User talk:Helaine (Wiki Ed)

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Hi Helaine,

I am teaching a graduate level course where I would like to include creating a wikipedia article as an assignment. The course looks at issues pertaining to dictatorship, democracy and human rights in the Middle East, and I feel that my students could significantly contribute to the breadth of information on these issues available on Wikipedia. I 'think' I have designed a comprehensive assignment, based on reading many many other Wikipedia assignments. However, what I am struggling with at this point is gaining "course instructor rights" for the assignment. I have posted a request on the Education notice board, however I am not entirely clear on what happens next. Am I supposed to notify someone that I am seeking these rights? Please excuse me if this is an 'obvious' question but at this point I feel like I need some guidance. I was hoping that you might be able to help?

Thank you very much for your help. It is greatly appreciated! M0SN24-TD (talk) 13:58, 19 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

@M0SN24: I'm putting you in touch with TFlanagan-WMF. Wiki Ed only works with institutions in the U.S. and Canada. Good luck. Helaine (Wiki Ed) (talk) 18:03, 19 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Can you check my students edit counts on our WikiEdu dashboard? This is the second semester students are complaining that their edits are not tracked on the dashboard. Are we doing something wrong? https://dashboard.wikiedu.org/courses/Baruch_College-CUNY/Social_Inequality_SOC3156_(Winter_2017)

Amanda's count seems off and Brady said his was, too.--sheridanford (talk) 17:09, 23 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Can you check my students edit counts on our WikiEdu dashboard? This is the second semester students are complaining that their edits are not tracked on the dashboard. Are we doing something wrong? https://dashboard.wikiedu.org/courses/Baruch_College-CUNY/Social_Inequality_SOC3156_(Winter_2017)

@Sage (wiki Ed): Can you look into this? Thanks.Helaine (Wiki Ed) (talk) 17:48, 23 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Amanda's count seems off and Brady said his was, too.--sheridanford (talk) 17:10, 23 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

sheridanford — can you provide more detail about what seems incorrect? The dashboard seems to match up with the contribution histories for the ones I checked:

• Special:Contributions/BernieJerome
• Special:Contributions/Amandaxiaowenli

I note that for BernieJerome, some of the edits are very recent, and would not have shown up until a few hours after they were made; the dashboard updates its data several times per day, but new edits do not appear immediately.--Sage (Wiki Ed) (talk) 18:00, 23 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I think we figured out that we were reading recent edits as total edits.--sheridanford (talk) 16:23, 28 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Glad you figured it out. Helaine (Wiki Ed) (talk) 21:21, 30 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Helaine--I don't think our dashboard comes with a gradebook, right? Dr Aaij (talk) 18:59, 26 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Dr Aaij: right. We may eventually do some integration with course management systems like Canvas and Blackboard, but at this point, there's no grading features.--Sage (Wiki Ed) (talk) 19:01, 26 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks Sage. Dr Aaij (talk) 19:06, 26 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I was very surprised to see this. I see that you express the intention of "creating a neutral source of information" (my emphasis) and yet you also refer to "a historically unique U.S. President whose agenda has been explicitly anti-environmental, sexist, and racist". Do you think it is likely to be helpful to put that comment in a page for students, giving them the impression that such advocacy of a point of view is acceptable on Wikipedia? A number of editors have expressed concern about some of the pages created by students on that course, with several of the pages being subject to deletion discussions because they are perceived as being written to promote a point of view. It is impossible to know, but I wonder whether one of the causes of that problem may be presentation of the course to the students in a way which encourages them to see campaigning for a point of view as a legitimate aim. I am also bewildered as to how you can think that what you have said is compatible with your avowed aim of "creating a neutral source of information". Even more bewildering is your comment about "a neutral, well-documented record of the assaults on the environment and environmental justice expected to unfold early in the Trump Presidency." How on earth can you apply the word "neutral" while asserting that what you are referring to constitutes "assaults on the environment and environmental justice"? The editor who uses the pseudonym "JamesBWatson" (talk) 00:48, 7 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, JamesBWatson. Trying to get up to speed on what's going on with this class. We have multiple staff members focused on it this morning. Jumping in here just to clarify that Helaine did not write the page in question. She helped the instructor set up the course page, and so it was her account that appears as creator. The text was written by the instructor, however. Just wanted to clear that up -- we will be working to address the specific issues in other fora they've come up. Thanks. --Ryan (Wiki Ed) (talk) 13:38, 7 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

@Ryan (Wiki Ed): Thank you for that explanation. I did find it really surprising that someone with Helaine's experience would post the sort of content I referred to, and learning that she didn't makes much more sense. However, I suggest, Helaine, that this illustrates several examples of why it is not a good idea to allow your account to be used to post content written by someone else. For one thing, you are responsible for anything posted by your account, and are therefore likely to have to take the rap for anything unsuitable, and for another thing this hides the identity of the true editor responsible. Also, shared use of accounts is not permitted by Wikipedia policy. Obviously, there is no objection to your helping an inexperienced editor to design and write a page, but your account should not be the one which eventually saves the page when it has been written.

