Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Dapto High 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 (non-admin closure). Sean MD80 talk 03:00, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Dapto High School

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An article on a non-notable high school. The article has existed since October 31, 2006 and still has no references to offer. Heavy vandalism is an ongoing concern with this article also, keeping it in a near constant semi-protected state. -- Longhair\talk 10:54, 20 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Australia-related deletion discussions.   —Longhair\talk 10:54, 20 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Keep I've never seen a high school that could not be referenced. Don't have time myself at the moment, but i'm confident references are available.--Cube lurker (talk) 16:37, 20 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Schools-related deletion discussions.   -- --Cube lurker (talk) 16:41, 20 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Merge with locality - ie Dapto, New South Wales until references external to the school have been located and content developed such that it needs separate article.--Matilda talk 21:13, 20 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Keep - although I still maintain the school is not notable per se, the article has been very thoroughly improved, woud be too big to include in the locality article and Wikipedia is better with than without the article! --Matilda talk 03:48, 22 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Keep Aren't high schools inherently notable? I also agree with the comment above &mdash; with time references could most certainly be found &mdash; Galaxy250 (talk) 21:30, 20 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Comment - see Notability (schools) - there is no consensus that schools are inherently notable. There are some criteria to establish notbaility - none of these have been put forward for Dapto.  Where notability has not been established, what is usual : A school article that fails to establish notability will not be deleted, if the school can be confirmed to exist. It would be simply redirected to the appropriate article for the relevant locality or school district (US and Canada only). Thus the article could be later expanded back out into its own article again when sources should become available. --Matilda talk 22:15, 20 January 2008 (UTC)


 * keep - Generaly articles on school's are good way into wikipedia for younger people, they can write about something they know about and learn a lot about citations, npov, vandalism and a lot of other important things. Fasach Nua (talk) 21:36, 20 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Comment - it would seem that the only thing the students of Dapto High are learning about is vandalism in the 15 months or more of the article's existence. Perhaps the young people could learn about their locality instead while expanding the sub section on their school til it is large enough to be broken out.  The article currently has all but no meaningful content other than it exists. --Matilda talk 22:20, 20 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Keep - Consensus has found that high/secondary schools are notable (see WP:OUTCOMES). An article being frequently vandalized is NOT a reason to delete it.  The Los Angeles, California article is vandalized almost every day; are we to delete that? --Oakshade (talk) 01:19, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Comment - you have misquoted WP:Outcomes which states with respect to high schools: Schools are frequently nominated for deletion, but consensus is frequently not reached. Most of the approximately 270 school articles nominated for deletion in the eight months January to August 2005, resulted in no consensus, while fewer than 15% have actually been deleted. Most elementary and middle schools that don't claim notability are now getting deleted in AfD, with high schools in most cases being kept. - concensus frequently not reached and high schools in most cases being kept - does not equal concensus being found that high schools are notable. You have not addressed the issue of notability in relation to Dapto High.  Moreover, the issue is not merely that the article is frequently vandalised, it is that no content has been added in over a year other than to say the school exists  I have found no sources to support any claim to notability (I have searched which seems to be more than any editor who has so far expressed a view of keeping the article).  There are no reliable sources even to support the claim of poor academic results which frequently gets added.  Other than celebrating 50 years, there is nothing to say.  Probably a good thing!  Why can this not be said in a sub section of the locality article as per Notability (schools)?  The current policy proposal for schools and Wikipedia:Outcomes suggest redirection is a reasonable outcome.  --Matilda talk 02:34, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
 * First of all, I wasn't quoting WP:OUTCOMES. However, as you typed out, WP:OUTCOMES states "... with high schools in most cases being kept."  That is what WP:CONSENSUS has found and there is no evidence prior to this AfD that consensus has changed.  The nom used frequent vandalism of this article as one of their primary reasons to delete it.  --Oakshade (talk) 02:55, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Concensus was not necessarily found - as the point initially states Schools are frequently nominated for deletion, but consensus is frequently not reached - keeping of high schools was as a result of no concensus to delete which is not the same thing as consensus to keep. I can appreciate that vandalism is not a criterion for deletion, however, notability should be a criterion for keeping and not redirecting to locality article (sub section on schools or this school as appropriate).  When sufficient material has been written the article can be broken out again. --Matilda talk 03:12, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
 * From our discussion on my talk page, It is clear that you do not agree that the recently-added content satisfies the notability requirement, at least not to your satisfaction. While I agree that this content does not define notability for the school, I do maintain that it provides a certain fullness, a certain roundedness, and the certain je ne sais quoi that an article has to have to be more than a mere listing. While the WP:SCL is not de jure (has not been officially ratified), it has the effect of being in force, de facto, in that over and over again articles get nominated for deletion, and the same outcome prevails. High school articles are almost invariably kept. They are the kind of institutions that have a place of importance in their communities that certainly means that sources will be found for them. One only has to look. It is a matter of convenience to assume that high school articles are notable, in order to avoid all this wasted time. We collectively write thousands of words about how 50 words need to be deleted, and to what end? A this article survived AFD banner on a talk page. Nearly every single time. The bright lines provided by WP:SCHOOL are convenient, and they are very much in effect, ratified or not, in daily AFD discussions. This AFD is yet more proof. You may also want to read what User:Jimbo has said on the subject: here. JERRY talk contribs 05:43, 21 January 2008 (UTC)


