Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Open University Students Association


 * 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 redirect to Open University. As a compromise.  Sandstein  23:04, 4 March 2018 (UTC)

Open University Students Association

 * – ( View AfD View log  Stats )

I nominated this for speedy, as it is an obviously hijacked page, made into organization’s “own” website. Would need to be completely redone. This was removed with the edit note, "unspeedy - well established title deserves AfD". Well hm. OK what I said already. I will add a) all unsourced or self sourced; b) per its editing stats mostly edited by SPAs including the recent who wrote We are the OU students media team. The username literally represents who we are and by blocking our account removes our ability to edit the page for our OWN organisation. This is not a Wikipedia article. It would need to be completely written from independent sources. A BEFORE search yields a few refs with passing mentions so success in doing that appears unlikely. Jytdog (talk) 15:15, 8 February 2018 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Organizations-related deletion discussions.  Every morning   (there's a halo...)  15:36, 8 February 2018 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of England-related deletion discussions.  Every morning   (there's a halo...)  15:36, 8 February 2018 (UTC)


 * Keep. One of the largest students' unions in the UK with some 200,000 members. The page did need editing to become a neutral, objective article, and anyone editing from the OUSA should familiarise themselves with Wikipedia's guidelines before re-editing this page, but now that issue has been dealt with I see no reason to delete this page. Eloquai (talk) 16:43, 8 February 2018 (UTC)
 * That !vote has nothing to do with Wikipedia's notability guidelines. And people from the organization should not edit it directly per the WP:COI guideline. Jytdog (talk) 16:47, 8 February 2018 (UTC)
 * Students' unions are a peculiar case though; these are organisations that have thousands of members (hundreds of thousands of active members in this particular case), which students interact with and utilise on a daily basis, and which have served millions of university alumni... but which are unlikely to receive prominence through the normal channels we use to establish notability, since they are essentially 'private' institutions. In this case, I think we need to think liberally; this organisation has a significant membership and customer base that includes the population of one of the world's largest universities, and unlike other UK students' unions', operates on a truly national and international scale. I'm quite happy to hold my hands up and say that it's difficult to defend through Wikipedia's notability criteria, but I also think there's a strong case to be made for employing a liberal interpretation of the criteria in this specific case. Eloquai (talk) 17:12, 8 February 2018 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Education-related deletion discussions. North America1000 18:11, 8 February 2018 (UTC)

 Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
 * Delete No indication it passes WP:NORG BillHPike (talk, contribs) 23:48, 8 February 2018 (UTC)
 * Keep. as an exception to our usual practice of not having articles about these associations. Because of the nature of the university, this has a greater size & significance than almost any other of them.  DGG ( talk ) 01:46, 11 February 2018 (UTC)

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, North America1000 13:15, 15 February 2018 (UTC)  Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
 * First, I may have a COI as I must have been a member in the mid 1970s as I was an OU student. Second, I understand the argument that this organisation is very large, but is it noticed? Most members have no real link to it. Are there reliable sources that discuss what it does and what influence it has? For now I give weak support to deleting it. Bduke    (Discussion)  08:25, 16 February 2018 (UTC)
 * Comment. My gut feeling is that this is notable because of the size and reach of the university with much of the study being online. But the refs in the article say delete and i've googled for refs but come up short because it has a very generic name. Szzuk (talk) 15:06, 19 February 2018 (UTC)
 * Both my parents studied at the Open University but seem to be unaware of the existence of the OUSA. Every single student is automatically enrolled in the organisation, but it would appear it only organises a few online forums and local meet ups in the United Kingdom. The study is online but the OUSA is not involved in the study, which is actually based on small tutor groups with their own forums. I personally have the rather cynical view that it only exists so Open University students can acquire NUS Extra cards and other student services and discounts where membership of a student union is a prerequisite. It could probably be enough to mention it at Open University (where it is already described). Prince of Thieves (talk) 12:24, 23 February 2018 (UTC)

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, –&#8239;Joe (talk) 00:04, 25 February 2018 (UTC)
 * Redirect to Open University. The organisation is large enough that it's a reasonable encyclopaedic topic, but there don't appear to be enough sources to support a separate article. –&#8239;Joe (talk) 00:06, 25 February 2018 (UTC)
 * Redirect as per Joe - seems like the best scenario. SportingFlyer (talk) 03:43, 25 February 2018 (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.