I am sure you both know far more than me both about how these educational projects work in general and about the details of this particular one, and I have no doubt that you are, as Ryan says, "trying to get up to speed on what's going on with this class", and I trust you will be able to resolve the difficulties with it. However, I do wonder how it came about that a project came to be set up, with the apparent blessing of members of the Wiki Education Foundation, when it appears to be run by one or more people with precious little idea of how Wikipedia works. For example, I have seen posts from someone using the title "professor" giving lavish praise to students for contributions which seem to me to fall foul of various Wikipedia guidelines and policies. It seems to me that nobody should teach a class to edit Wikipedia unless he or she already has a substantial knowledge of how Wikipedia works, including an awareness of all the key policies and guidelines. The editor who uses the pseudonym "JamesBWatson" (talk) 14:06, 7 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

@JamesBWatson: You raise a good point regarding potential problems arising when content is technically created on Wikipedia by someone who did not write it. The reason for it is technical (which, granted, does not create an exception to the rule). Instructors create course pages on the Wiki Ed Dashboard. That content is then mirrored on-wiki (for transparency and ease of linking to information, rather than functional reasons). If the instructor's account is not autoconfirmed, that content isn't created because the external link to the Dashboard triggers a CAPTCHA. So Helaine (or Samantha) does it. The identity thus isn't always visible in the history (at least not the first time around for the instructor), but the username is always linked in the "instructor" field of the course page. As there's already discussion of the particulars of this class ongoing at ENI and ANI, I'm going to defer to those for the rest (I just posted a response at ANI). --Ryan (Wiki Ed) (talk) 15:26, 7 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I notice that you're listed as a resource for this class. We've been having significant issues with students from it posting non-neutral material (see User talk:Burgesspfc and User talk:AngelicBeaver). Would you be able to give them some guidance on selecting appropriate article topics and writing about them in a neutral way? I've unfortunately had to delete quite a few promotional articles, and I'd much rather see it be handled by a soft word than the big hammer. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 04:10, 24 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

@Seraphimblade: Thanks for bringing this to our attention. User:Shalor (Wiki Ed) will reach out to the students, and I will reach out to the instructor. We'll keep you updated. Helaine (Wiki Ed) (talk) 16:47, 24 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Hi. I just found out about this class and the following community remedy. I was under the impression that all such classes had a page that listed the professor, the students, and the responsible party at WikiEd but none of that info is present and your name is the only one on the page history. Please explain. Chris Troutman (talk) 23:28, 3 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Chris. There are separate course pages for each section (e.g. Wikipedia:Wiki Ed/University of California, Berkeley/Environmental Justice Section 101 (Spring 2017)). There you can find the instructor, students, and Wiki Ed staff working with the class. I would have to defer to Helaine or Sage regarding why EJustice's userpage doesn't link to the section course pages or why the blank page you've linked to exists. --Ryan (Wiki Ed) (talk) 23:53, 3 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Hello Helaine, my name is Joseph Elias and I am currently pursuing an MFA in Performing Arts Management at Brooklyn College. I'm looking forward to learning more about Wikipedia as we complete our assignments this semester. Jre1991 (talk) 04:00, 2 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Hi there, Helaine! My name is Grace Riehl. I am a first-year MFA Performing Arts Management student at Brooklyn College. I am looking forward to working with you this semester as I improve a Wikipedia article. Thanks! GGRiehl (talk) 04:11, 11 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Hello, Helaine! My name is Emmaosmundson (talk) 02:06, 12 September 2017 (UTC)Emmaosmundson and I am a first year student pursuing my MFA in Performing Arts Management from Brooklyn College. I am very much looking forward to working with you this semester on this Wikipedia project. Thank you![reply]

