User:GuySmiley03/Evaluate an Article

Which article are you evaluating?
Wetland

Why you have chosen this article to evaluate?
I recently read an article about the EPA removing federal regulations for a lot of wetlands. Also read about them in the 3rd chapter of our textbook, so now my interest is peaked.

Evaluate the article
Lead Section

The first sentence of the article perfectly introduces what wetlands are and provides a clear definition to the reader. The major sections of the article include "Definitions and terminology", "Processes", "Disturbances and human impact", "Ecosystem services", "Conservation", "Restoration", "Climate change aspects", "Valuation", and "Legislation". The lead section does not explicitly provide descriptions of the articles major sections but has some of it integrated into the introductory information. Not all major sections are briefly described, as nothing is mentioned about legislation. All the information provided in the lead section is further explained in their respective major section. The lead section as a whole is not too overly detailed and appears to be easily understandable for someone who does not have a science background.

Content

The article has a plethora of information for its major categories but some do appear to have more information then others. The "Legislation" and "Disturbances and human impacts" are lacking in information compared to the other sections. The "Legislation" section has little information on international efforts with its most recent cited effort is from 2018. In National efforts, it only has a section about the United States with 2 paragraphs, and Canada with 2 bullet points. Both countries could have more information added, especially with the EPA changing wetland regulations in 2023, it could provide valuable information for the article. Also with the only national efforts including the US and Canada it could be expanded to include non western countries around the world to show what efforts they are making as well. Besides this all the content seems to be up to date and relevant to the topic of the article

Tone and Balance

Bring an article about science, finding instances of a biased point of view can be rare, but with the article including sections about legislation, climate change, and human disturbances some biases could arise. After a review of these sections, no instances of bias could be found and it all appears to be from a neutral point of view.

Sources and References

This article contains 155 citations made up majority by scientific papers. The only major deviance from scientific papers seems to be to government websites when pulling information for legislative efforts to protect wetlands. The ages of these scientific papers seems to be newer as well. Obviously with a field that is relatively new, a lot of the information will be new as well. The oldest article I could find was labeled as being made in 2001, with some being published 2021 and beyond.

Organization and writing quality

The article seems to be very professional and well written, with no grammatical or spelling errors throughout the whole article. The organization into the 9 sections breaks up the most important aspects of the topic perfectly. Seeing that the major sections are all the major points our conservation biology textbook hit, it clearly is well though out.

Images and Media

All the images and diagrams included in the article enhance the readers understanding of the topic. They each are well captioned and appear to adhere to copyright regulations, as they are listed as public domain/free usage photos. All the images are laid out in an appealing way, but I also believe the article could benefit by the inclusion of more. When talking about the locations of wetlands around the world, I personally believe a global map with wetland locations listed on it would allow for a better understanding. Also sections like "Disturbances and human impacts" don't have any photos, and I believe addition of photos of human impacts on these lands would help the information of that section.

Talk Page Discussion

There doesn't seem to be much, but there is some action behind the scenes on this article. The most recent post was from December 2022, with mainly one user (EMsmile) making up the large majority of posts. The correspondence seems to be about images and the removal of some uncited information. The article is currently apart of 6 WikiProjects including Ecology, Geography, Sanitation, Climate change, South Africa, and Limnology and Oceanography. It currently has a C-class rating. This article goes into much more detail about the scientific functions of a wetland, whereas our textbook merely just talks about their importance and effects. Our course is a Conservation Biology course, so knowing about water chemistry, hydrology. and more aren't necessary.

Overall Impressions

Overall I feel like this is a good article. It isn't perfect, but with diligent improvements it can get there. The article is very strong with the quantity of information sections currently have, especially with information on ecosystem services. Some more helpful images and greater information on legislation will allow for it to become a better article.