User talk:Pensadora956/United States Border Patrol

Organization
Hi there. So it looks like you have decided to work on the English language page, right? I am looking at the Wikipedia article, and it already has a lot of really good information. Under "History" there are three short paragraphs about border control before the USBP. Then, there is a longer paragraph that covers the period from 1924 to 2003. I would restart by simply copying that paragraph into your sandbox, and then begin building it out using your sources. You should be able to create a separate paragraph for the 20s, the 30s, and the 40s, if you want. Ideally, try to include information not simply about what the USBP did, but how Mexican Americans viewed and responded to the BP. Ihiyotl (talk) 21:17, 4 November 2021 (UTC)

Lead
Reading through this time, I have a better understanding of what you are doing (revising content as well as adding content), so I read your sandbox draft alongside what is in the current article. In the lede section (the two paragraphs that precede the table of contents) the language is rough. If you haven't already done so, be sure to read this first. Based on these guidelines, I would suggest that facts like the number of agents and the budget (which will change from year to year thus making anything you put in soon obsolete) don't need to be included in the lead section. I would probably want to include the following items: its date of creation, its location within the federal government, the fact that it is a law enforcement agency, the fact that it is has faced criticism, what justification was given by Congress for its creation in 1924, and what the agency described as its mission in 2021. Currently, some of the writing as it exists in the public article is unclear. I think this stems from the fact that both the USBP's and the CBP's own websites are exceptionally poorly written. To improve this, I would think about what the actually important information is and just write new sentences that convey that information in plain and clear language. For example: "The United States Border Patrol (USBP), was officially created on May 28th of 1924, is the United States Customs and Border Protection's (CBP) largest federal law enforcement arm within the United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS)." could be reworded as "The United States Border Patrol (USBP) was created on May 28, 1924. As of 2021, it is an office within U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), which is an agency of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS)." In quoting from the website, be sure to include a date for the quote, since the text will inevitably change. While the USBP website is not a credible source for information about the USBP, it is a credible source for what the USBP says about itself (e.g., what its mission is) and for facts about its structure (e.g., its budget). Ihiyotl (talk) 23:54, 13 November 2021 (UTC)

Links
You are currently using hyperlinks instead of citations, I think. "Labor Appropriations Act of 1924" shows up as a link, but clicking on it does not take me, as I would expect, to the Wikipedia page for that act, but to the CBP website. You should cite the legislation (H.R. 8350) using Wikipedia's cite tool. It's not called the "Labor Appropriations Act of 1924," it turns out. After a lengthy internet search, I finally went to the UT Library website and found the full-text PDF for the Act. You can get there by searching for "68th Congress Bill Profile H.R. 8350, Bill Profile" using the library's search engine. The Border Patrol appropriation is on page 91. Let me know if you have trouble figuring out the citation format for legislation. I assume there is a standard APA format for this. The later links that you have in your draft should also be endnote citations instead. Ihiyotl (talk) 00:32, 14 November 2021 (UTC)