddle Faddle 22:35, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

well, please, be my guest and expunge the libellous remarks if its not too much trouble. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 195.93.21.99 (talk • contribs)

If you register a username, and place {{helpme}} on your talk page describing what you need, then a friendly passing admin will help you. I am not one and thus cannot. Fiddle Faddle 17:06, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

Re Medics and Oxbridge These figures are clealry out of date. The school does not send 10-15 to Oxbridge "annually" - in 2005 it sent 3. I, therefore, suspect the figures for medical schools are similarly inflated. RumiRumi67 06:08, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

To Do

I would suggest that some pics of the campus / buildings are needed, including more info about them, for example their Grade listed status.

A fuller history of the college since foundation, including more detail about changes in its charitable work over the period, and maybe some info about the social changes which helped to bring this about (although this should be limited in detail as it should be included in depth elsewhere).

Maybe this can include some info about the change in the uniform too.

What does the community think?

I think that the references can be tidied up somewhat using the Harvard citation template as well. Major Bloodnok 08:57, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Now done. Major Bloodnok 20:02, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

House mottos

I've added a column for them, and added Cr's. I was wondering about the translation and the less correct translation. We always thought it was "With patience the condom may be broken". Fiddle Faddle 11:19, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

Nicknames for headmasters?

I am ambivalent, but perhaps "Bloody Harry" should be recorded for posterity, as should "Lips"? Fiddle Faddle 17:00, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

I'm a touch wary of adding bits like that - my main concern is that the page would turn into the school magazine, rather than being an encyclopedic entry. Somewhere in the Schools Project page in WP it says something along those lines... I had a cursory look at some other schools' pages and there are many which are guilty of just that. I think we're on the verge of crossing that line with the list of HMs as it is, although it does say much about 19th & early 20th Century schooling that they were all Reverends, so should be in.

Mind you, it's worth thinking about, certainly. Major Bloodnok 08:21, 18 August 2007 (UTC)

It would be a shame to lose such things as nicknames from memory. "BH", for example, shows the viciousness of his beatings, an interesting, if painful, reminder of history. Yet I can see the virtues of not including them.

The list of headmasters itself, however, is an important historical fact, and does not cross the line in my opinion, whereas any list of other staff, or even a list of governors and council, is somehow irrelevant. The figurehead is a figurehead and sets the tone of the school during his tenure.

I'd very much like to see the sport segments developed, not so much to show current results (to me ephemeral), but to show the history and development of that sport as encyclopaedic facts. When and why did Volleyball start (if it started)? That is, to me, encyclopaedic. The current team composition or a results table, in the context of a school is not.

I don't mean "let's rewrite Scadding et al," I mean let;s condense and distill a real history of the place in a way that allows people to gain much from this article, but that also sends them, as any good encyclopaedia does, to the sources when they want more.

Fiddle Faddle 09:54, 18 August 2007 (UTC)

I think I agree with everything you've written above. Major Bloodnok 21:43, 19 August 2007 (UTC)

Impassioned plea for Citation Templates

An excellent list of notable OEs has appeared. But this means I have a plea. There are wonderful, glorious, excellent citation templates, like {{cite web}}, {{cite book}}, {{cite journal}} that make this whole thing really easy and wholly encyclopaedic. I tidied a load of these and others tidied the rest. But please, oh please can we use them in references when we add them? It takes the originator of the ref almost no time at all, but other editors take considerably longer. Fiddle Faddle 12:42, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

In case you are unsure, here is an example:

{{cite web |url=http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/08/24/db2404.xml |title=Obituaries - James MacKeith |quote=one of the great forensic psychiatrists of his generation |accessdate=2007-08-28 |publisher=The Daily Telegraph |date=2007-08-24}}

Delivers:

"Obituaries - James MacKeith". The Daily Telegraph. 2007-08-24. Retrieved 2007-08-28. one of the great forensic psychiatrists of his generation

This is regimented, easy to understand, easy to do, and formal. makes the article even better. Fiddle Faddle 13:05, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

references

Might we have a look at using {{cite web}}, {{cite book}} (etc) to get the references really on stream? I do prefer them to be small, though, as references, rather than large as main text. Fiddle Faddle 14:59, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

To be honest, I didn't even know that {{cite web}}, {{cite book}} were options; anything to make the references tidier! The references are now smaller, but I had to put them into one column because urls don't return onto a new line if they're very long. With {{cite web}}, {{cite book}}, what are the practicalities?Major Bloodnok 07:03, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

The best answer is to try it and see, just working quietly down the references one at a time. I know of no article where they've given problems (yet) when used in this way. The parameter list is sensible, and they format well. Fiddle Faddle 08:27, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

