Talk:Dalhousie University/Archive 1

Risley Hall and daycare centre
Are Risley Hall and the daycare centre equipped residence the same place or different? If not, then the new residence built for the fall of 2004 was removed incorrectly. Peregrine981 03:49, Dec 8, 2004 (UTC)

As far as I have been able to find out, Risley does not have a daycare. - Haunti 20:32, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Risely Hall and the residence with the daycare are different buildings. According to the campus map on the Dalhousie website, the residence with the daycare is called the "University Child Centre & Residence". It is located on the corner of Seymour and South Streets across from Risley Hall.--Pthalio 23:26, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

As a Dal student, I can confirm that Risley Hall does not contain a daycare. The daycare is located on the basement floor of the Psychology building. The Psychology building itself is considered to be a component of the Life Sciences Centre, which is a large underground structure that connects many buildings on the Sexton campus. Lusankya 17:13, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

There is a daycare in the LSC, which is at the west end of Studley Campus. The daycare centre in question is located at South & Seymour in the Killam Properties building, which faces the back side of Risley Hall. Benwedge (talk) 02:39, 15 November 2010 (UTC)

Noted faculty members
Here's my suggestion on the "noted faculty members" section. If a faculty member is noted enough to put on the list, either they should have a wikipedia page already or you should take the time to make one and tell us why they're so notable. Right now it just looks like people are taking their favourite professors and putting them on the list with no justification. Obviously I'm not an expert in all those fields (or any of them), but a little explanation of what makes the prof so notable would be nice, preferably in their own wikipedia entry. - Haunti 13:47, 28 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I disagree. The professors that ARE included there are quite well recognized in their fields, particularly within Dalhousie itself, and a little research will dig up news articles, priase, and research citations. Wikipedia isn't the purveyor of all information, nor is it the arbiter of notability. Your notion is foolish. Many Nobel Prize winners haven't been given a wikipedia page yet. Just because they haven't, doesn't mean they should be mentioned. Also, when there is an empty article, it opens the possibility up to expansion. Danielfong 04:11, 16 May 2005 (UTC)

What is the policy at pages dedicated to other Canadian universities? I can name a few professors in the Political Science department who have reputations matching David Cameron (Denis Stairs, Jennifer Smith, Peter Aucoin, David Black and Tim Shaw), but I don't have the resources or knowledge (i.e. birth dates, etc.) to make separate wikipedia pages about each of them. Chris LaRoche 14:34, 02 Sept 2005 (UTC) ( The previous comment was signed by Chris LaRoche but posted by the anonymous IP 142.68.92.227 (talk) )

I don't think it's a good idea just to base the idea of "noted" professor based on general feels for how recognized he or she is. There are more objective measures such as whether they are highly cited or not. See: ISI's Highly Cited Researchers. Though, I'd rather not wipe out anything though. --Jtn5 05:01, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

The ISI citation link isn't working -- although I can say two additions for my department (Denis Stairs and Peter Aucoin) wouldn't be based on "feelings," but an understood professional reputation that can be backed up by awards and bios written by third parties such as the Canadian Institute for International Affairs. Many faculty and staff at Dalhousie atract students from all over Canada for research/learning purposes. Compared to the other "research university" pages dedicated to Canadian Universities, Dal's page needs a lot of fleshing out. The noted alumni section could be expanded, too. Chris LaRoche 08:00, 26 Jan 2006 (UTC) ( The previous comment was signed by Chris LaRoche but posted by the anonymous IP 142.68.92.227 (talk) )

Northern Maine?
"Using money acquired from the duties collected during the occupation of northern Maine in the War of 1812, Ramsay established Dalhousie as a college open to all people regardless of class or creed."

