Talk:South University/Archive 1

Untitled
Added factual information with citations to South University Wikipedia page. I kept it short, sweet and backed up with citations. Should the company attempted to delete facts, they can be added with additional details. Forprofited (talk) 01:29, 17 November 2010 (UTC)Ed

Proposed update
Hi, I've written a revised draft for this article, which I'd like to discuss with other editors here. This article has several issues, which I'll provide more detail on below, but first I need to disclose my conflict of interest with this topic. As I have disclosed on my user page, I work with User:WWB Too, who has been working on behalf of Education Management Corporation (EDMC) for several months now to seek improvements to articles related to the company. Likewise, I am working with EDMC and have written this draft on their behalf and with their input, as South University is one of several schools the company owns.

As for the issues with the current version, I'm primarily concerned by the lack of reliable sources to support information in this article, so my main goal in rewriting this was to clean up extraneous information and provide quality sources throughout. I should note that I have relied on primary sources in just a few locations to support statements of fact where I was unable to find independent sources. Below, I've put together a short explanation about what I've changed in each section. As I've aimed to keep this overview a manageable length, it doesn't cover every single change, so please do ask if there's anything I don't mention but that you're curious about.

Introduction + infobox
 * From the introduction, I removed the specific school names because it is too much detail for an overview of the school.
 * From the infobox, I removed some extraneous information including the school's colors and Savannah, Georgia as the location, because there are multiple South University locations. I also took out the "Affiliations" parameter since the school is not affiliated with Education Management Corporation, but owned by the company and Template:Infobox school indicates that this parameter is for academic and sporting affiliations.

Accreditation
 * Some of the information in this section is about the school's locations and organizational structure, not its accreditation status, so I've moved this other information into a more appropriate section, keeping the focus here just on the school's accreditation status.

Colleges and schools
 * I've renamed this section simply "Colleges" since the specific school location information is covered later on in the article and have removed unrelated information about other Doctor of Pharmacy programs in Georgia.

History
 * I've added information about the resolution of the lawsuit with Sewanee: The University of the South and clarified when the school was acquired by EDMC.

Locations
 * I've renamed this Organization and expanded this section to cover information related to the school's parent company, online and campus based programs, as well as the locations of the schools. As part of this, I've taken out the list of specific locations since there are no articles for those schools the list and the heavily linked list was hard to read. I think it makes most sense to simply list the number of schools, so that is what I've done. Listing all the names makes the section more difficult to update in the future, as campus locations can change over time.

Footer content
 * I haven't made any changes to the categories in my draft, but I wanted to point out that some of these categories were added in reference to specific South University locations, and that all locations are not included as categories. I suggest that it might be simpler to remove these categories, again incase there are changes to South University locations in the future.
 * I've removed the link to the "Official online page" from the External links section. Not only is it currently a dead link, but it isn't a page that is likely to be beneficial to a reader of the article.

My draft has been added to my user space here: User:16912_Rhiannon/South_University

Thanks for taking the time to look at this. I'm looking for both feedback that I can use to improve this draft and, when we're able to reach consensus, an editor who is willing to update the current article for me. Because of my conflict of interest I will not make any edits to the article myself. Again, if there is something that I've changed that you disagree with, or are unsure about, please ask. Thanks, 16912 Rhiannon (Talk · COI) 22:25, 10 October 2013 (UTC)


 * Thanks so much for the detailed explanations; they were very helpful! I compared your version to the version of the article in main space and I don't see any objectionable or problematic changes so I've copied your version into main space.  Thanks for the edits and the transparency in declaring your COI. ElKevbo (talk) 02:13, 11 October 2013 (UTC)


 * Hi ElKevbo, thanks so much for reviewing the article and moving it live, very much appreciated! As a quick follow-up request, I've just uploaded the university's logo, would you be able to add that into the infobox for me? Once that's in place my request here is complete. Thanks, 16912 Rhiannon (Talk &middot; COI) 20:37, 11 October 2013 (UTC)
 * Logo was added by ElKevbo, so my request is complete. 16912 Rhiannon (Talk &middot; COI) 21:55, 18 October 2013 (UTC)

Help with two minor updates
Hi, as you can see from the above message, I worked with another editor to update this article just a few months ago. I did this work on behalf of Education Management Corporation (EDMC), South University's parent company, and therefore did not make any edits to the article directly.

Since completing the update to the article I've had this page on my watchlist and wanted to ask editors to look at, and hopefully revert, a recent edit that I do not think was beneficial to the article.

An unregistered editor made to the article inserting a long list of degrees offered by the school. In addition to the formatting being problematic, I feel that it is too much information for this article. This page should provide an overview of the school, not a directory of their degrees. Also, I believe the source used fails to meet Wikipedia's standards.

How do other editors feel about this addition? Would someone be willing to undo it?

Also, I'm hoping that someone may have a moment to update the enrollment figure listed in the infobox and the Organization section. EDMC has released more recent enrollment figures and South University's enrollment has dropped slightly, from 18,400 to 18,370. This can be sourced via the October 2013 enrollment presentation on this page of EDMC's website. The direct link is available there but I'm not sure about using that since it automatically downloads the PDF—is that still appropriate for the link in the citation? Thanks, 16912 Rhiannon (Talk · COI) 20:01, 20 December 2013 (UTC)


 * I agree about not listing every major and so does our guideline for college and university articles. I also updated the enrollment figures and source; feel free to make minor, uncontroversial changes yourself although it would still be a good idea to drop a brief note in Talk when we make such edits. ElKevbo (talk) 20:43, 20 December 2013 (UTC)


 * Thanks so much! I have to say, I'm nervous about making any edits where I have a COI and have been following the "bright line" rule to avoid any potential unpleasantness, but I'll keep what you say in mind re: uncontroversial changes. Thanks, 16912 Rhiannon (Talk &middot; COI) 21:12, 20 December 2013 (UTC)

Merger proposal
I suggest merging South University Savannah into South University. Much of the information in that article duplicates what is in this. South University Savannah is practically an orphan (I just deorphaned it by linking to it from this page), whereas South University is well-connected to the rest of the encyclopedia. I'll plan to circle back and complete the merger if there isn't any objection. PacificWonderland (talk) 18:11, 3 November 2015 (UTC) Given the lack of objection, I'm going to complete this merge now.PacificWonderland (talk) 01:29, 29 July 2016 (UTC)
 * Support per nominator. Corkythe hornetfan  18:29, 3 November 2015 (UTC)

For profit on non-profit?
The article states in several places that South University is for profit, and in several others that it is non-profit. Can someone clarify?

Donaldwduck (talk) 14:23, 6 December 2018 (UTC)


 * I've added a note that describes how some sources consider it non-profit but the Department of Education still classifies it as for-profit. I think I also cleaned up things in the article. ElKevbo (talk) 03:30, 7 November 2019 (UTC)


 * The US Internal Revenue Service revoked South University's non-profit status in November 2019.