I've done a simple web one to show you how it works. (see history in the article - currently ref 26). It encodes the url under the title of the work, so column issues won;t happen. I'll do a few more from time to time, but don't have that much time to spend on WP nowadays. Fiddle Faddle 08:40, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

Also done a simple book one. The good thing about the Book is the ISBN parameter. It also means you can consider removing the "further reading" section. The basic work you did on the Harvard b stuff pays dividends here, and the cite templates take it further. It's especially good that you can choose quotes if you want in order to illustrate items. Fiddle Faddle 09:01, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

That looks good Fiddle Faddle. I'll see what I can do when I get the chance. My only concern now is to ensure that the repeated references can still work, but I'll experiment and take a look. Major Bloodnok 10:26, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

Repeats still work provided the <ref></.ref> pair has a name, so no issue there. And it means you can go back to the 2 col layout when you want to. I'll do a few more from time to time as well, the burden isn't all yours. Slow and steady and it will all come right and be a better article for it. I'm grateful you took some of the stuff I'd started by the scruff of the neck and shock it into shape, so this is a sort of "payback" :) Fiddle Faddle 11:03, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

The references task is going well, I think. Another few days of "one every so often" and we'll soon finish the job. We're each missing the rules for the <ref></ref> pairs going immediately after a punctuation mark, not before it. I've certainly got to go back and have a look at a few that I've done. I wish the editing pane made this entire easier, but mediawiki software is not wonderful with complex edits. Still, once it's done the article will be far better for it. Does Salmon;s book have an ISBN? I can't find one anywhere. Fiddle Faddle 16:54, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

Good job on the references! The article looks so much better for all your work! I've taken another look at the Salmon book, and I can't see an ISBN number anywhere, although I did once find the book being sold on Amazon, so there must be a number somewhere...Major Bloodnok 16:33, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

I just got a bit carried away. Suddenly I worked out how to do a huge batch all at once. I confess I loathed the punctuation corrections, though. the cite templates make things so much clearer, despite appearing repetitive. They mean that a reader can go directly to a relevant item and (ideally) find the ISBN. I tried Amazon for the book, but it isn't present. There must be a global ISBN directory, but I have no idea (yet) where to look. Fiddle Faddle 16:41, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

I've just had a look at the British Library web-site, which lists the Salmon book, however it doesn't appear to have an ISBN number, only a "system number", whatever that is. It can be found here. I don't know whether this is at all helpful?Major Bloodnok 17:46, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

Display of Notes

The notes are getting to be longer than the article. In itself that is fine, but as a display it may be undesirable. I've made the notes a scrolling box, and this is up for discussion, naturally. The immediate apparent disadvantage of hidden notes vanishes when one clicks the note ref in the text. The box auto-scrolls to and highlights the relevant item. I am undecided. I've made the scrolling area just under a screenload for ease of general use. Fiddle Faddle 08:54, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Task done?

A few of the older references are capable of improvement, but I think, those apart, it is "job done" for now. Fiddle Faddle 10:45, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

Notable Staff

I'm pretty sure that Geographer Roger Lane was a javelin thrower of note. google refers, but is it the same bloke? Fiddle Faddle 16:56, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

Not sure - couldn't find any evidence via your links. Good work on the page - it's looking great, especially use of the badge...! I'm going to tackle the next part of the history when I get a chance... Major Bloodnok 17:02, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

I can't see evidence either. but I know he was a significant sportsman. That badge was not I. I simply claim credit for donkey work. I am more a stoker than a helmsan here :) Fiddle Faddle 17:11, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

Orange?

Is orange really one of the school colours in any traditional sense? I know it was brought in for marketing purposes some six? years ago but it has never AFAIK formed part of the school uniform or sports kit. Rather it has just been used on signage and publications.

I would have though blue and white were the school colours ast thats the colour of the sports kit and indeed the blazers up to the '70s were blue with a white stripe.

Or am I old, crusty and wrong?Blackshod 20:47, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

I am unsure of the orange, too. Blue, White and house colours. Those I recall from 65-70. Whatever it is, it was never attributed to Sainsbury's! Fiddle Faddle 21:20, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

I did wonder about the Orange, although there is the argument that since the colour has been adopted by the College as part of its branding that it is therefore an de facto school colour. However, I feel that since it is part of a branding exercise for exterior consumption and not used within the College it's not an official school colour.Major Bloodnok 16:39, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

I think we must revisit "Orange" in the light of the school badge. I suggest an email to the school secretary might solve the question? While emailing I suggest that copyright approval for use of the logo is sought and then logged in the WP OTRS system. Sorry, chaps, I'm letting someone else do this one. Too much on my plate at present elsewhere. Fiddle Faddle 17:21, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

Assessment

Great job everyone on the page, and now we have a pretty good rating!

