Talk:University of Wyoming/Archive 1

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Archive 1

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This article is or was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Ringbloomj.

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RFC

I have listed this page on Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Politics. I think it would be good to get some input about what other Wikipedians feel about keeping a reference to Matthew Shepard in this article. --MatthewUND(talk) 05:37, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

Absolutely, Shepard should be included. He is a "notable" UW person, that put UW and Laramie into the international spotlight. The reference does not have to be extensive, but it should be there. The University of Wyoming also references Shepard on its website [1], continues to have an outreach symposium [2], and discusses the efforts and actions that his murder spurred at the UW. Moreover, a google search for "University of Wyoming" and "Matthew Shepard" brings up over 26,000 results. Srcastic 07:46, 21 December 2005 (UTC)
Moreover, the inclusion of "notable" alums, many of whom aren't even notable enough to have their own Wikipedia article, weighs for including Shepard. 07:49, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

I came here from the RfC notice. For the benefit of those who haven't been editing the article, would someone please clarify whether the issue is (1) including a wikilink to Matthew Shepard in a list of alums, or (2) including more of a mention than that, and if so, what? I could go check the history, but I think it's more efficient if the knowledgeable people make things clear here for the benefit of all RfC responders. JamesMLane 11:31, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

I have tried to include a brief reference to Shepard and his killing in the article itself. I would invite you to look in the history to see for yourself. I haven't put Shepard in the list of alumni, yet I think it would be reasonable to add him to that list. Basically, some people out there don't seem to want any reference to Shepard in this article, but I have always thought that it is important to include a brief reference. I wanted other Wikipedians to comment on the matter, because I assumed (it looks like I assumed correctly) that other Wikipedians would agree with me that we need to keep some reference to Shepard in this article. I essentially wanted to prove to those who don't want the reference that I am not being unreasonable in wanting to keep it in the article. --MatthewUND(talk) 09:37, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

26,900 Google hits say this university did receive widespread attention in connection with Matthew Shepard. Gerry Spence receives 318 Google hits. W. Edwards Deming gets 225. Even Vice President Dick Cheney receives less than half of Matthew Shepard's results on a combination search. Durova 17:20, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

Given Google's evidence, I believe Shepard belongs in the list of notable alums, unless the term alumni implies graduation (he died before graduating?). If so, the wording should probably be changed 'Notable students' or something like that. I don't know whether I would agree or not to a mention of him in the article's prose text itself. Given no other alums are mentioned there I am not sure if it is appropriate, but I would have to see the wording and how it fit in to be sure. Kit 21:09, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

Following the logic of previous comments, every former student who is the victim of a horrific crime should be listed as a notable alumnus. Does being in the wrong place at the wrong time make one notable?

Matthew was born in Casper, Wyoming. Should he be mentioned in the Casper article? He attended an Episcopal church. Should he be mentioned in articles about the Episcopal Church? He lived in Denver before moving to Laramie. Should he be mentioned in the Denver article? He died in Fort Collins, Colorado. Should he be mentioned in the Fort Collins article? These facts and the fact that he was a University of Wyoming student had nothing to do with his murder.

None of the events surrounding his murder took place on the UW campus. Matthew is mentioned in the Laramie article, which is appropriate, since that's where his murder and the trial of his attackers took place.156.153.254.67 20:34, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

I'm not sure what logic you're referring to but it certainly isn't mine. My observation is that this university received more attention in the news media in connection with Matthew Shepard's murder than in connection with all of its other listed notable alumni combined. If other places and institutions connected with his life also maintain lists of notable people associated with them, and if that association received similar attention in news media, then he deserves similar mention in those related articles. None of those articles (some of which I doubt exist) have a bearing on the present discussion. Durova 02:43, 24 December 2005 (UTC)
Having come here to put Category:Wyoming Cowboys football together, I caught this discussion. I believe he should be listed as an alumnus, for no other reason than that he is notable. I don't think the crime itself should be described in the article, as it did not take place on campus. However, the large support rally on campus on 10/10/98 [3] and the UW-related scholarship in his name [4] absolutely deserve mention in the article.--Mike Selinker 11:56, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

I think that Matthew Shephard should continue to be mentioned and linked in the article. In principle, every biography which can be associated with a particular education institution could be linked. David | Talk 18:49, 1 January 2006 (UTC)

