Talk:Michael M. Crow

Copyright problem removed
Prior content in this article duplicated one or more previously published sources. The material was copied from: http://president.asu.edu/about/michaelcrow. Infringing material has been rewritten or removed and must not be restored, unless it is duly released under a compatible license. (For more information, please see "using copyrighted works from others" if you are not the copyright holder of this material, or "donating copyrighted materials" if you are.) For legal reasons, we cannot accept copyrighted text or images borrowed from other web sites or published material; such additions will be deleted. Contributors may use copyrighted publications as a source of information, but not as a source of sentences or phrases. Accordingly, the material may be rewritten, but only if it does not infringe on the copyright of the original or plagiarize from that source. Please see our guideline on non-free text for how to properly implement limited quotations of copyrighted text. Wikipedia takes copyright violations very seriously, and persistent violators will be blocked from editing. While we appreciate contributions, we must require all contributors to understand and comply with these policies. Thank you. Presidentman talk · contribs Random Picture of the Day (Talkback) 16:08, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Copyvio history for this article
- Voceditenore (talk) 09:51, 30 November 2012 (UTC) Updated by Voceditenore (talk) 06:41, 21 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Deleted (under the original title Michael Crow) as a blatant copyright violation from www.asu.edu/president/meetthepresident on 27 March 2006
 * Recreated, again with copyvio, blanked and new non-copyvio version begun at Michael Crow/Temp on 21 May 2006
 * Article deleted and replaced with content of Michael Crow/Temp on 12 June 2006
 * Copyvio re-added with this edit on 16 February 2007
 * Copyvio partially removed with this edit on 19 October 2007
 * Copyvio from president.asu.edu/about/michaelcrow re-added with this edit on 23 November 2009
 * Copyvio removed and revisions containing it deleted on 20 November 2011
 * Copyvio from president.asu.edu/about/michaelcrow re-added with this edit on 31 July 2012
 * Copyvio removed on 16 November 2012
 * Copyvio from president.asu.edu/about/michaelcrow re-added with this edit on 16 November 2012
 * Copyvio removed on 16 November 2012
 * Copyvio from president.asu.edu/about/michaelcrow re-added 4 January 2013 (twice), 11 January 2013 (twice), and 5 February 2013 by three anonymous IPs tracing back to ASU (149.169.164.12, 149.169.244.244, and 149.169.212.82).
 * Copyvio removed 4 January 2013 (twice), 11 January 2013, 12 January 2013, 5 February 2013. All copyvio versions from 4 January to 5 February 2013 revision deleted on 5 February 2013

Article stubbed
I have stubbed this article for several reasons. First and foremost, almost all of it was a blatant violation of Wikipedia's copyright policies — virtually verbatim from president.asu.edu/about/michaelcrow. Even if it had been released under a free license, its tone was wildly unencyclopedic "PR-speak" and basically an advertisement for the university. Secondly, there are BLP concerns with the addition of unsourced rumours and coat-racking. Thirdly, the material about Obama speaking at the commencement is pertinent to the university's article not to Crow's.

Editors are welcome to build this article back up but you must do so in your own words and write in a neutral, non-promotional, encyclopedic tone. This is an encyclopedia article and a biography, not the university's brochure nor a soapbox for factions who are critical of him and the university. A balanced article can and should include criticism, provided it is not given undue weight and is meticulously sourced to reliable independent publications, and no, cfraa.org is not one of them. I've checked the edit history of this article, which seems to be a series of subtle edit wars between those determined to use it for the university's PR and those who are determined to use it to express their grievances about the university in general, but are using this biography to do it, i.e. coatracking. Neither of these approaches is appropriate or acceptable. Voceditenore (talk) 07:55, 16 November 2012 (UTC)


 * I strongly urge both sides involved here to collaborate on this talk page as to how to best take this article forward. Before you do, please familiarize yourselves thoroughly with our policies on biographies of living persons, neutrality, and verifiability. And while you're at it, look up "biography" in a dictionary.  As a so-called "biography" this article was absolutely dreadful and profoundly uninformative with virtually no information on this person's actual life prior to assuming the presidency of the Arizona University 10 years ago. If you can't collaborate to ensure that this develops as a proper encyclopedia article, I will not hesitate to bring these issues to the Biographies of Living Persons Noticeboard. Voceditenore (talk) 08:13, 16 November 2012 (UTC)