I was wondering about the comment about re-organisation. I've always thought that the lead was too long; most of it should go into a subsequent history section, which would mention the "mutiny", the introduction of houses and when sport started...Major Bloodnok 18:02, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

In terms of rearranging etc, there is a tool I'm about to run and will paste the output below, that looks at the article versus guidelines. Once I find it, that is! Fiddle Faddle 20:07, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

"review" by Automatic Peer Review tool

The following suggestions were generated by a semi-automatic javascript program, and might not be applicable for the article in question.

• The lead of this article may be too long, or may contain too many paragraphs. Please follow guidelines at WP:LEAD; be aware that the lead should adequately summarize the article.^[?]
• The lead is for summarizing the rest of the article, and should not introduce new topics not discussed in the rest of the article, as per WP:LEAD. Please ensure that the lead adequately summarizes the article.^[?]
• Per Wikipedia:Context and Wikipedia:Manual of Style (dates), months and days of the week generally should not be linked. Years, decades, and centuries can be linked if they provide context for the article.^[?]
• If there is not a free use image in the top right corner of the article, please try to find and include one.^[?]
• When writing standard abbreviations, the abbreviations should not have a 's' to demark plurality (for example, change kms to km and lbs to lb).
• As per Wikipedia:Manual of Style (dates), dates shouldn't use ^th; for example, instead of using January 30^th was a great day, use January 30 was a great day.^[?]
• Per Wikipedia:Manual of Style (headings), headings generally do not start with articles ('the', 'a(n)'). For example, if there was a section called ==The Biography==, it should be changed to ==Biography==.^[?]
• As per Wikipedia:Manual of Style (headings), please do not link words in headings.^[?]
• Per Wikipedia:Manual of Style (headings), avoid using special characters (ex: &+{}[]) in headings.
• There are a few sections that are too short and that should be either expanded or merged.
• As done in WP:FOOTNOTE, footnotes usually are located right after a punctuation mark (as recommended by the CMS, but not mandatory), such that there is no space in between. For example, the sun is larger than the moon [2]. is usually written as the sun is larger than the moon.[2]^[?]
• Please ensure that the article has gone through a thorough copyediting so that it exemplifies some of Wikipedia's best work. See also User:Tony1/How to satisfy Criterion 1a.^[?]

You may wish to browse through User:AndyZ/Suggestions for further ideas. Thanks, Fiddle Faddle 20:08, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Looking at this, it seems to me that this is not ever going to be a featured article and that we may choose that some of the items do not apply. Certainly where a "^th" is in a quotation it must stay that way, for example. But the list is worth working through. I've used thsi list with good effect on other articles. As a guide it is excellent. Fiddle Faddle 20:21, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I have moved the text around, but not changed it. My next step will be to fill out some more relevant detail into the history section, and possibly to re-name sections... Major Bloodnok 15:17, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

AVO in alumni

Andrew is a very pleasant chap, and being MD of BUPA is doubtless a notable personal achievement, but does this make the cut as a notable alumnus? Fiddle Faddle (talk) 16:46, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

Colours

I had a communication with someone from the Bursar's office at the College, during the course of which we discussed the school colours. It's true that originally they were officially blue and white, but Orange has always been part of the school crest. When co-ed was introduced Orange was brought back as an official colour (and thus part of the branding). I suggest the colours entry on the info box is updated to reflect this. Sadly, the book by Salmon doesn't have the arms printed in colour, and the book by Scadding doesn't show it at all (although the colour theme of the book is Blue, White and Orange). Anyone got an old copy of the arms anywhere so we can check, on a mug, tie, book etc? The one displayed on the page is, I believe a recent version. There are things I'd like to do on the page, like standardise the format of the OEs for example, but time is pretty tight at the mo, so I'm not sure when I'll be able to.Major Bloodnok (talk) 11:25, 24 February 2008 (UTC)

My late father had a college crest on the wall at home which I guess dates from the 1950's as he left in 1953 or thereabouts and I am pretty certain that it predates me, I have just asked my mother to check it - there is no orange present albeit that the lamp and serpent are apparently a reddish colour. Smidsy999 (talk) 18:01, 24 February 2008 (UTC)

I've just checked my 80's version and there is definatly no orange on that. The parts that are orange on the coat of arms on the article page are very much gold on the version on my wall.Smidsy999 (talk) 18:06, 24 February 2008 (UTC)