I think the statement "northern Maine" is incorrect. The area seized by Ramsay was the coastal area of eastern Massachusetts in the Maine territory. The actual state of Maine wasn't created until 1820. The area seized stretched from the International Boundary at the St. Croix River to Penobscot Bay but was largely concentrated on Castine. The term "northern Maine" typically refers to an area inland from the coast - mostly Aroostook and Somerset counties. During and after the War of 1812, both Britain and the U.S. claimed the area with Britain claiming the entire St. John River watershed. The boundary which gave this area to the U.S. was not decided until the 1842 Webster-Ashburton Treaty.

"'He [Ramsay] fulfilled his dream by using the spoils of war: Castine, a small port in Maine, was being used during the War of 1812 as a base by American privateers who harassed shipping along the eastern seaboard. Lord Dalhousie sent a Royal Navy force from Halifax to capture Castine and turn it into a Customs port of entry. When the war ended, the Navy returned to Halifax with the money it had collected as Customs duties.'"

Plasma east 14:46, 28 Apr 2005 (UTC)


 * Would it be better to say, "what is now northern Maine"? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.173.38.112 (talk) 13:55, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

# of faculty
I think adding a note about how many faculty there are, perhaps broken down by school, would be a good thing to add. Anyone have this information? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.104.40.85 (talk) 12:30, 29 May 2005 (UTC)


 * The number of faculty are now published at http://www.dal.ca/About%20Dalhousie/Dalhousie_Index.php - 1,142 —Preceding unsigned comment added by Dal Expert (talk • contribs) 02:20, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

Coat of Arms
I took the liberty of replacing the previous back & white jpeg image with a fair-use png version of the official coat of arms, as verified by the registrar’s office. See: Wikipedia prefers png over jpeg format for logos. --OldCommentator 16:56, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

Academic Rankings
I've removed the references to Dal as a leading Canadian university & as one of the best ranked doctoral institutions in Canada. If someone can source this (and not from the Dal website) then let's add it, but, unfortunately, Dal ranks near the bottom in almost every category. I'm not sure that we want to draw attention to this.

The school was named as an excellent location to engage in post-doc studies by a scientific magazine based in the states.

I suggest that we point to specific achievements, otherwise it's just going to look ridiculous.

—Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.222.163.42 (talk) 00:10, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

Further to this, I had tried removing "Dal is part of the Canadian Ivy League" before and someone put it back in. Let me be clear - and in no way am I dissing the school here - there is no "Canadian Ivy League". If you disagree, please find a reference to back that up (I guarantee you won't). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 131.137.245.208 (talk) 11:53, 14 January 2010 (UTC)

Endowment
Does anyone know where the endowment information in the sidebar is from? The number cited ($321 million) is in conflict with the number cited by the List of Canadian universities by endowment. -C. LaRoche, July 2006  ( The previous comment was signed by Chris LaRoche but posted by the anonymous IP 142.68.92.227 (talk) )


 * I think we should defer to the publication, unless someone can support the other figure. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.222.163.42 (talk) 15:36, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

Deferred Maintenance
Does anyone have evidence that this is true/current, or is it just an urban myth that floats around campus? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.173.38.112 (talk) 13:58, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

The university is not "facing serious financial problems," like the Wikipedia entry currently reads (Nov. 19/07), as it's had a balanced budget for the past 20 years. But deferred maintenance is still a huge, long-term concern not only for Dalhousie, but for universities across Canada. Back in 2001, the Toronto Star referred to a number of $3.6 billion worth of repairs and facilities renewal required at Canadian universities, and I'm sure that number has increased in the years since. The subject of deferred maintenance was addressed in last year's report by the Long Term Financial Planning Committee of Dalhousie's Board of Governors (see page 20 - lots of great background there). In the 2007/08 operating budget, the university increased spending on facilities renewal by 15 per cent ($1.2 million), which is in line with the Committee's recommendations. RRM - Dalhousie (talk) 15:11, 19 November 2007 (UTC)

Halifax Explosion
Does anyone believe that the assistance rendered by Dalhousie in the rescue operations and follow-up investigations of the Halifax Explosion is worth mentioning, perhaps within the trivia section? Unless there's any objection or if someone beats me to it, I'll see about adding this in whenever I get around to it. --Thisisbossi 04:19, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

