Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Beaver Creek Elementary School


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.  

The result was keep. Can't sleep, clown will eat me 05:34, 16 November 2007 (UTC)

Beaver_Creek_Elementary_School
AfDs for this article: 
 * – (View AfD) (View log)

Bundle of articles about schools, elementary and secondary, all non-notable. The following list of schools is included on this bundle by me: (they can all be found on the page for School_District_36_Surrey, which is probably part of the problem. Epthorn 07:07, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment - please outline each high school you have researched and why the sources failed to meet WP:N. TerriersFan 19:17, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment: You cannot prove a negative statement. These schools do not meet notability because of a lack of independent, verifiable sourcing that establishes it via WP:NOTE; I cannot show evidence of this except for the lack of notability established. While I could say "this school fails to establish notability" for each article, it seems like it would greatly clog up AFD, doesn't it?Epthorn 07:11, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment. You didn't seem to intend to include secondary schools in this VfD but they are listed below. Double Blue  (Talk) 17:20, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the catch, I mis-typed that. Fixed. Epthorn 18:42, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

* *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  * - The reason I have selected all of these is each fails to demonstrate notability. I prodded them, but some helpful creature exercised his right to take the prods off almost all the pages. It may be his/her right to do that, but it's my right to grumble about having to spend another hour or two doing this. Anyway, I left out a few schools that should probably also be deleted because they at least TRY to demonstrate notability. I'll nominate them one by one when the dust clears here. Epthorn 07:09, 10 November 2007 (UTC)


 *  Re-direct all elementary school articles to School District 36 Surrey; Keep all secondary school articles Keep all for now - It is very difficult to assess the notability of each school with this number been nominated. The elementary school articles do not appear notable and hence non-controversial re-directs to the district article are appropriate, it is a accepted practise not to bring these cases to AFD. A lot of the secondary schools been nominated have signs of notability, and most secondary schools brought to AFD are established to have notability and are kept. If the secondary schools are to be brought to AFD I suggest it is done individually and their existing and potential notability looked at on a case by case basis. Camaron1 | Chris 10:53, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
 * I'm not against a re-direct, and in fact some of the schools on that page are redirected to the same page. It is a little odd because the page lists, in chart form, all the schools, with links. Having all these links simply point back to the same page they are linked FROM is a little confusing. Epthorn 15:31, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Links which link back to the page you are on should be avoided yes, in this event it sensible just just to remove the links manually. I think in the end though this simply is not going to work as some elementary schools could be more notable than the articles suggest and hence blanket deleting/re-directing them all might not be sensible. It is better just to deal with them on a case by case basis and re-direct those that are not notable. Camaron1 | Chris 19:40, 10 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Schools-related deletions.   —Camaron1 | Chris 10:54, 10 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Comment. I believe primary/elementary schools do not normally need to go to AfD unless the deletion is in any way controversial. They should probably all be deleted. I'm not sure that I see the need for a redirect as this would only encourage the creation of a new article in the future. However the secondary schools are a different matter. They should really all have separate AfD pages so that people can comment properly. They should certainly not have been nominated en masse in this fashion. Proper articles can usually be written on the vast majority of secondary schools and they very rarely get deleted at AfD. Dahliarose 14:26, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Believe me, Dahliarose, I didn't want to have to tag all these. I tried using prod, but someone took away the tag, forcing my hand.Epthorn 15:31, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
 * I can see that it is a waste of time bringing all the elementary schools to AfD, and I am quite happy to recommend them all for deletion. I am, however, concerned about all the secondary schools. I've only had a brief look at some of the schools listed, and some of them do indeed seem to have notable elements. I know nothing about Canadian schools, but I think the way that these schools have been nominated en masse means that they will not get a fair hearing. Dahliarose 15:46, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment - why? Most elementary schools are non-notable I agree but some are notable as shown by several that have been sourced and kept recently. Each and every school should be individually considered against available sources. TerriersFan 19:38, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
 * I did leave out a couple of the secondary schools, but those I left in, while they generally have more information than the elementary schools, still don't really give any encyclopedia-type info. Info about mascots, what sports are in the athletic programs, etc. Personally, I don't see any inherent difference between elementary schools and secondary schools in terms of notability. I know people are supposed to look through all the different articles for deletion, but if you feel there is one or two particular schools that shouldn't be here, maybe you can point them out? Epthorn 16:35, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
