User:Rnguyenhist463uo/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: Office of Price Administration
 * Briefly describe why you have chosen this article to evaluate. I chose this article because of the last reading we did on the OPA. I wanted to see how much information about it is on Wikipedia.

Lead

 * Guiding questions


 * 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?

Lead evaluation
It is clear that the OPA was set up to establish price controls during WWII. It also explains that the federal government established the OPA via an executive order. It doesn't appear to go too in-depth on the points system that the agency used. It is concise and does not have extraneous details. It could have more information about how it impacted society in general.

Content

 * Guiding questions


 * 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?

Content evaluation
The article's content is relevant and up to date, since the agency has been dissolved and no longer functions in everyday life. The content is a little thin, and it sometimes does not flow well, jumping from topic to topic. I wish it had more content on how the agency impacted everyday Americans and how they thought of themselves as consumers, though that may not belong on Wikipedia.

Tone and Balance

 * Guiding questions


 * 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?

Tone and balance evaluation
The article is neutral and doesn't have any major unsupported claims.

Sources and References

 * Guiding questions


 * 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?
 * Check a few links. Do they work?

Sources and references evaluation
Some of the important claims are cited with a source, but most do not have citations, such as a statement about how an Office of Price Stabilization performed actions similar to the OPA during the Korean War. There are only 6 citations in total for this page, and it does not contain very many academic journals or contemporaneous newspaper articles about the OPA. Out of the 2 available links for sources, 1 does not work. The other sources are books or print journal articles.

Organization

 * Guiding questions


 * 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?

Organization evaluation
The article does not have any major grammar or spelling errors. It has at least one in the following sentence, where there shouldn't be a comma after "commodities": "The OPA had the power to place ceilings on all prices except agricultural commodities, and to ration scarce supplies of other items, including tires, automobiles, shoes, nylon, sugar, gasoline, fuel oil, coffee, meats and processed foods." This sentence should either delete that comma or include another comma before the phrase "except agricultural commodities." In the section about the office's administration, the article jumps from unrelated topic to unrelated topic. It discusses its fictional counterpart in a novel, then how it unsuccessfully tried to revoke a license of a car dealer, and then how the Office of Price Stabilization performed actions similar to the OPA during the Korean War. If more information was added, then these facts could each go in their respective sections.

Images and Media

 * Guiding questions


 * 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?

Images and media evaluation
Yes. Other than the gallery, which includes three images of OPA tokens and of a ration book, there is only one image. The featured photo is of an OPA propaganda poster, but the caption does not mention the year of its issuing. This article could use more images, and I'm particularly interested in the actual physical space of the OPA office and what it looked like. The images adhere to copyright regulations.

Checking the talk page

 * Guiding questions


 * 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?

Talk page evaluation
No one appears to have commented since 2006. It doesn't have a rating.

Overall impressions

 * Guiding questions


 * 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?

Overall evaluation
This is a short article that would benefit a lot from edits, even small things like adding citations. It has the basics, such as the introduction and some images, but could be improved with more thorough information, so I'm evaluating it as underdeveloped.

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

with four tildes — ~


 * Link to feedback: Talk:Office of Price Administration