Noted alumni
The phrase Very prestigious orthopedic surgeon sticks out as an anomalously, both on the page and generally. I think the first two words should be deleted, since the heading already suggests that individuals listed are notable. Does anyone agree? I don't want to remove the words without some discussion ... perhaps he is very prestigious, in the sense that he average American knows his name... --Dankelley 15:32, 17 February 2007 (UTC)

Merge from Howe Hall
Please merge any relevant content from [ Howe Hall] per Articles for deletion/Howe Hall. (If there is nothing to merge, just leave it as a redirect. If there are many dormatories, it might be worth creating a new article Dalhousie University student housing.)  Thanks. —Quarl (talk) 2007-02-19 12:03Z 


 * Actually, I like the Howe Hall article and I feel that its provision of history asserts its notability as a stand-alone subject (per WP:NOT). I agree that if additional information can be found on other dorms, this might make for a decent Dalhousie University student housing article.  Or at the least, 1 or 2 sentences for other dorms and then label them as stubs.  --Thisisbossi 15:43, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

Dalhousie University Rugby Football Club
I don't think this should be merged with the School page. the Dalhousie Tigers page if anything. But lots of other rugby clubs have their own pages, so perhaps we should keep this one, too. SaraK 22:08, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

Dalhousie University as Wikipedia editor
As my profile page explains, I work for Communications and Marketing at Dalhousie. Given my position, I figured it wise to provide an explanatory note before you see edits on the Dalhousie Wikipedia entry being made with this account.

We've been debating about becoming active editors on our Wikipedia page for a while now. On the one hand, by Wikipedia's definition we're a biased editor, so clearly we'd be amiss to go about shamelessly re-editing the page in our own image. On the other hand, there are often false or misleading edits that are made and take a long time to be corrected, which is concerning when Wikipedia is becoming a key information resource. Because we're already monitoring the changes that get made to the page (thank heavens for RSS) and have Dalhousie facts and figures out our fingertips, we’re in a good position to quickly correct and update information.

For example, while I enjoy a Dawgfather lunch as much as the next person, Jerry Reddick is not a professor at Dalhousie, nor do we have a “Dawgology” program. And while the statement about Dalhousie having the second-highest tuition in the country is true, the statement about "serious financial problems" is incredibly misleading as the university has had 20 straight balanced budgets (not to downplay the problem of deferred maintenance, but it’s a nationwide problem that stems from Federal and provincial funding cutbacks – hardly a Dalhousie-specific issue that warrants being labeled as “serious financial problems” without qualification).

So in the coming days/weeks/months, you may see edits being made with this account. I’m not going to be doing stealth edits or anything stupid like that: every change will have a short explanatory note and, when at all possible, will be sourced (preferably external if I can find the information). For larger changes, I’m going to try and start discussion threads first and see if we can come to some sort of consensus. It doesn’t seem like Dalhousie has the most active discussion page in the world, but it’s only right that I try and engage here first before making major edits on my own.

On that point, does anyone have any concerns with my being here? Any advice on how best to make updates without imposing, or how best I can get information to other editors who have questions about Dal's Wikipedia page? Is there anyone who’s following this page regularly and might be interested in working on some larger edits (trying to bring the page in line with the Universities’ WikiProject)? Let me know.