 * Update I have re-expanded the article with a basic biography that covers Crow's academic and personal life up to and including his appointment as the current President of ASU. At some point, it would be useful to have a subsection in the biography covering his tenure at ASU in more detail. However, this should be impeccably sourced with a neutral point of view and without undue weight given to "controversies". If you are from the ASU press office or are a disgruntled student or employee of the university, you are almost certainly not the best editors to take on such a section. Some of the stuff that has previously appeared in this article has been quite ridiculous, from blaming Crow for a shortage of parking places to the alleged "censoring' of some of the more puerile stunts in the student newspaper. Others were verging on the libellous. Conversely, an airbrushed hagiography stands out a mile away and actually detracts from the subject's reputation rather than enhancing it. The articles in the External links section from USA Today and the Arizona Republic are probably the best independent sources to start with for writing the subsection. Material from the article in the Phoenix New Times, should only be used if it can be corroborated by other sources. Voceditenore (talk) 17:51, 17 November 2012 (UTC)

Please observe talk page guidelines!
I have just finished restoring this talk page and archiving the pre-2011 discussions to Talk:Michael M. Crow/Archive 1. Over the years, multiple messages have been deleted, signatures deleted, messages moved etc. The most recent occurrence was today. . Talk pages are meant to be a complete record of the discussions. Deleting or editing legitimate comments is considered bad practice, and especially removing or altering the messages of other editors. See WP:Talk for an explanation of how to conduct yourselves on article talk pages and the rare circumstances when it may be legitimate to delete or refactor a comment, e.g. defamation, copyright violation, a severe personal attack on another editor, or off-topic chat/nonsense. The majority of the illegitimate comment deletions were done by IPs tracing to Arizona State University. If you keep this up, you are liable to find yourselves blocked. So cut it out. Note also: Voceditenore (talk) 18:44, 29 November 2012 (UTC)
 * 1) Sign all your comments
 * 2) New sections go at the bottom of the page, not at the top or in the middle.
 * 3) Do not interrupt another editor's comment to insert your own.
 * 4) Put new comments or responses in a particular section beneath the previous comment and indent your comments.

Edit request on 18 February 2013
The external links and news media references are presently biased in a self-promotional manner by Michael Crow. He is a very controversial figure in the community and the community at large. Therefore I suggest adding some balance and reference the following new articles:

"Once Collegial, Research Schools Now Mean Business", B. Wysocki, Jr. Wall Street Journal, May 4, 2006. ASU's True Colors, Jana Bommersbach, August 2009, Phoenix Magazine, page 152.

I would also suggest deleting several of the current references which are largely PR pieces for Michael Crow, to make the number of such PR pieces be balanced by these two and the ASU, Inc. article by Megan Irwin.

The external link to the President's web site is quite self promotional. If this will be included in the article, I would suggest also linking to the site of Citizen's For Responsible Administration of ASU, which provides a different perspective on Michael Crow's administration. http://cfraa.org.

Asusparky (talk) 00:28, 18 February 2013 (UTC)
 * All of the external links except for the link to the ASU Office of the President website are inappropriate under the external links policy and have been removed. I have incubated them here on the talk page just in case they are useful for verifying specific statements made about Mr. Crow on the article.
 * The external link to the ASU Office of the President website is appropriate and I will not remove it. I will also not add a link to a website that exists specifically to criticize the article subject, unless that website is used to verify specific statements made in the article.
 * As for the article as a whole, I see no overly promotional tone. I have seen many, many blatantly promotional articles and this does not fall into that category. If the "controversy" on Mr. Crow is as well-documented as you indicate, please provide text to add to a new "Controversy" or "Criticism" section. Keep in mind that since this is a biography of a living person, any contentious information about him must be referenced to reliable sources and appropriate weight must be given to such discussion. This article cannot become a coatrack for a group or multiple groups' criticism of Mr. Crow. Cheers, &mdash; KuyaBriBri Talk 17:30, 19 February 2013 (UTC)


 * Press articles
 * Irwin, Megan (26 April 2007). "ASU, Inc". Phoenix New Times.
 * MacEachern, Doug (14 December 2007). "ASU's Michael Crow first 5 years". Arizona Republic
 * Pope, Justin (25 March 2007). "Arizona St. strives for simultaneous growth, quality" USA Today *(via Associated Press)
 * Stripling, Jack (16 July 2010). "Arizona State U. has problems, just how its president likes it", USA Today
 * Time Magazine (11 November 2009). "10 Best College Presidents: Michael M. Crow"

New Controversy Section
As per the suggestion of the editor, I have added a Controversy section, which documents the controversies which Michael Crow's administration of ASU has raised as well as how these appear to be a style of Michael Crow, rather than simply something the ASU administration has done.