 * I would like to recheck the ones that people seem to think assert some notability. It is evident that some people who commented before my comment (below) didn't check each article on the list, as they should have done.  I know that because my talk page was accidentally included in this and people left comments without noticing it. - Rjd0060 18:54, 10 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Delete all or redirect all to their home district. Deletion is appropriate, but redirection might help reduce re-creation. In any case the schools are non-notable, do not assert notability, and have no content to lose. CRGreathouse (t | c) 14:59, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment - please outline each high school you have researched and why the sources failed to meet WP:N. TerriersFan 19:16, 10 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Strong Delete All: I guess a redirect would be okay, but these need to go. All of the secondary schools, in addition to all of the elementary schools, fail to assert notability.  They are just there.  - Rjd0060 15:14, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment - please outline each high school you have researched and why the sources failed to meet WP:N. TerriersFan 19:16, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment: When you go to Wikipedia, you shouldnt have to research the information you find here. I've looked at each (and every) article listed above and the fact is they fail to assert notability .  I haven't done any outside research.  That should not be necessary.  If something out there makes these schools notable, that information needs to be included in the article.   - Rjd0060 19:28, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment - if the article is inadequately sourced or fails to assert notability then it should be appropriately tagged for improvement. Giving a deletion view without assessing available sources to determine whether notability can be established is not a responsible approach and such blanket views should be ignored. TerriersFan 19:38, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
 * I agree. I misspoke.  I was simply trying to point out (again) that the articles fail to assert notability.  If these werent schools (if they were people or other places) they could and would easily be deleted speedily via A7. - Rjd0060 19:46, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Actually, I think that you make a fair point. The way that policy has developed amongst admins who consider speedies is that some categories of people and places are considered to have sufficient inherent notability not to be speedy deleted. This includes, numbered highways, hamlets, judges, fauna and flora, schools etc. This doesn't mean that articles on these are fit to survive an AfD merely that they don't merit an A7 which is reserved for the clearest cases since it involves deletion without consensus. As it happens, most of the elementary schools are not notable and I was busy merging and redirecting those to the School District (an accepted practice that has emerged from many AfDs) when this mas AfD appeared. TerriersFan 22:11, 10 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Keep verifiable and NPOV schools. There is no consensus for a notability standard for schools. WP:Schools shows the many attempts at reaching one. I believe public schools, by their nature, are notable. They have the financial and future of their community's youth invested in the school and there is tremendous interest in knowing what the school is doing, how well it is doing it, and how it compares to others. I have never started a school stub but the fact so many are written shows how many people do think they are encyclopedic. A good stub is a useful place for people to add notable content when they find it where many would not know, or want, to begin the process of starting a new article. Should a consensus develop for elementary school notability, I will abide by it but they should be merged and redirected to the school district. At least then the article will not be repeatedly started and it will give a place for notable facts to be added. What, precisely then, is the problem with keeping these articles? Are we running out of paper? "Imagine a world in which every single human being can freely share in the sum of all knowledge." Double Blue  (Talk) 17:17, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Respectfully disagree with this logic. Just because lots of people make articles about schools does not imply they are encyclopedic. Ever seen these schools in another encyclopedia? Lots of people believed the world was flat, as well. As to the point about the financial and future of the youth, et al, what about making an article about every doctor who delivers babies, then? Every fire station? Every grocery store? There are places on the internet to place this information, notably school websites. Existence of information is not evidence for inclusion on a site, and wikipedia does have guidelines as to what it is not (WP:DIRECTORY) Epthorn 18:23, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Wikipedia is a good place for neutral, verifiable articles on schools including facts that would not go on school websites. Straw man argument but I'll answer anyway. There are notability guidelines established for people and shops. If an encyclopedic article on a fire hall can be written that is verifiable and NPOV, why not? What harm is there? I do see a benefit. Double Blue  (Talk) 18:33, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
