Wikipedia:Featured list candidates/List of Wilfrid Laurier University people/archive2


 * The following is an archived discussion of a featured list nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured list candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The list was not promoted by User:Matthewedwards 15:52, 25 October 2008.

List of Wilfrid Laurier University people
previous FLC

I nominated this four months ago. It was archived even with two supports and no opposes. Anyways, I have cleaned it up further, and it should be good to go once more! Gary King ( talk ) 20:19, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

Support Comments  from
 * Ref 23 is missing a publication date.
 * "Wilfrid Laurier University is a public university located in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, and founded in 1911 as the Evangelical Lutheran Seminary of Canada and later Waterloo Lutheran University." Was founded.
 * "The university has had nine chancellors including the incumbent John A. Pollack, who has served in this position since March 31, 2008. Wilfrid Laurier University has had seven presidents including the incumbent Max Blouw, who has served in this position since 2007." Commas before "including" (both times). Dabomb87 (talk) 15:40, 13 October 2008 (UTC)


 * All done. I think you mean commas before "including". Gary King ( talk ) 15:54, 13 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Yes I did. Dabomb87 (talk) 16:00, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

Comments - sources look okay, links checked out with the link checker tool. Ealdgyth - Talk 17:22, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

Oppose I know that education-related lists are difficult to make comprehensive – see the way I tried to demonstrate comprehensiveness on a previous nomination – but I'm having difficulty accepting, at present, that so few people from this university are notable in almost 100 years of history. BencherliteTalk 18:56, 13 October 2008 (UTC)
 * On my browser, there's a large white space between the "This is a dynamic list" and the table. Perhaps move the template above the sub-heading? (Update: I'll check appearance on my work browser tomorrow)
 * Image sizes shouldn't generally be specified. (Update: I'll check appearance on my work browser tomorrow; on my home computer, the specified images are looking tiny)
 * "Known for" shouldn't be a sortable column.
 * Having both "#" and "Term" as sortable in the Chancellors / Presidents tables is redundant. Well, if you insist...
 * Wikilinks to Chancellor and President – are these the best available links, or would Chancellor (education) and University president be better?
 * More fundamentally, I think this article fails the FL criteria on comprehensiveness:
 * Why isn't there an article on John Pollack?
 * Why aren't there articles on five three of the presidents?
 * When were the undergraduates / graduates there? What did they study? See e.g. List of Dartmouth College alumni or List of alumni of Jesus College, Oxford for what can be done.
 * Update: Thanks for adding the "discipline column in, but (a) what is "General" in this context? and (b) why have two names got dashes? BencherliteTalk 22:43, 22 October 2008 (UTC)
 * What efforts have been made to make this as comprehensive a list of notable faculty and alumni as possible? What sources have been consulted to try and find names to add to the list? Just looking at Category:Wilfrid Laurier University alumni, what about David Black (football player), Ken Evraire, Paul James (soccer), Dave Knechtel, Peter Mackie (soccer), and Chuck McMann?


 * I moved the dynamic list. The image size is set so that the image doesn't move on top of the table. I'll leave both "#" and "Term" sortable since it's more useful to have both sortable than one not sortable. Is it required for articles on every one of the chancellors and presidents to exist? Regarding the table, information isn't usually easily available about when the students were there. I've added in what their discipline was. To find these names, I've mostly scoured Wikipedia for biographies that have graduated from the school, as only people that already have an article should be included since they are already notable. I've added some more people to the list; it will never be completely comprehensive. Gary King ( talk ) 20:15, 13 October 2008 (UTC)


 * Simply relying on existing Wikipedia articles isn't enough to show "comprehensiveness" for me, I'm afraid. The missing chancellors and presidents are clear examples of articles that should exist.  People can be notable without having an article on Wikipedia, and lists of this sort need to set out as full a list of notable people associated with the university as possible.  Unlike other FLCs that we could mention, this means that much more preparatory legwork is required, since the missing articles need to be written about WLU people to start with (by you and / or others) to get a fuller list.  BencherliteTalk 21:23, 13 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Compared to Jesus College, Oxford, I don't think there are comprehensive lists of alumni of the school available for me to access for this, though. Gary King ( talk ) 21:40, 13 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Well, find the names yourself, then ;-) ! The Jesus College website list of alumni is quite short. So, to get around that, I've been (a) working through biographical dictionaries (such as the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography and the Dictionary of Welsh Biography), (b) searching online newspaper archives for obituaries or mentions of people that ought to have an article about them, and (c) reading the published histories of the college and the college's own publications; on Wikipedia, I've been checking (d) "What links here" for articles that haven't been properly categorized, plus of course (e) the alumni category. Whilst Jesus College is over 400 years old, it doesn't have that many students (at present, not more than about 500 at any one time, and much, much fewer than that in the past).  The Jesus College list isn't complete, but it's comprehensive. In contrast, we have just 22 notable former students in the 100-year history of WLU, with a current student population of 12,000? I'm sure that there are Canadian reference works and newspapers that can be checked for more names. What about (d)? And you hadn't even done (e) until I pointed it out! Are you really saying that this is a comprehensive list? BencherliteTalk 22:10, 13 October 2008 (UTC)
 * I'll do d) now. I did do e), at least when I first submitted the list for FLC a few months ago. I hadn't done it since then; the new names had the category added to them after the last FLC. Gary King ( talk ) 23:22, 13 October 2008 (UTC)
 * I spent a few hours looking for more names and have added them. Gary King ( talk ) 02:10, 14 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Well, that's a mild improvement. However, I note that, instead of creating further articles on Laurier people, or attempting to explain why this is a comprehensive list anyway, you've chosen to create other, easier, lists to get to FL status and given up on this one. My oppose stands. BencherliteTalk 22:43, 22 October 2008 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.