Talk:Centre College/Archive 1

Betas
Josh just told students through email that the Centre College Beta Theta Pi chapter had been disbanded; which is why I edited the page.

The Fall 2006 Centrepiece (sent out in January 2007) also announced the shutdown of the Beta chapter.

Dekes
What evidence does anybody have that the Dekes are looking for reasons to take somebody's house on campus? In fact, the entire Greek community gets along very well with the off-campus Dekes and the fraternity is actually more solidified now that they aren't constrained by College rules. Also, if the College is worried about the Dekes being detrimental to the campus community, they should consider whether or not the Dekes pose more of a threat off-campus.
 * I don't know who posted that but I think I want it out—if you remove it I certainly won't object. Arwcheek 21:13, 29 March 2006 (UTC)
 * "the fraternity is actually more solidified now that they aren't constrained by College rules . . . Also, if the College is worried about the Dekes being detrimental to the campus community, they should consider whether or not the Dekes pose more of a threat off-campus. - That sure sounds like wishful thinking to me.

Trivia
classes were not in fact canceled for the VP Debate so keep it as is! attendence was "optional" Arwcheek 16:09, 3 February 2006 (UTC)


 * Yes, classes were cancelled for the VP debate. In order to clear up this issue, I contacted Mike Norris of the Centre College media contact department.  He dug up the answer and replied to my e-mail telling me that classes were in fact cancelled.  However, seminars were made available for students on Debate Day.  If there is any further disagreement about classes being cancelled on that October 5th, please contact Mike Norris at Centre College.  Regular classes were cancelled.


 * thanks! Arwcheek 15:09, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

A couple of things, in this regard, that I recall from my days as a student at Centre-- 1) The story went that troops were coming through Danville, headed to the Battle of Perryville, when Centre cancelled classes during the Civil War; 2) I believe classes were cancelled in favor of a Convocation at the beginning of Operation Desert Storm in January 1991. Again, this is just my recollection-- Anyone able to confirm either of these? (SleepyDad 05:13, 13 January 2007 (UTC))

Copyright Issues
Traditions (Dead Fred and Flame Run) and Athletics (football) have been copied verbatim from the Centre web site, which constitutes copyright infringement unless properly referenced. If you are the original creator please please please make a note of it here. Arwcheek 19:38, 9 February 2006 (UTC)


 * Don't quote me on this, but I think the entries might have been copied into the article by the Communications Dept. At the very least it came from somewhere on campus, as 65.82.112.x to 65.82.119.x is owned by the college.  I tried to make it sound less like a commercial trying to sell the college using nudity. Terawatt 20:08, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

Old Centre
Earlier, somebody had written that Old Centre was formerly called Old Main-- to clarify, Old Main was actually a separate building on campus that was demolished in 1965.

Larry Matheny
The section on Larry Matheny seems wildly unencyclopedic. Without substantial justification for keeping it (and a commitment to clean up the tone), consider this a notice of my intent to remove it. Acdixon 20:36, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
 * I completely agree. There are other sections here with a tone not appropriate to Wikipedia which I'd like to either clean up or remove also. Do we really want detailed information on the flame run?? Arwcheek 21:01, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
 * Agree.. the info on the Flame Run should go-- especially the plug for the newsletter. (SleepyDad 05:14, 13 January 2007 (UTC))

The Flame Run is arguably the most well-known Centre tradition. Why has it been taken out? 162.129.251.29 03:32, 23 April 2007 (UTC)mb
 * The tone of the flame run section sounded like a brochure and was not ready for Wikipedia. Content on here needs to be original. Arwcheek 11:09, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

Splitting article
I can understand a separate page for the college presidents, but commencement speakers too? The lists aren't terribly long to begin with, and frankly, neither of them should have moved at all. Arwcheek 15:36, 9 November 2006 (UTC)
 * For me, these lists really interrupted the flow of the article. No, the list of commencement speakers wasn't that long, but it could grow indefinitely so. If it remains in the main article, perhaps it should be made a sidebar or something. You're really not going to hurt my feelings if you want to change it back to the way it was; I just thought this gave the article a cleaner look. Acdixon 13:14, 10 November 2006 (UTC)
 * That's ok-- I'm just afraid that the articles "get lost" and people will be less likely to update them in the future. Arwcheek 15:05, 10 November 2006 (UTC)
 * Nobody else seems to have weighed in on the two articles splitting off of the main one, so I'm going to go ahead and remove the proposal to merge. Arwcheek 21:20, 17 December 2006 (UTC)

Infobox
Not to be contentious, but almost every other four-year college in Kentucky is using the University infobox. (Spencerian College and Sullivan University are the exceptions.) Also, the University infobox is maintained by WikiProject Universities, which means any changes are thoroughly vetted through peer review. Why would we deviate from it in favor of a home grown solution? I know aesthetics is always subjective, but isn't there something to be said for consistency? Acdixon 16:22, 10 November 2006 (UTC)
 * This info box has worked well for Centre and many other colleges for a very long time. If anything, it acts as a model for what Wikipedia standards should rise to. I don't see the aesthetics-is-subjective argument as valid here, as this box is in fact of higher readability as well as aesthetics. Just because others use one style doesn't make theirs better! Let's make Wikipedia better in content, readability, and in aesthetics!Arwcheek 18:22, 10 November 2006 (UTC)
 * I was about to change to the University infobox, but looked at this discussion and decided not to activate it. Instead, I've put a University infobox, completely filled out for Centre, in comments on top of the main article. IMHO, that would be an acceptable compromise until there's a complete discussion on this item. — Dale Arnett (talk) 19:45, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