  • I'm glad to see that most who have commented here think, like me, that Shepard should be mentioned somewhere in the article. Now, the question should be do we include a mention just in the alumni list, in the main body of the article, or in both? I would personally say in both, but I would be ok with just the alumni list if that's the consensus. --MatthewUND(talk) 23:35, 1 January 2006 (UTC)
    • My personal preference would be just in the Alumni list, because the murder did not have anything in particular to do with the University (it wasn't, so far as I understand it, an on-campus bar from which Matthew Shepard was taken). However, if there is a mention of the University's response to the murder, then that could fit in the main text. David | Talk 11:40, 2 January 2006 (UTC)
      • That sounds like the right idea. If you feel like talking about the response to the murder, that seems solid.--Mike Selinker 20:46, 2 January 2006 (UTC)

What I have a problem with is Shephard is not an alumni of Wyoming. He attended but did not graduate. There are a lot of people who attended Wyoming. There are even many who graduated that aren't listed, including the Army Chief of Staff and Art Howe to mention a few. Also, I find it interesting that so much attention is paid to the fact he was gay but there is such an attempt to ignore the fact that it has come out since the trial that it was a meth deal gone bad and he owed several thousand to the two men serving prison terms. -- UNKNOWN USER

  • I understand the argument here, but there are many instances of this throughout the wikipedia; i.e. Scottie Pippen as a UCA graduate or James Dean as a Sigma Nu. James Dean was never initiated into Sigma Nu and Scotty Pippen was never graduated from Central Araknsas, however these instances are not disputed due to the fact that they are "positive" in nature. However, in the spirit of NPOV, I feel that Matthew Sheppard should be included in the entry for UW. --Scaife 19:19, 16 January 2006

I saw some recent revisions regarding Matthew Shepard that seemed to be out of line with the NPOV. In particular, someone had added that the crime was allegedly hate-motivated. Someone then removed the "allegedly" and added that it had resulted in global indignation. I've removed the extraneous text. Wyoming does not have a hate crimes law and therefore, while his sexual orientation *may* have been a factor, it was not, by definition, a "hate crime". I also think that the "global indignation" comment goes beyond the normal context for Wiki and I've removed it. Bdevoe 18:42, 6 November 2006 (UTC)

I noticed that back in November 06, the Matthew Shepard reference was removed from the Notable Alumni and Attendees section (which was renamed in Jan 07). Does anyone know the reason behind this edit? If not, we should put this back into the article per the significant discussions in this thread. Bdevoe 17:46, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Matthew Sheppard does not belong on this page. It is interesting that recent additions have been from individuals who did not attend the University of Wyoming, so their opinions regarding his status as a "notable" alumnus carry no weight with me. Having received two graduate degrees from UW, I think can I speak for most other alumni that we do not want his name listed among honorable alumni who actually accomplished something and contributed to society. Slyjackalope 22:17, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