Maybe a way forward is to amend the info box to show Orange to be an official colour (the crucial test after all is surely that the College considers it to be an official school colour), and to recognise in the footnote that there is some disagreement over the colour's origin. As far as WP controversies go, I think it's a fairly minor one in the grand scheme of things.Major Bloodnok (talk) 09:36, 26 February 2008 (UTC)

Not sure as I would have thought that there is a differece between colours used in 'Brand' ie on websites, publicity material etc and the more 'traditional' meaning of a School's Colours ie that used in uniform and sports kit. AFAIK Orange does not appear on either of the latter. Most notably not on the new Blazer that came in last year where the blue badge was replaced by a gold - decidedly not yellow - rendering of the coat of arms. I would say how it is presented in the article now is a pretty accurate recording of the situation —Preceding unsigned comment added by Smidsy999 (talk • contribs) 20:58, 26 February 2008 (UTC)

Art

This paragraph had been added to the bottom of the main section. I have removed it because it is terribly vague and needs reference to actual content:

Although there are strong medical links, the school is also proud of its strengthening art department. There have been noticeable changes in the results, and now the school is aiming to further improve the department. In effort to this there has recently been a new extension built in. There have been a fair number of alumni to enter successfully into an artistic career, and with the exceptional results received recently more pupils are choosing art as a profession.

There are several OEs who are noted artists (Graham Sutherland for one) but that is noted in the OEs section, and I feel it only warrants inclusion in the bulk of the article if there is some noteworthy event which is relevant. In addition, extensions to existing buildings are not especially noteworthy in themselves, unless something extraordinary has occurred; this article is not a school newsletter. What is noteworthy is something like a building being renovated and being given a design award (which I know has happened to at least two buildings in the college, but I don't have references for that, so I don't feel comfortable in including that yet; if anyone has any further info, please feel free to include it).

The above para has problems with grammar and weasel words in addition to the above. If it can be improved, by all means re-instate. Major Bloodnok (talk) 09:14, 15 August 2008 (UTC)

Current pupil in Alumni

It seems to me to be so rare for a current pupil to be notable, that it is worth the mild inaccuracy of having such a person in the Alumni list. It is probably not worth a new section of notable current pupils, surely?

If you disagree please put Tyger Drew-Honey in such a section. He is notable and verifiable and appears in the OE Alumni database, presumably as a clerical expediency. Fiddle Faddle (talk) 19:56, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

It seems that someone objected, but didn't choose to create a new section. So I have. Fiddle Faddle (talk) 22:01, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

GSG and Best Schools etc

In general such links tend to be spammy at best, often requiring folk to subscribe to see the full articles. I removed them form the lead area and have not placed them elsewhere. I don't object to their inclusion exactly, but they need to be better formed as citations and cite the thing they say they do (another reason why I removed the GSG one. IT said pretty much the reverse of what the text on the page said!

Rankings themselves are kind of Ok, but such fame is transient. So it was 17th this year. Next year it may be first or 117th. More useful is a link to whatever the current rankings on an authoritative site.

Your mileage may vary. I don't feel hugely strongly about this. I'm just documenting my edit. Fiddle Faddle (talk) 17:29, 27 May 2012 (UTC)

I don't know the specific sites you've removed, but I can see why you've done it. I think you are correct in removing it from the Lead, although I don't think the Lead really reflects the article that follows it (as per WP:LEAD). In general terms, it would be useful to have reference to league tables where they indicate why the College is notable, although as you've pointed out, these should be used with caution. More useful may be to say where relevant that the College was 17th according to ranking by organisation x in year y. This could then be compared across the years and even with reference to other schools too.

Good work on keeping this page tidy - I now have a COI which limits my involvement. Ben (Major Bloodnok) (talk) 06:38, 29 May 2012 (UTC)

In general on schools articles most folk have some form of COI. Unless one is the marketing manager I suspect this is, broadly, irrelevant as long as one's edits are neutral and seen to be neutral. Without alumni and other connected folk editing them decent schools articles would be hard to find here. So, if you find things you need or want to do, do them in that spirt :) Fiddle Faddle (talk) 08:05, 29 May 2012 (UTC)

Malaysia and citations

I've just rolled back these edits simply because I have no way of telling from the citation that exists already that they are correct. Regrettably we rely on facts, not on truths, so they may be re-added once the correct citation is in place to back them up. Fiddle Faddle (talk) 06:18, 24 August 2012 (UTC)

Alumni is becoming diluted again

I haven't had the time recently, to get back on top of the alumni section. I'm about to flag those that need a citation as requiring it. Fiddle Faddle (talk) 08:09, 22 October 2012 (UTC)

Crest

I have uploaded the new College crest to reflect current branding. Keep up the good work! Ben (Major Bloodnok) (talk) 21:46, 8 September 2014 (UTC)

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