Talk:Wildfire emergency management/GA1

GA Review
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Reviewer: Arsenikk (talk · contribs) 08:16, 18 May 2012 (UTC)

The article is both interesting, generally well-written as as far as I can see, factually accurate. However, it falls short of the GA criteria in areas such neutrality, scope and style. It is written largely in the style of a college paper—for which it may be great—but an encyclopedic article is not a college paper. Specific concerns: I am forced to fail the article as it requires a major rewrite to comply with the good article criteria. Arsenikk (talk)  08:16, 18 May 2012 (UTC)
 * "Wildfire emergency management" is not a proper noun and thus not capitalized. The same goes for section headers.
 * A lead should start with a clear definition of the scope of the article, in this case, a one-sentence definition of what wildfire emergency management is.
 * The lead should summarize the article, not introduce it. After reading the lead, the reader should have a basic understanding of all they mayor points which are discussed later in the article. The main problem is that the lead uses one paragraph to define "wildfire", then one to define "emergency management", without discussing the intersection between the two, or any practical application.
 * Although the article is generally well-referenced, there are still some minor areas which need citations.
 * The article suffers from grave US bias. The article is written as if the US is the only country in the world which has wildfires. Although relying heavily on US sources is not necessarily a problem, the article is littered with references to US policy and US statistics while completely avoiding any other countries' policies. A typica example is the first sentence of the "introduction": "In order to exercise efficient emergency management, states susceptible to wildfires have collaborated to develop the Firewise Communities USA Recognition Program."
 * Do not link to external links inline.
 * No metric conversions are provided.
 * Avoid "introduction" sections.
 * There is no discussion of the historical developments within wildfire emergency management
 * Although bullet-points are common in academic books, they are frowned upon on Wikipedia.
 * Case studies may be an excellent pedagogical tool, but they do not belong in an encyclopedia. Specifically, the Oakland Firestorm of 1991 reads like a case study. Avoid long sections which act as an example, although providing a link may sometimes be appropriate
 * References for works cited by page need to listed in a separate list (there are several ways of doing this) so it is easy to find the entry for e.g. NFPA or Davis.
 * Online references need access dates.
 * Avoid see also links already linked in the article.
 * I have removed the external links. They are, again, highly US-biased and are resembling a link farm. In this line, any forestry service in the world dealing with wildfires could be included.
 * The article was uncategorized.
 * The article is an orphan.