This is a neutral encyclopedia; all individuals are listed assuming they meet the core criteria: 1) be notable and 2) Having be officially enrolled at the University for any period of time. These being easily verifiable facts for Matthew Sheppard, then he should remain. And to all editors, if there notable individuals that are not on this list, then please, by all means add them. Please don't consider the current list any sort of endorsement as to who is considered to be "eligible"; it is merely incomplete. It is my hope that eventually some day this list will grow big enough to have an article of its own, or even better, to have a category of its own. So rather then debate an individual that is obviously eligible to be on this list, help us make the list more complete. Thanks - CosmicPenguin (Talk) 23:27, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
Once again, I've removed Matthew Shepard from the "notable alumni" portion of this page. Even you have implicitly acknowledged that he was not an alumnus of the university, as your page edit description listed him as a "notable attendee." There is a big difference between attendee and alumnus. Regardless of the reasons why, he did not graduate from the university and is not an alumnus. Furthermore, you and several like you are just trolling this page and should mine your own business, unless you can show you have some kind of legitimate connection with the university. Your pretense at being "neutral" are laughable. I will continue to remove your edits to this page unless someone with authority directs otherwise. Slyjackalope (talk) 18:27, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
You do not know who I am, not why I edit. I am not neutral, nor did I ever claim to be - I have my own opinion and biases like everybody else. Thats why rely on precedent and policy. Throughout Wikipedia, notable attendees are listed on lists of alumni of universities. Your rationalization is that he never graduated, but then I noticed that you didn't bother purging any of the other "attendees" from the list, such as Malcolm Wallop. I think that if you are editing in good faith, you should take it upon yourself to remove everybody from the list that doesn't hold a degree from the University of Wyoming, and then to leave a comment in the main page to the effect that only sourced degree holders are acceptable. CosmicPenguin (Talk) 20:30, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
I'll add my voice to those who think Matthew Shepard should be on the list. Definitely notable, and "alumni" has been interpreted liberally in the past on many pages. For better or worse, fair or unfair, his death had a big effect on the UW and it's reputation. The place to address many of your concerns is the Matthew Shepard article itself. And, by the way, although this should not matter, I am a UW alum. --barneca (talk) 15:38, 26 November 2007 (UTC)
"Regardless of the reasons why, he did not graduate from the university and is not an alumnus." I was surprised to find out that "graduate" is not the same thing as "alumnus". He's clearly an alumnus according to this definition. His article is full of proof of notability. So, I'm not sure which "notable" or "alumnus" we could be disagreeing on. Is there a way we can come to a compromise? Maybe we can list him but state that he didn't graduate? ~a (user • talk • contribs) 23:38, 7 December 2007 (UTC)
How about we just leave any reference to him off the University of Wyoming wiki page, as there is already a wiki page (Matthew Shepard) devoted to this topic on which you can place anything you want. If you would like an example of who any reasonable alumnus without an agenda would consider to be a fellow notable alumnus, check out the profiles on the University of Wyoming notable alumni webpage. [5] Slyjackalope (talk) 00:54, 8 December 2007 (UTC)
There is no reason why he should be "censored" from this page. There is a clear precedent that individuals do not have to graduate from an institution to be listed as notable alumni. Furthermore, you seem to be one of the only editors on this page arguing for it's omission. OhNoitsJamie Talk 01:03, 8 December 2007 (UTC)
As I've previously stated to other liberals with agendas on this topic regarding messing with someone else's university wiki page, I'm not going to stop removing him from this page until instructed to do so by someone in authority. You have failed to meet your burden to prove that he meets the standards for inclusion on this wiki page, so I will continue to remove any inclusion of him as a notable alumnus, as he clearly is not one. Slyjackalope (talk) 01:24, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

what the hell does being liberal have to do with this, you jackass??! I'm a UW school of pharmacy alumnus- class of 2007, i'm VERY liberal and think he doesn't belong on this page. go back under your rock if you think 'liberals' are to blame! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 174.22.40.53 (talk) 00:38, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

I'm an admin, and I will block you if you continue to remove content against consensus. Furthermore, a uwyo.edu limited Google search turns up over a hundred references, including statements from the president. Though he never had the chance to graduate, it's clear that the University considered him to be part of the community. OhNoitsJamie Talk 01:25, 8 December 2007 (UTC)
A "part of the community" is a far cry from being a notable alumnus. Did he graduate from the university? What contributions during his lifetime did he make to the university? How does he compare in any way to any of the profiles on the university's own notable alumni page? What is this consensus that you keep referring to regarding his inclusion on the university's wiki page? You have several individuals who recently have agreed with you, while there are other individuals who have posted disagreement. How is this a consensus? How about you stop including him on here until you show some kind of agreement on your "consensus" from your fellow "admins?" Slyjackalope (talk) 01:43, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

I am revising these discussions to explain what I did. I removed the words hate crime from the reference. In Wyoming, there is no hate crime, there is only crime. Please do not change it back unless you can provide legal Wyoming documentation proving it was a hate crime. Rocco81b (talk) 10:12, 17 May 2009 (UTC) how can he be called an alumnus when he was tragically murdered before he could graduate? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 174.22.40.53 (talk) 00:22, 8 September 2013 (UTC) he never graduated from the university and is, hence not an alumnus — Preceding unsigned comment added by 174.22.40.53 (talk) 00:26, 8 September 2013 (UTC)

Copyright violation

Practically all of the edits recently made by Oatmeal29 were taken directly from this external site. Unless that user wishes to totally rewrite the text which he took from the external link and put it in his own words, I will revert his edits to an earlier version which did not violate any copyrights. --MatthewUND(talk) 01:54, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

NPOV Discussion

Hello all. I went through the article and have condensed some things and reworded some of the text to inject some neutrality. I am an alumnus of UW, though, so there will probably still be some bias. I would appreciate some comments on how best to update the sections to meet the quality guidelines. Thanks! Bdevoe 19:18, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

Are theatrical and musical events for free to students?