The Phoenix New Times article documenting the K. Milun case is an important document to reference, because the settlement of that case allegedly contained clauses preventing Dr. Milun from further discussing the case. It should also be noted that such a sealed case settlement is contrary to the public interest and is likely contrary to law in the state of Arizona.

In reviewing the data on this controversy, it is also important to note that Michael Crow's administration has a well-paid PR machine, which constantly pressures the local press here in Phoenix to run promotional articles. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Asusparky (talk • contribs) 18:26, 7 June 2013 (UTC)
 * No, what I suggested was:


 * "At some point, it would be useful to have a subsection in the biography covering his tenure at ASU in more detail. However, this should be impeccably sourced with a neutral point of view and without undue weight given to 'controversies'."


 * As I also pointed out above, as a self-admitted editor of a website entirely devoted to criticising Crow (cfraa.org), you are probably the last person (along with Crow's office at ASU) who should attempt such a section. I have copy edited the section considerably and added further references.


 * I removed references to primary court documents per our BLP policy, and kept only 3rd party reports of the case. I have also removed an article which is not hosted on the sites of either the author, or the magazine in which it was purported to be published, but is instead hosted on your website. I have renamed the section which was basically about his management style, along with criticisms of it as "Presidency of Arizona State University", and made it a sub-section of his biography. In general "Controversy" or "Criticism" sections (titled as such) give undue weight to criticism. In this case, the "controversies" consist of 3 lawsuits brought against ASU and 1 against Columbia, all of them by professors who had lost their jobs and/or funding. None of them were brought against him personally. Two of them were settled out of court, and two of them have been unsuccessful. It is also good practice to specify the sources of the criticism and praise in the text of the article rather than presenting them in Wikipedia's voice. Voceditenore (talk) 09:42, 10 July 2013 (UTC)

"Controversy" section re Theresa Cameron
I have removed this section which an anonymous IP has repeatedly, tried to add:
 * 1) This is not a "controversy" pertaining to Crow, and it is an unsubstantiated distortion. It is a controversy (if at all) pertaining to Theresa Cameron. Crow sent the letter of dismissal to her on the recommendation of the (then) Dean, Wellington Reiter. In the Phoenix Magazine report of the court case against ASU (note that it was not a lawsuit against Crow), Cameron is reported as admitting she could not personally point to any evidence that showed Crow had discriminated against her. "The jury deliberated and dismissed Cameron’s claims. Allegations of gender discrimination, disability discrimination and denial of due process were also dismissed by the court earlier in the trial process.". This reference from Phoenix Magazine in no way characterises this as a "controversy". Additionally, there is no evidence of enduring, widespread, and significant press coverage of this event to justify its inclusion here. Instead what we have is a brief article in a local magazine factually reporting that that the court case was dismissed by the jury and an opinion post in a blog with 3 comments. See also my comments above concerning "controversy" sections.
 * 2) There are no reliable sourced supporting the claim "Dr. Cameron was seen by many members of the academic community as arbitrary, unfair, and discriminatory". The only reference given is the opinion of one person in a blog posting who claimed her dismissal was unfair. Please read WP:Reliable sources, particularly as they pertain to the Biographies of Living persons.
 * 3) Neither of the two sources supports any of the following claims:
 * "Copying material onto syllabi, however, is widely regarded as common practice among professors"
 * "Dr. Cameron's firing is the only known case of a tenured faculty member being fired for using another instructor's syllabus without attribution."
 * "The move to fire Dr. Cameron was strongly opposed by the University Faculty Senate."

Voceditenore (talk) 14:19, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

External links modified (January 2018)
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I have just modified 3 external links on Michael M. Crow. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20090227051633/http://www.arizonafuture.org/news/bio-francis.html to http://www.arizonafuture.org/news/bio-francis.html
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20130108042627/http://www.napawash.org/fellows/fellows-biographies/michael-m-crow/ to http://www.napawash.org/fellows/fellows-biographies/michael-m-crow/
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20140714231333/http://www.auditorgen.state.az.us/Reports/Universities/Arizona_State_University/Financial_Audits/Financial_Audit_June_30_2012/ASU_6_30_12_Rpt.pdf to http://www.auditorgen.state.az.us/Reports/Universities/Arizona_State_University/Financial_Audits/Financial_Audit_June_30_2012/ASU_6_30_12_Rpt.pdf

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