- RRM —Preceding unsigned comment added by RRM - Dalhousie (talk • contribs) 14:43, 19 November 2007 (UTC)


 * I can't speak for the rest of the people here, but in principle I don't think that there is anything terrible about Dalhousie having a person pay attention to what goes up on this page. As you say, lots of companies/institutions have been doing it secretly anyway. In terms of trying to get consensus about changes to the page before hand, I don't know how important that is. One of the pieces of advice that is given for making changes to articles is "be bold". I think we only need consensus on changes if there really is a disagreement, and the page keeps going back and forth. I vote for you to make changes as you see fit, knowing that people are watching, and will comment/undo if they disagree. Also, you should list me as being President. :)


 * Itamblyn (talk) 04:45, 11 January 2008 (UTC)


 * I try to keep a close watch on this article and certainly don't have a problem with such edits. Actually, I think it's great that such stakeholders get involved, as they are typically more aware of notable information and where to find verifiable references.  That said, so long as everything is properly attributed, such contributions could be extremely helpful. Cheers! -- Bossi  ( talk • gallery • contrib ) 04:49, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

"Current" Issues
I've been looking through Wikipedia pages for most of the big Canadian universities and few, if any, of them have a section titled "current issues." Given the one here on the Dal page, it's not hard to see why - it hasn't been significantly edited in months, if not back a year or two. Hardly current.

I'm thinking we should junk it, but I'm wondering what best to replace it with. After all, factually questionable statements about the university budget aside, there's some good information here. Maybe a section on "Reputation"? (That's what many universities have). Or changing the section on "Faculties" to "Academics" and including some of the content under there?

Any thoughts before I start tinkering?

RRM - Dalhousie (talk) 12:16, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

Logo vs. Coat of Arms
There's been a bit of back and forth editing on the use of the university logo/coat of arms in the sidebar. This comes from two competing concerns:

1. What seems to have become the Wikipedia standard for universities is to put the "coat of arms" in the top spot of the info box, with the "logo" buried at the bottom under the link to the school's website.

2. At Dalhousie, what's used as the coat of arms is unfamiliar to most - most people only see it as part of convocation ceremonies, while a few might see it on the occasional formal document. The logo, in contrast, is used pretty much everywhere.

I'm biased as a communications and marketing person, but to me the page should emphasize the most recognizable identifier of an institution. But I'm also quite respectful of Wikipedia's own practices, so that side of my brain wants me to just leave things as they are. Anyone have any thoughts on this? —Preceding unsigned comment added by RRM - Dalhousie (talk • contribs) 12:21, 25 May 2009 (UTC)

Notable people
The article currently contains a section that lists a number of notable people (and some less-notable). This is not usually done in good Wikipedia articles on universities. Usually there is a short section listing a few very notable alumni or faculty, and a sub-article that gives a full listing of noteworthy people. There is already such a sub-article. Accordingly, I propose to edit the section, removing most of the names to the sub-article and writing a brief overview section. That way this article might aspire to becoming a future good or featured article. Let me know if there are any concerns. Sunray (talk) 22:30, 19 November 2009 (UTC)


 * Sounds like a great idea. (RRM - Dalhousie (talk) 11:31, 23 November 2009 (UTC))


 * Done. Sunray (talk) 06:53, 10 December 2009 (UTC)

sodales
'Sodales' redirects here; why? I'm not finding it in the article. Cynwolfe (talk) 12:38, 20 May 2010 (UTC)
 * In the meantime, I've changed the redirect to the entry on sodalitas and sodales in the Glossary of ancient Roman religion. If the Dalhousie article later provides content on sodales, that redirect page can be turned into a disambiguation page. Cynwolfe (talk) 13:46, 20 May 2010 (UTC)

Redmond College
Redmond College in the Anne of Green Gables series of books is based on Dalhousie University (see e.g. http://www.lmm-anne.net/archives/2008/geography/kingsport.html), which is where the author, Lucy Maud Montgomery, had studied. -- pne (talk) 14:11, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

Photoshopped photo of Henry Hicks
The Photoshopped photo of Henry Hicks is eerily similar to the photoset shown here:

http://dalnews.dal.ca/photoessay/dalnight/1.html

One definitely is not the other, but i can't help if the OP of this photo (through an account that doesn't exist any longer) isn't properly citing his/her own attributions to the owner of this photoset linked above. just saying.. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.137.73.194 (talk) 03:19, 31 October 2010 (UTC)