Copied from Wikipedia:Help_Desk#University_of_Wyoming_page

There is an error on the University of Wyoming page on Wikipedia. The page lists that students are allowed to attend university sponsored theatrical and musical events for free, and this is not true. Student fees contribute to these events, and students are required to pay a small fee to attend events in the Theatre and Dance, Cultural Programs, and Music departments. Students are allowed to attend some events for free, but these are generally sponsored through the ASUW (Associated Students of the University of Wyoming), SAC (Student Activities Council) and CAC (Concerts and Convocation). Please correct this information on your page.

Sincerly, Leslie Gallagher [email removed]

There is no source in the article to verify whether these events are free to students or not. Patleahy 00:29, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

I removed the disputed sentence since it is un-sourced and I didn't think removing it detracted very much from the article. Patleahy 00:52, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

I personally had to pay $7 in order to view a play for my theater class at UW. The theater and musical events are NOT free for students Wyoskier 05:02, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

Merge

It has been suggested that the article Branding Iron be merged with this one. A.Z. 07:52, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

Say what? OhNoitsJamie Talk 23:43, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

History and Stephen W. Downey

Shouldn't there be a "History" section and mention of Stephen W. Downey? - 4.240.78.224 (talk) 11:24, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

Law School

Beings as though Gerry Spence graduated from this university, and he is listed in the notable alumni, and several other reasons making the Law School quite notable, I think it would be appropriate to add a section here on the Law School. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.125.220.4 (talk) 04:01, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

It is appropriate for all schools at the University to be mentioned, regardless of the fame of their alumni. We just haven't had anybody take the initiative yet. CosmicPenguin (Talk) 04:20, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

General Improvements

This page strikes me as one that needs dramatic improvement. There seems to be very limited information and the format seems to be unusual compared to other colleges' pages. Therefore, I will donate some of my free time over the next week trying to improve things. I will begin by taking photos of the campus this weekend to fulfill the the image and photograph request. Then I will begin to add information and straighten out the page. If anyone is interested in helping me, I would certainly appreciate it. Thanks, Cqfx (talk) 03:04, 11 September 2009 (UTC)

Some pictures have been taken...I'm in the process of editing and waiting for my account to be old enough. The plans for this week also include writing a history section. Cqfx (talk) 02:52, 15 September 2009 (UTC)

Pretty happy with the Campus section at this point, except for several details.

  1. I still want to add Classroom building section.
  2. More information about the Apartments
  3. A paragraph about the Art museum

Next week, I move onto the History section. --Cqfx (talk) 04:30, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

Citations Needed for Alumni

Having a bit of a disagreement about whether we should provide citations for alumni of the school. N2e has argued that if there's a claim that someone is an alumnus/alumna that we should provide a citation for that claim. Many of the places where they've placed the cn tag are for pro athletes who have Wiki pages of their own with citations for their alma mater. I'm wondering whether it's desirable to have an entire list of people with citations showing they attended the school (any school) or whether, my opinion, that information should be on the individual pages. I can certainly go in and add a ton of citations, but it seems duplicative and pointless to add citations for individuals who already have references on their own pages. Per verifiability it's only those items that have been or are likely to be challenged. Is this deemed more likely for alumni of UW? Thoughts? Bdevoe (talk) 20:49, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

