Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/St. Thomas University Students' Union

 This page is an archive of the discussion about the proposed deletion of the article below. This page is no longer live. Further comments should be made on the article's talk page rather than here so that this page is preserved as an historic record. The result of the debate was keep with a strong recommendation to merge back into the parent article.

St. Thomas University Students' Union
I keep trying to merge this with Saint Thomas University, but Spinboy keeps reverting it. There is no content here that requires that this be a separate article. We really don't need the address and phone number, Wikipedia is not a yellow pages. Delete that and there is no content. The template indicates that there are lots of these non-articles. RickK 05:26, Jan 27, 2005 (UTC)
 * Keep. We already had this debate over at Votes for deletion/Students' Society of McGill University. I feel you are just being vindictive. --Spinboy 05:33, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Keep, if it is merged it cannot be in Category:Canadian Students' Associations. - SimonP 06:05, Jan 27, 2005 (UTC)
 * Why is that important? RickK 06:06, Jan 27, 2005 (UTC)
 * It's important in that there's no legitimate distinction to be made between universities whose student unions deserve articles and those whose student unions don't. Either St. Thomas stays or they all go; nothing in between is appropriate. Bearcat 18:58, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Of course it can (the merged article, that is). Sure, only a small part of the page would deal with the student union, but anyone looking for the little bit of information we have on this student union through categories would still find what they're looking for. Merge and redirect. &mdash; &#1051;&#1080;&#1074;&#1072;&#1081; | &#x263a; 13:08, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Categories exist to serve articles, not the other way round. Mackensen (talk) 06:43, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Merge is reasonable. It seems forever doomed to a two-sentence substub otherwise. &mdash;Korath (Talk) 06:32, Jan 27, 2005 (UTC)
 * Merge. The categorization argument has some value, and a students' union may well be worth an article of its own (many are quite significant organizations), but this is just a two-line substub. Generally speaking, if one is going to write about a subject that will potentially be nominated for deletion, it is good to do one's research first and actually start out with something that establishes some kind of notability, not to fill out the empty space with contact info which is of absolutely no interest to anyone except people who probably already know it (and can be found on the webpage in any case). I could change my vote to keep if the article gets better or if a new and more informative article is posted after this one has been merged. / up+land 08:45, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Delete. What is there to merge?   If Spinboy thinks there is something encyclopedic to say about this subject, he should say it. --BM 11:02, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Merge and delete, making appropriate comments on Talk page to preserve GFDL. Look. The Encyclopedia Britannica 11th edition had many long articles; the article on Bible is over one megabyte, for example. The average article length in encyclopedias seems to be in decline. The current Britannica is two-thirds "macropedia" but one-third "micropedia." The World Book, which seems to be directed at a high-school audience, has lots of short articles. Ironically, the fact that Wikipedia is not paper seems to be taken to mean that we have a 32K limit. But there's no reason for Wikipedia to become a nanopedia. Information makes much more sense in context. It's much more likely to get wide review by knowledgeable editors when it is part of a larger article then when it is off by itself. It's much more likely to get treated systematically in relation to other similar pieces of information when they can be seen together. And, if an article can't be in more than one category, then what good are categories? Dpbsmith (talk) 13:51, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Well said. However, the 32KiB limit is a result of practical considerations relating to article download time, HTML rendering time, and web browser limitations rather than being something that is actually inherent in a non-paper encyclopaedia per se. Uncle G 15:54, 2005 Jan 27 (UTC)
 * If there is potential to expand this article to the equivalent of Student_Federation_of_the_University_of_Ottawa or University of Victoria Students' Society, which are not "non-articles", then Keep as a stub. If there is  no potential at all for expansion beyond this substub, no matter how dressed up with hyperlink-farms-in-boxes it may be, then Merge. Uncle G 15:54, 2005 Jan 27 (UTC)
