Wikipedia talk:Requested moves/University of Maryland, College Park

This poll is being created on the basis of previous discussion at Talk:University of Maryland, College Park. Please refer to that page if interested in a history of these discussions.

Long names - formal university use or statute use?
University & College Names

'':In many cases, a well-known university may adopt a short form of its name, even though this may create some ambiguity with similarly named schools (e.g. University of Texas (at Austin) vs. University of Texas at Dallas). In such cases, Wikipedia prefers that the insititution's full name (e.g. "University of Texas at Austin") be used in most cases where the possibility of ambiguity exists, even though many users may be unfamiliar with the long form of the name. The short name (e.g. "University of Texas") should be reserved for either a disambiguation page or a page dedicated to the organization governing the related universities.''

I'm a little confused as here in the UK there are a lot of cases where the formal name of a university as listed in the statutes is not the same as the one used by the university in all current signage and literature. The problem is convoluted further by colloquial usage of old names.

Amongst those possibly affected are the following:


 * Queen Mary, University of London (my own institution) - which itself now never uses Queen Mary & Westfield College (with or without University of London) but a) this name is still in the statutes; and b) a lot of alumni & people outside the college still call it that.
 * Royal Holloway, University of London - formerly Royal Holloway & Bedford New College in almost the same situation, though the "New Bedford" title still appears on the campus gates.
 * Birkbeck, University of London vs Birkbeck College (which we have up at just Birkbeck). Not sure about the statutes, but even the main buidling still has the historic "Birkbeck College"; however all literature goes for the formal title.
 * Lancaster University vs University of Lancaster and many similar cases. Again statute vs current university usage.
 * University of Kent vs University of Kent at Canterbury (my alma mater) - not sure if the statutes have been changed, but the latter title is now confusingly used to mean the Canterbury campus.

Under this vote which would be used?

Timrollpickering 10:21, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)


 * Tim, we haven't really been considering non-US naming conventions, but I suspect the operative phrase may be "where the possiblity of ambiguity exsist". Even if that portion of the poll were endorsed, I wouldn't expect it to have any effect unless the short/common name was creating ambiguities with respect to other similarly named instituions.  Is that the case with respect to any of the examples you have cited?  Dragons flight 19:15, Mar 26, 2005 (UTC)


 * I read the original wording differently at first but University of Kent at Canterbury might be one - for many years this term was heavily in use for the institution and the standard abbreviation was "UKC" which had massive prominence. Now there has been a drive to change that to University of Kent with the abbreviation "Kent" (even the website and email addresses have switched) and the term "University of Kent at Canterbury" is formally used to refer to the Canterbury site (whilst "University of Kent at Medway" was introduced for the new campus). The newness of Medway complicates matters further. Timrollpickering 22:21, 26 Mar 2005 (UTC)


 * Well that sounds a lot like Maryland, and hopefully the poll as written will provide some feedback regarding how to deal with that situation. Dragons flight 23:33, Mar 26, 2005 (UTC)

Hey Tim, I think we're restricting this to the United States - creeping Americocentrism in not clarifying that. I'll make it clear. john k 16:25, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I would have to agree. British names further complicate this problem, and it should probably be solved separately. -Howardjp 16:47, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Suitable Poll
I think the language has been cleaned up to the point this is a good poll. -Howardjp 17:07, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Poll is open
Since we have gone two days without any additional significant comments on the language of the poll, I have decided to open it. I will now be going around and posting references to the poll in the relevant places. Dragons flight 17:02, Mar 27, 2005 (UTC)

don't put discussions in the main namespace
don't put discussions in the main namespace. Dunc|&#9786; 20:39, 27 Mar 2005 (UTC)