User:MitchG265/Evaluate an Article

Evaluate an article
This is where you will complete your article evaluation. Please use the template below to evaluate your selected article.


 * Name of article: (link) Biosecurity in the United States
 * Briefly describe why you have chosen this article to evaluate. I am interested in both biology and computer science, so I wanted to learn about biosecurity and what that entails.

Lead

 * Guiding questions

The lead's introductory sentence is concise and clear about the definition of biosecurity. It includes a brief description of the agricultural impact and the threat of bioterrorism, but does not mention anything about the legislation or medical countermeasures sections. The lead mentions agriculture but only provides information related to aquaculture in the article. The lead is very concise but goes into some detail about the WHO and its impact on biosecurity, which should probably be in the another section.


 * Does the Lead include an introductory sentence that concisely and clearly describes the article's topic?
 * Does the Lead include a brief description of the article's major sections?
 * Does the Lead include information that is not present in the article?
 * Is the Lead concise or is it overly detailed?

Content

 * Guiding questions

The content in the article never strays from biosecurity and the evolution of global health. Since the concept of biosecurity has only emerged in the last few decades, all the content is up to date. However, the section titled "Agriculture and Aquaculture" does not include anything about the agricultural side of biosecurity. Information regarding agriculture is included in the "Governance and Legislation" section, but only talks about a case of avian influenza in 2015. I do not believe this article deals with an underrepresented topic, as I discovered other articles related to biosecurity in my searches.


 * Is the article's content relevant to the topic?
 * Is the content up-to-date?
 * Is there content that is missing or content that does not belong?
 * Does the article deal with one of Wikipedia's equity gaps? Does it address topics related to historically underrepresented populations or topics?

Tone and Balance

 * Guiding questions

The article does not explicitly favor any given side, just tells facts. I did not see any biased claims either. The article lists many different definitions of biosecurity from a wide range of government organizations in the US. The article does not persuade the reader into supporting or opposing biosecurity. Overall, this article manages to effectively balance various definitions of biosecurity with a completely neutral, unbiased tone.


 * Is the article neutral?
 * Are there any claims that appear heavily biased toward a particular position?
 * Are there viewpoints that are overrepresented, or underrepresented?
 * Does the article attempt to persuade the reader in favor of one position or away from another?

Sources and References

 * Guiding questions

The majority of the facts in this article are backed up by scientific papers and official government websites in the US. However, there are several news articles listed as sources, such as sources 4, 6, and 14. These news/op-ed articles, especially source 4, are not reliable secondary sources. While all sources center around biosecurity and are current, many of the sources do not have authors listed, as they come from government websites. Sources 2 and 5 are both written by Laura A. Meyerson but there is an overall diverse spectrum of authors. The links that I clicked all worked.


 * Are all facts in the article backed up by a reliable secondary source of information?
 * Are the sources thorough - i.e. Do they reflect the available literature on the topic?
 * Are the sources current?
 * Are the sources written by a diverse spectrum of authors? Do they include historically marginalized individuals where possible?
 * Check a few links. Do they work?

Organization

 * Guiding questions

Yes, the article is easy to understand, straight to the point, and provides many definitions of biosecurity from reputable sources. I did not notice any spelling or grammatical errors during my perusal of the article. The sections reflect the major points of biosecurity. As this topic is relatively new and specific, there is a smaller amount of information, but it is all well-organized.


 * Is the article well-written - i.e. Is it concise, clear, and easy to read?
 * Does the article have any grammatical or spelling errors?
 * Is the article well-organized - i.e. broken down into sections that reflect the major points of the topic?

Images and Media

 * Guiding questions

The article does not include any pictures.


 * Does the article include images that enhance understanding of the topic?
 * Are images well-captioned?
 * Do all images adhere to Wikipedia's copyright regulations?
 * Are the images laid out in a visually appealing way?

Checking the talk page

 * Guiding questions

There is not much conversation about this article, except that most of the information was copied from the general "Biosecurity" page. The article does not have a rating on either the quality scale or the importance scale.


 * What kinds of conversations, if any, are going on behind the scenes about how to represent this topic?
 * How is the article rated? Is it a part of any WikiProjects?
 * How does the way Wikipedia discusses this topic differ from the way we've talked about it in class?

Overall impressions

 * Guiding questions

This article provides a decent introduction to the concept of biosecurity in the US. It is useful for learning the basics of biosecurity and its brief history in the US. However, it lacks a good amount of information, probably because it was derived from the general biosecurity page. The article needs to add more information about the impact of biosecurity on agriculture and aquaculture, as that section had the least amount of information. It is complete but slightly underdeveloped in some areas.


 * What is the article's overall status?
 * What are the article's strengths?
 * How can the article be improved?
 * How would you assess the article's completeness - i.e. Is the article well-developed? Is it underdeveloped or poorly developed?

Optional activity

 * Choose at least 1 question relevant to the article you're evaluating and leave your evaluation on the article's Talk page. Be sure to sign your feedback

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