 * Those articles are only expanded by the lists of former presidents. The only relevant information is in the lead, which could be merged into the universities' articles. JoaoRicardo 17:45, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Then substitute Athabasca_University_Students_Union or McMaster_Students_Union. The point still stands.  Some of these student union articles have been clearly padded with fluff, such as contact information (despite the fact that Wikipedia is not a telephone directory) and hyperlink-farms-in-boxes, because there is nothing really significant to say about them apart from "  Student Union is the student union for  and is a member of  ".  But others have not, because there are significant things to say about the student union.  Depending from which of those two categories this student union is in, it should either be kept as a stub or merged.  (And the same goes for the other 26 articles, for which this can be viewed as a test case.) Uncle G 12:36, 2005 Jan 28 (UTC)
 * Delete. Gtabary 16:05, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Merge and redirect to Saint Thomas University. Not enough information for its own article. And the university's article is quite small itself, it could use some expanding. JoaoRicardo 17:47, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Keep, with clear precedent from the other Canadian university student union articles. (There are really fairly few Canadian universities, btw.) Samaritan 17:49, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * That's not really much of a precedent, they could all be merged into their respective university articles as well, as has been mentioned. Adam Bishop 17:58, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * As can all articles on American and British and Swedish student unions. If this goes, they all go. This one is no less notable than any other. Bearcat 04:47, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Furthemore, a bad precedent is no reason to keep the standard bad. Now, bad is arguable. :-) Gtabary
 * There is no precedent from those articles. 22 of the 26 student union articles were created, and have been largely maintained since, by Spinboy, the creator of this one.  Creating an article for every student union in Canada appears to be his project.  If anything, the VFD discussion of this article can be viewed as a test case for the whole set of 22 articles. Uncle G 12:36, 2005 Jan 28 (UTC)
 * Where there is precedent from is Category:United Kingdom Students' Unions. Out of the 700 student unions in the U.K., only 17 have encyclopædia articles in their own right.  Ironically, Spinboy cites this as precedent for what he has been doing.  But in fact it is precedent for not doing it. Uncle G 12:36, 2005 Jan 28 (UTC)
 * There already is precedent with the previous vote related to the Students' Society of McGill University. Please, don't attack me. Make your case for deletion, sure, but we can leave the personal attacks outside. --Spinboy 17:19, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Reporting your very argument from that very debate is not personally attacking you. Uncle G 18:13, 2005 Jan 28 (UTC)
 * Delete. Nothing of importance here. Gamaliel 17:59, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Merge main body of article into Saint Thomas University if its not already there. An individual student union never needs a breakout article, and there's hardly an content here anyway. Delete the executive listing as unencyclopedic. If the article creator ever leaves wikipedia I don't know how's going to update things like this, and wikipedia is getting rather full of this sort of stuff. -R. fiend 21:56, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * "An individual student union never needs a breakout article." Fine, then I trust I'll be seeing all the American and British student unions on VfD by tomorrow...? It's all very well and nice to say this, but when only one such article is actually up for deletion, only that one will actually get deleted. And the bottom line remains that there's no defensible argument for singling this one out; either this stays or they all go. Bearcat 05:09, 29 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Delete.... some student organizations are notable (see Yale's Skull and Bones Society, for example), but not this one. --Idont Havaname 22:51, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Delete nothing in the article. kaal 00:37, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Delete: nonnotable organization. Wile E. Heresiarch 00:40, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Delete, not yet notable enough, nothing here worth merging. Megan1967 01:51, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Redirect or Delete. There's nothing here particularly notable. Mackensen (talk) 06:42, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Merge/redirect/delete, no preference as to which. That there exists a category for Canadian student unions is bad enough. Madame Sosostris 06:46, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Weak keep. There seems to be a clear precedent for other student union articles from other countries as seen in Category:Students' unions. Although I don't know how notable St. Thomas University is (not being from New Brunswick), since all public universities in Canada are notable enough, I believe that the university is notable enough. I am making this a weak keep because I don't know how notable the student union itself is, though I'd be inclined to guess that it is also notable enough. --Deathphoenix 18:26, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Merge. --fvw *  19:00, 2005 Jan 28 (UTC)