 * I must have been unclear. I don't mean that you want all doctors to be notable. But your logic, that schools should be notable because of their effect on people, can be carried to that conclusion. Doctors who save lives should then automatically be considered notable because of their effect, shouldn't they? And firehouses that do the same? And there are notability guidelines established for articles; they call for, among other things, verifiable sources independent of the source. I fail to see how the article deserves to be in an encyclopedia because it doesn't hurt. This seems to be a complete negation of WP:NOTE, which has no presumption of school notability (which would seem to indicate they have the same standards)Epthorn 18:48, 10 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Keep Mass deletion like this is a bad idea. WP:EiC is maintaining these articles.  I just clicked through the first few, and while they are stub class, there is every indication that people are slowly turning them into full blown articles with the necessary references.  As a parent with school-age kids, I'd rather see a standardized set of articles for the schools in our district than have these all deleted and then re-created by various people (likely students) who don't follow the guidelines established at WP:EiC.  After mass deletionist move on, you wont be the ones stuck cleaning up the mess of stubs that the students will be re-creating.  --Stéphane Charette 17:30, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
 * I doubt it's much harder for a student to edit an existing page. Frankly, I had to revert two or three instances of either vandalism or very immature editing as I was going through the articles for deletion! "Teachers currently give to much homework" and such. A redirect to the district page would probably take care of this problem more effectively. While I wish the best to projects, their interest cannot in and of itself establish notability or a promise to make an article better (no crystal ball, etc). They seem to be concerned with warning members about potential deletions, but in the absence of a consensus that schools are 'automatically' assumed to be notable, I think we really have to take it on a case by case basis- and these schools just don't establish notability. Epthorn 18:39, 10 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Speedy keep all as train wreck. This is a wholly irresponsible AfD since there is no indication that each schools has been individually researched. We don't delete articles because of inadequacies with the articles but only if the institution is not-notable. That requires an individual search for sources and there is no indication that this has been done. In general, High/secondary normally can produce enough sources if am editor looks closely enough. TerriersFan 19:12, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Thanks for your comment about my irresponsible actions. Very useful. I do agree that we delete articles only if the articles are non-notable. You seem to imply, however, that I just found some schools and decided to delete them. If you look at each of these articles carefully, as I have and as is necessary in an afd like this, I really question if you can find any notability that I did not as I went through them. Find sources about the existence of a school, it's demographics, or it's location is not notable in and of itself. If you have found notability in going through each school as I'm sure you did, which particular school is it regarding?Epthorn 07:20, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Additionally, your comments on your talk page with Alansohn also point to the idea that I 'indiscriminately' prodded these articles. I did no such thing, and you can note that there are a few schools which I did not include on this afd as they seem to make an attempt to establish notability. Epthorn 07:25, 11 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Speedy keep all as per TerriersFan. This mass nomination process does not allow for a fair hearing. The nominator has not explained why he thinks each school does not satisfy the notability criteria. Most elementary schools do get deleted but some are notable and do deserve articles. It is impossible to consider each school's merits or otherwise when the schools have been nominated in such a way. Dahliarose 21:46, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of British Columbia-related deletions.  -- A. B. (talk) 21:36, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Strong Keep all 17 Secondary schools, and Delete all of the elementary schools. I have checked all of the elementary schools, and found that only Kensington Prairie Elementary School‎ was mildly interesting, but not notable enough to justify an article.  PKT 21:49, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep. I appreciate all the work that the nominator and certain other editors went through to examine these articles. The ones I looked at definitely needed improvement. Some could be merged with their town article if there is no interest in developing the article. I think I would just blank, merge and comment why the page is blank! Then later speedy delete the page. A lot of work! One (early) school had a Canadian Olympic member. I thought that was noteworthy, though the school might not be responsible! But the same is true for place notables. The trouble with a kitchen sink list is all it takes is one little exception to turn the vote of a sympathetic editor. Sorry. Student7 00:03, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Speedy Keep All No evidence has been provided that each of these articles has been reviewed and addressed individually for notability per deletion policy. Alansohn 00:05, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
 * The evidence of notability must logically rest on establishment. I can not evidence a LACK of something, except by noting it. I went through each of these schools. Which school do you think does evidence notability? I keep asking this question...Epthorn 07:13, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment Like I said, high schools should be left alone. SolidPlaid 04:17, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