 * My issue raised on your talk page was to congratualte you as the only !voter of keep to have actually added some content. I think the things you have added do not make the school notable and I have explained that on your talk page.  You did however wrongly suggest that the school was ranked about 500th in Australia (and thought by use of adjective that this was a good result) when in fact its current ranking is 602 out of 673 in NSW with an HSC success rate for credit ranking of around 1% compared with top ranked school of 74%.  The other keep !voters have added no content and I doubt whether they even know where Dapto is.  They are satisfied that a school exists and therefore must have an article.  It may be a matter of convenience to assume all high schools are notable.  It is also lazy and not in fact generally so.  We have good processes to redirect to locality articles - thus adding to that article.  Your suggestion below that this AfD is snowy is depressingly true becuase there are contributers who vote blindly and do not think through issues of notability - nor are they prepared to contribute to add content.--Matilda talk 06:06, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Keep Article has oodles of encyclopedic content, plenty of sources, stablishes notability per WP:N without having to reply on WP:SCHOOL; let's keep this discussion on track... its not about WP:SCHOOL, its about this article. This AfD is looking pretty snowy to me. JERRY talk contribs 03:49, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
 * SHOULD BE DELETED FOR SURE. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 137.154.16.30 (talk) 03:55, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Please describe why you think so. Note: The above IP address has vandalized this article using falsified edit summaries in the past.JERRY talk contribs 04:33, 21 January 2008 (UTC)


 * Keep Above and beyond the broad consensus that all such articles are inherently notable, the article as it currently stands providesd ample reliable and verifiable sources to satisfy the Notability standard. Alansohn (talk) 06:02, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Delete This school is non-notable and the article doesn't make any claims that it's anything more than a standard high school. I'm skeptical about the claims that there's a consensus that high schools are automatically notable - the proposed WP:SCHOOL guideline is going nowhere and violates key wikipedia policies and I've seen articles on high schools deleted. As such, I'd prefer to see people come up with a better reason to keep this kind of article than what's basically a variant of WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS. --Nick Dowling (talk) 09:00, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Comment - you are, again, misdirecting yourself when you say "the article doesn't make any claims that it's anything more than a standard high school". It doesn't need to; it needs to have multiple, independent sources to meet WP:N; which it does. TerriersFan (talk) 21:38, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Comment Actually, given that high schools aren't automatically notable (WP:SCHOOL is nothing but a proposal) notability does need to be demonstrated. I genuinely don't see how a collection of newspaper references about things which happen at all high schools "address the subject directly in detail" and are "more than trivial". There seems to be a view that a handful of routine mentions in the media makes something forever notable - this doesn't make much sense to me, especially when the incidents which it is claimed establish notability involve non-notable people doing non-notable things such as teenagers lighting fires. --Nick Dowling (talk) 09:12, 22 January 2008 (UTC)


 * Merge This meme that schools are by consensus inherently notable continues to pop up. I have not seen anywhere where this consensus has been demonstrated. The article is distinctly lacking in encyclopedic content.  A 50th anniversary celebration, a minor fire ($100,000 in damage is not much and arsonists attack schools on a reasonably regular basis) and a unremarkable HSC ranking. Throwing every mention that can be found on Google into the article does not make it encyclopedic.  Merge to Dapto, New South Wales until some content with some claim to encyclopedic value can be found. -- Mattinbgn\talk 12:18, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Comment I agree - Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information, which is what school articles now turn into when well-meaning people try to save non-notable school articles from deletion. --Nick Dowling (talk) 09:15, 22 January 2008 (UTC)


 * Keep Any high school will almost certainly have notable things about it. Just may take time to find. Hobit (talk) 19:25, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Keep - It has multiple, independent sources to meet WP:N. TerriersFan (talk) 21:38, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Keep. It only took me a couple of minutes to find that the school's careers advisor was named top careers advisor in New South Wales for his innovative programme, and to add this (with a reliable source) to the article. I'm sure there's loads more stuff that could be added, but there's more than enough there to establish notability already, and it's way past my bedtime so I can't do it now. Phil Bridger (talk) 00:14, 22 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Keep. Plenty of stuff to establish notability. Rebecca (talk) 01:03, 22 January 2008 (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.