 * As I've already noted in several other VfDs today, this is yet another case where you can't make a defensible distinction between which ones are notable and which ones aren't. Either this stays or every article in Category:Canadian Students' Associations goes. And there's no legitimate argument for deleting this but letting American or British student union articles stand, either. The only acceptable options are keep this, or delete all university student unions, period; nothing in between is appropriate. Bearcat 19:02, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * That's a good point. Maybe we should go put those British and American articles up on VfD next. --Spinboy 19:19, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * That's an absolutely fantastic idea. Go for it! Nobody cares about these unions except the people who are in them anyway, and they can jus get their own damn sites. Madame Sosostris 05:56, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * False dichotomy. Your argument is equivalent to posting "keep this, or delete all biographical articles, period" on Votes for deletion/Michelle stephens. &mdash;Korath (Talk) 20:05, Jan 28, 2005 (UTC)
 * Disagreed. Biographical articles are not equivalent; there are objective standards of notability that can be applied (though, granted, some subjectivity may come into play with borderline cases). University student unions, however, a topic where notability comes as a group; either they're all legitimately notable or none of them are. If you believe differently, then please, explain to me how you draw the distinction between a notable student union and a non-notable one, because the standard that I see being applied here is "Canadian university = a priori non-notable student union". Bearcat 20:11, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Most of the people voting on this aren't even Canadian. Yes, a few may not be deleted, due to historical significance, but Bearcat is right. This comes down to is the group notable or not. And if not, why doesn't it apply to British and American student unions? I see a double standard. --Spinboy 21:56, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Personally I voted to merge this because of the relative lack of content, compared to, say, the Glasgow University Union article, which I voted to keep. I'm not Scottish, and this has nothing to do with any lack of respect for Canada as a nation. I don't consider every student union encyclopedic, but would at least consider voting to keep the article on this one if it can be shown to have a relatively long history, previous presidents who have gone on to do something important etc. In the article's present state, I can't tell whether the union is of even the least significance to anybody outside the present student body of the university. / up+land 10:41, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Delete. Carrp 20:12, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Keep. --JuntungWu 09:35, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Keep Though the content of the page is minimal, and there is as yet little I can see in the article to suggest notability, I have a bit of a concern with a page that gets slammed with a re-direct within a half-hour of its creation. Wouldn't it be a bit more polite to hold off and watch a page for stagnation, say 48-72 hours or more to give it a chance for improvement? I know some of the articles I've started are far from being finished... but I also go to work at 8am and generally don't get home until 10pm. Between article updates, I do additional research, hunt down spellings of names and dates, etc. in the name of accuracy. If I was Spinboy, I might get a wee bit hot under the collar myself. The biggest downfall of VfD is the failure of the process to adequately address works in progress IMHO. Weaponofmassinstruction 04:45, 1 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Comment. A sentence or two on why it is notable would have been helpful; but he shouldn't work on it now until the VfD process is complete, and if it is going to be deleted because its notability can't be established, it will have been a good thing that he didn't waste too much time on it.   --BM 12:23, 1 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Delete. Student organizations do not inherently merit articles.  The encyclopedic content of this article could be summarized as "St. Thomas University has a Students' Union", a sentence which can be included in the school's page.  The officers' names are of no interest, the brief description of activities is already implied by the words "Students' Union", and the contact info is beside the point in an encyclopedia.  Isomorphic 22:26, 1 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Keep as above, there is precedent. Also, this union is notable per its way above average student participation - the voter turn out is around 80% where most Canadian universities are at 20 or less and they recently had a successful campaign to get a universal bus pass with the city despite the much larger UNB withdrawing from the deal. - Jord 04:49, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)

This page is now preserved as an archive of the debate and, like some other VfD subpages, is no longer 'live'. Subsequent comments on the issue, the deletion, or the decision-making process should be placed on the relevant 'live' pages. Please do not edit this page.