Football
Okay, two things on the football section: 1) there is still no source indicated for the lines about the College hiring football players, so I'm going to take that out, and; 2) Where did this piece about the "Sargrin Foundation" awarding Centre the 1919 National Championship come from? According to the NCAA website, the Championship for that year was retroactively split between Harvard, Illinois, Texas A&M, and Notre Dame. Someone verify the source on this supposed Centre Championship or else I'm striking it.--SleepyDad 16:58, 6 February 2007 (UTC)


 * As for the portions you bring up, I can't seem to find a source either. ...And the rest of the football section came from some kind of promotional literature, but I left it in the hopes that others would edit and change it. Anybody out there care to start the football section over again? Arwcheek 20:22, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

Class cancellations
I revised the article to reflect the cancellation of classes for one day during the Great Blizzard of 1978, when roads were closed and the professors could not get to classes. At that time, the Cento, if I remember correctly, said that some of the older professors remembered a two-day closure in 1948, also for a snowstorm. There seems to be uncertainty as to whether classes actually were canceled for the Battle of Perryville (which was in 1862, not 1865 as stated in the article). Also, I believe that classes were canceled at some point in the 1979 - 1981 time frame, when the college basketball team made it to the NCAA tournament for its division. —Preceding unsigned comment added by John M Baker (talk • contribs) 23:41, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

'Highly regarded' ?
Should this collocation stay in the first sentence in the article about Centre College? I think it is POV. Let's face it, being 44th in US News isn't exactly the definition of being "highly regarded", but even if it was - you won't see other very prestigious institutions putting such claims in their wikipedia pages. E.g. Harvard and Yale. Harvard: "Harvard University (incorporated as The President and Fellows of Harvard College) is a private university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, U.S., and a member of the Ivy League." Yale: "Yale University is a private university in New Haven, Connecticut."

But either way, self-praise of this kind is doing Centre College a bad favor. And it's still POV, i.e. it does not belong in an encyclopedic article.

Your thoughts? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Logain2006 (talk • contribs) 08:49, 14 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Logain2006, as the person who made the edit you are criticizing (i.e., the revert of your edit), I'm not ignoring your thoughts, but am on vacation right now and don't have time to respond. Meanwhile, I would welcome the thoughts of others.  John M Baker (talk) 12:11, 14 August 2008 (UTC)


 * I would have no problem with the phrase if it is sourced by a reliable source... Then it isn't POV, it's reporting on someone else's POV.--Paul McDonald (talk) 12:24, 14 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Well, a week later and it still isn't. Logain2006 (talk) 17:23, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

But in the same paragraph, Centre is ranked as the 13th best college in the country, so I really don't think that this statement is POV. On the other hand, this and other supports for Centre's high regard, coming as they do so closely after the word "highly regarded," may make those words unnecessary. On further consideration, therefore, I do not have strong feelings either way as to whether the words "highly regarded" should appear. John M Baker (talk) 19:56, 20 August 2008 (UTC)
 * In light of the mentioned redundancy, together with some expressed concerns about POV, I think the appropriate course is to remove it. Acdixon (talk • contribs • count) 20:52, 20 August 2008 (UTC)
 * You have to understand that I am not disputing the great reputation of the school. I am just saying that it makes no sense to establish its public image in the first sentence of the article. As I mentioned earlier, the pages of other excellent schools don’t do that and it is an accepted norm that the reader should infer the quality of the institution from the various rankings and sources of information available throughout the article. The reader, on the other hand, should not be spoon-fed a conclusion or a point of view. I know this seems trivial but you won’t believe the amount of people that base their decisions, including college admission, on an authoritative source and Wikipedia is viewed as one – it should be as clean as possible. So, I’m happy to read that you’ve changed your position. Logain2006 (talk) 21:03, 20 August 2008 (UTC)
 * I think that the removal of the phrase was the right move. Sure, it's a great school and probably is "highly regarded" but how does one measure that?  It's better to say "ranked 13th best" and give specific details and referencese than wide-reaching comments that make great sound bites but have little meaning.--Paul McDonald (talk) 12:23, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

College name
The college was originally organized as Centre College of Kentucky and was known by that name, in formal contexts, for most of its history. Recent references, however, seem to call it only Centre College, even in contexts where the formal name would be expected. Is this now the legal name? Perhaps there should be some reference to the old name and a cite to the name change, if there was one. John M Baker (talk) 01:14, 14 September 2011 (UTC)


 * Centre College of Kentucky was the original legal name remains so to this day. Based on my discussions with admissions office personnel, Centre made a conscious choice to no longer publicize the "of Kentucky" portion of the name a few decades ago. This choice was apparently motivated by the desire to cast the College as a national, rather than regional, school of excellence. It may be worthwhile to find proper citations and make reference to the legal name in the history section, if only because several older alumni still subscribe to the "Centre College of Kentucky" designation and older news articles use the legal name as well. Strife87 (talk) 22:01, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

It's interesting how the name of the school never evolved into the normal American English spelling of "Center" and remained "Centre" like the usage in Canada and England. Anyone or any locals got an opinion on that? I'm thinking it might have had something to do with a benign appeal with Great Britain and the old Empire. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Consulzephyr (talk • contribs) 23:43, 11 October 2012 (UTC)

Assessment comment
Substituted at 11:09, 29 April 2016 (UTC)

External links modified
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Ethnic breakdown
The ethnicity breakdown of the student body in the "Student Life" section adds up to well under 100%. While this should hardly be a major focus of the article in any event, if it is even going to be included it all, it should be reasonably correct. The current numbers patently are not. 2600:1004:B118:F21E:BC84:1A98:65BF:9CED (talk) 00:51, 30 July 2018 (UTC)
 * If you compare the sentence in the article with what's in the cited source there are several categories that are not included in the article e.g., non-resident alien at 7.5%. ElKevbo (talk) 01:50, 30 July 2018 (UTC)