 * I did read how you 'removed the prods' and 'left snarky comments for the prodder' but never actually explained why any one of the schools was notable. User_talk:Alansohn. How are high schools inherently different than grade schools?Epthorn 07:28, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
 * The onus is on the nominator to show that it is not notable. People will usually take the nominator's word for it (even though they shouldn't) for an elementary school. High schools are assumed to be notable, and are kept about as frequently as community colleges when brought to AfD. It's almost a self-fulfilling prophesy, since there are folks who will work very hard to find evidence that a high schools is notable. SolidPlaid 19:45, 12 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Comment: Well, I don't really think there will be a consensus here for full deletion. The elementary schools, perhaps, but while no one has really yet articulated what differentiates secondary schools from elementary schools (absent increased notability via sources, etc), I think secondary schools will probably have to be severed from elementary schools. Epthorn 07:57, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
 * All of us working on school articles know from experience that it is possible to write a decent article which fully satisfies WP:N on virtually any secondary/high school in the English-speaking world, because multiple independent reliable sources are generally available. Nearly all secondary schools which come up for deletion are kept. The problem is that the initial school articles are often very poor and the notable features are not always mentioned. The only ones which do tend to get deleted are very new schools where no sources currently exist. It is much less time-consuming all around if these articles are improved rather than pointlessly nominated for deletion. There are far fewer sources for primary/elementary schools and they have far fewer claims to notability. They nearly always get deleted. There are however some exceptions. It is very difficult to know with a mass nomination if an important school has been mistakenly nominated. Dahliarose 14:15, 11 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Keep all and renominate any individual primary schools separate. There's no point nominating the secondary schools, as when they are considered properly one by one, almost all recent ones have been kept at AfD on the grounds that they are probably notable. . DGG (talk) 03:56, 12 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete all They all fail to assert notability and are thus speedable per A7, as explained by Epthorn and Rjd0060; that there is a "school lobby" that systematically tries to keep every school is not relevant, and an abuse of AfD. I respect the opinion that all schools are inherently notable, like towns and villages, but here is not the right place to change the rules. I suggest the village pump (policy), or WP:POLICY to establish such a new rule. --victor falk 09:51, 12 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep all Why this list? There are tens of thousands of school articles. I would be happy to see non secondary schools which are not notable stubs, but are you sure one of these secondary schools is not where some important meeting of a rock group or a software launch wasn't made. I agree with above... if you want to make large deletions which effectively change policy then you need the village pump. Victuallers 15:06, 12 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep all DGG argument is sound Victuallers 15:14, 12 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment - Issues relevant to this AFD are been discussed at WT:SCH. Camaron1 | Chris 19:13, 12 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Strong Keep all 17 Secondary schools —Preceding unsigned comment added by Themarriottmariner (talk • contribs) 20:33, 12 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete the elementary schools. The others need to be considered on an individual basis.  This action would be consistent with numerous previous precedents.  There is no reason to require a separate discussion on each elementary school.  Vegaswikian 10:36, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment - I see no basis for the elementary schools not being considered individually. At least one of them is well referenced and establishes notability. Elementary schools are mostly not kept, I agree, but some are and mass deletion without individual consideration is against deletion policy. TerriersFan 01:58, 15 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Keep -- Individualized consideration of each of these schools is required, since they may not be so similar in character as to be amenable to treatment in a single AFD nomination. John254 01:33, 15 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep - WP:N & WP:ORG discuss this explicitly. Schools are notable. Kingturtle 17:53, 15 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Normally, it would have voted delete or merge/redirect (in the case for elementary schools and keep for secondary schools per  outcomes as usually secondary schools are more notable then elementary and middle schools. But I suggest to close this discussion and start a separate Afd discussion for the elementary schools while Keep the secondary schools. I'm going a bit whith John254 rationale. There is too many articles proposed for deletion in this one although last week there was a more extreme regarding List of United Kingdom places which the nom placed like over 100 articles in a single afd. -- JForget  00:13, 16 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment - this is looking a likely closure but any AfD for the elementary schools must deal with them singly not as a mass or we shall have another train wreck. Every school has a different range of available sources and merits separate consideration. TerriersFan 05:00, 16 November 2007 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.