User:Sandopolis/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: COVID-19 pandemic in the United States
 * Briefly describe why you have chosen this article to evaluate. It is the main focus of our class, and it is a topic that is being updated every day.

Lead

 * Guiding questions
 * The introductory sentence is the first sentence of the article and does a good job at concisely and clearly describing the topic. There is a Table of Contents that outlines the article's major sections. Most of the information seems to be presented in the various subcategories that follow. The Lead is rather detailed and seems to give more details that might be better off under the Timeline 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 article's content largely seems relevant to the topic, and it is almost all up-to-date given the evolving nature of the topic. It doesn't look like anything major is missing -- if anything, there might be additional information that is not specific to the pandemic in the US and therefore might belong under another COVID-19 Wikipedia page. The Lead mentions the disproportionate impact on marginalized populations, but the Impacts section does not give as much detail as I would have expected.


 * 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 seems largely neutral, as it is presented a timeline of facts about the evolving nature of the pandemic, followed by sources to back these facts. There doesn't seem to be a heavy bias one way or another, but there are times where the choice of facts presented might be meant to steer the reader along a certain path. Among overrepresented viewpoints include those of government officials and organizations, whereas underrepresented viewpoints include those of marginalized populations. The article largely does not seem to try to persuade the reader in any one particular direction over another.


 * 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

All facts appear to be backed up by reliable sources, although some of the sources might be more thorough than others. All of the sources are current given the evolving nature of the topic. However, they do not seem to have diverse authorship. The few links that were checked ended up working.


 * 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

The article is certainly well-written, but perhaps offers a bit too much detail that might not be directly related to the topic of the Wikipedia page. There are few major grammatical or spelling errors. Although the article is quite long, it is definitely well-organized, as shown in the Table of Contents.


 * 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

There are multiple images and graphs that support the discussion. Most of these figures are well-captioned. It isn't entirely clear whether all of the images adhere to Wikipedia's copyright regulations. The figures might be a bit out of place at times, but they are certainly placed to make the whole article more visually appealing.


 * 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

The Talk page includes conversations about recent changes made to the article and the reasons/motivations behind making those changes. The article appears well-rated and is a part of the "Articles created or improved during WikiProject United States' 50,000 Challenge B-Class COVID-19 articles." The discussion on Wikipedia is largely digging much more "into the weeds" compared to our discussions, which have been about greater themes and their implications in society.


 * 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

The article's status seems to be one of constant updates. One of its strengths is that the nature of the topic is drawing many people to the Talk page, so there are more perspectives and people able to review the revisions of each other. The article can be improved by focusing some of the detail that seems to have been recently added, perhaps by restructuring certain parts of the article. In its current state, the article is certainly well-developed in terms of detail, but just needs a little polishing in terms of structure and organization.


 * 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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