Hi. Thanks for starting a discussion on the matter. I suspect some of my requests for a cited source that a few persons are UW alumni started this off. It is definitely not any more necessary for alumni of UW.
My sense on the matter is that the key claim to be supported for anyone added to this article as a UW alumni is that they are 1) notable and also, 2) verfiably alumni of UW. If they have their own WP article, then notability is assumed. However, the reader of this article should not have to peruse, for example, a 12,000 word Wikipedia article on Dick Cheney to verify that Cheney is, in fact, a UW alumnus. Cheney's article length is on the long side, but the principle remains for any of the claims to UW alumni status. Since the claim in THIS article is that they are a UW alumni, then that claim should be sourced with an in-line citation in this article, per WP:CS. Hope the explanation helps. N2e (talk) 06:03, 31 December 2010 (UTC)
I'm not sure I agree that there exists a need to cite on this article a verifiable claim that individuals are alumni if the citation exists on their WP page. I think that, provided the other page does provide a citation of their alma mater, it should be sufficient as the link to their page is provided. We've provided a link back to the primary source, so to speak. (As an aside, other pages like List of University of Colorado at Boulder alumni would simply be a gigantic list of references.) I understand the concern raised about some of the longer articles, but I'm not sure that it's strong enough to warrant the work necessary to source everything. I am, admittedly, an occasional editor rather than a rabid contributor, but it does seem somewhat contrary to accepted referential practices.
That said, I will work to provide references for all of the alumni (the ones N2e has called out are by far the easiest as professional sports has the most accessible information on the web). My sense is that I don't think it "likely to be challenged" if the reader can refer to the other source material. Perhaps, though, N2e is providing the challenge by adding the cn tags. Bdevoe (talk) 17:43, 3 January 2011 (UTC)
Thanks Bdevoe for your work to start adding citations for these claims! I will try to respond to your substantive comments in turn.
1) I don't think it really matters a great deal if the citation for a similar claims exists on another page in Wikipedia. Wikipedia policy does call for any substantive claims in all articles—including "List of..." articles—to be verifiably sourced per WP:V, a core wiki-policy. Wikipedia itself is not considered an adequate source: see the section Wikipedia and sources that mirror or use it in the WP:V policy, to which I believe WP:CIRCULAR is a shortcut. The lone exception, where sources are not required, is disambiguation pages. We need not cite every detail about any particular alumni, but if a claim is made about Jane Doe is an alumni (which is an assertion), then a citation should be provided that will source that claim.
2) I did a quick survey of a few alumni articles: Frison, Frullo and Gowdy (just picked three in order). Each of those articles makes the claim of a UW connection. For Frison and Gowdy, I can locate no support for the claim; I don't dispute it is true, but it should be cited in both places to stay in Wikipedia: this article and in the biography article. For Frullo, the citation listed at the end of the paragraph with the UW claim does contain a valid and verifiable source: an article in the Texas Tribune.
Keep up the good work. N2e (talk) 13:31, 7 January 2011 (UTC)
Thanks for the reply. I really don't believe that WP:CIRCULAR applies here as we're not using one WP article to bolster the other and vice-versa (hence the "circular"). Rather, we're doing exactly what any good reference does - refer back to the "primary source" of the information (in this case, the individual's WP article). The articles for those individuals should contain information to substantiate any claim of alumni status - if they don't, then the primary article is lacking (and I will work to rectify those as well). Again, I think we simply have an "agreement to disagree" on what WP:V means in this particular case. That said, as you have challenged the information, the has been or is likely to be challenged requirement for WP:V has been met and I will work to resolve it.
Thanks again. Bdevoe (talk) 17:48, 7 January 2011 (UTC)
Thank you for the good attitude about it, and especially for working to improve the encyclopedia in an area which you care about. I think your suggestion that we "agree to disagree" is a good way to term it for the discussion on this particular Talk page. I don't see any way that WP:V allows for Wikipedia articles to source claims in another article; and you apparently do. It has been debated at length on several occasions leading to the WP:V policy we have today; and WP has only three core policies of which WP:V is one. So with progress being made here, I will leave it for the policy debates for any further fine tuning. Best wishes. N2e (talk) 01:45, 10 January 2011 (UTC)

Notable alumni section

Hi. The alumni list has gotten to the point that it needs to be split off into its own article. See the following colleges as examples. Corkythehornetfan (talk) 22:54, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

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Citations needed

There are several sections that are lacking citations, which also have out-out-date information. Please do not remove the tags until reliable sources can be found and added to this article. Bearian (talk) 19:20, 7 June 2016 (UTC)

Washakie (McGary)

Should Washakie (McGary) be mentioned in this article, or a related article? ---Another Believer (Talk) 04:46, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

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