I was wondering if you wouldn't mind taking a look at my sandbox and seeing if I am on the right track with the project. I have it laid out as a breakdown of all the nutrients needed for a lactating and gestating cat and a brief description of the nutrients provided in the diet. Is this the correct way to go about setting up the page? Thank you, Heather — Preceding unsigned comment added by Hgozzard (talk • contribs) 02:37, 21 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Hello, you should reach out to Ian (Wiki Ed). 2603:3024:1D00:A900:26:CB63:A7FA:34E (talk) 17:40, 21 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Helaine, My group is working on Low Protein for Cats that we would like to add to the wiki page cat food. We would greatly appreciate it if you could reveiw our work that is on my sandbox before we add it to the cat food page. Thanks, Mfox03 (talk) 16:10, 28 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, you should reach out to Ian (Wiki Ed), the Wikipedia expert for your course in order to have your work reviewed. Good luck. Helaine (Wiki Ed) (talk) 16:41, 28 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Hello,

Your account is currently configured with an education program flag. This system (the Courses system) is being deprecated. As such, your account will soon be updated to remove these no longer supported flags. For details on the changes, and how to migrate to using the replacement system (the Programs and Events Dashboard) please see Wikipedia:Education noticeboard/Archive 18#NOTICE: EducationProgram extension is being deprecated.

Thank you! Sent by: xaosflux 20:28, 8 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Helaine. My name is Toby. I'm in Amy Hughes' Theatre History course this fall.--Tobymsinger (talk) 02:13, 4 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Helaine! My name is Praycious and I am also in Amy Hughes' Theatre History course this fall. Just wanted to stop by to say hello! --Pawilsong (talk) 02:36, 5 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

The students in this class seem to be involved in creating multiple duplicate articles. Could you please figure out what's going on there. DGG ( talk ) 20:24, 23 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I am teaching using Wikipedia for the first time and up until now this has been a good experience. A Wikipedia editor MPS1992 has come out last evening and attacked me and my students. On my talk page, he accused me of not being a professional and accused my students of randomly wrecking Wikipedia. They have worked with me for months coming up with the edits that they want to make and their projects are due tomorrow. I know that I will still be able to see their edits if someone deletes all of them, but I am concerned that this user is reacting quite harshly to them and to me.

One student that he seems particularly concerned about is a young woman that I have who is working on Tupac Amaru II. She is a Spanish major and went to great lengths to find a Spanish source (the only one that she could locate) that she duly translated and then put the information completely in her own words. There does not seem to be any warnings about translated material in the WikiEducation pages. I am having trouble seeing how it is different from high-quality English sources that one would use for facts that one is putting into their own words. Could you please explain this to me?Sheddedl (talk) 13:45, 23 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]

(by talk reader) @Sheddedl: The editing by Mcadden at Túpac Amaru II was generally unhelpful and rightfully reverted. Mass removals of cited text, which Mcadden is guilty of, is typically considered vandalism. The lack of any edit summaries hurts the collaborative nature of the project. Mcadden never gained consensus for their edits and, as the classroom deadline loomed, they made a series of unhelpful edits which our long-term editor had to repair. This sort of student behavior sours the opinion of our volunteers on educational outreach. Your misguided defense of your students does not endear you to our community, either. Regarding translating sources, the issues seems to be that the language intended probably mimicked the flowery language of the source itself, in violation of WP:NPOV and WP:PUFF. Wikipedia welcomes offline (hardcopy) sources as well as sources in foreign languages but the text added in Wikipedia's voice cannot parrot the source, especially without quotations. This is the sort of issue that should have been diligently worked out on the article's talk page in early to mid-April, rather than a dump of edits yesterday. That you worked with these students is irrelevant here on-wiki; your naivete speaks to the fact that you are an outsider who really needed a campus ambassador. Chris Troutman (talk) 14:17, 23 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]

• Hi! I've responded to this here. Shalor (Wiki Ed) (talk) 19:40, 23 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Helaine. I came across this sandbox while checking on some non-free content flagged as possible WP:NFCC#9 violations. It appears that Sairam Pamulaparthi Venkata is a student that you and Ian (Wiki Ed) are helping out. Perhaps one of you could explain that non-free content can only be used in accordance with WP:NFCC. In addition, the overall tone of the draft has more of a research paper feel to it than a Wikipedia article, but that's just my intial impression from a quick glance of the article. Maybe this can be addressed appropriate by the creator as explained in WP:JARGON. -- Marchjuly (talk) 06:27, 7 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Marchjuly: I took a shot at both of these issues with the user in question. Ian (Wiki Ed) (talk) 20:30, 7 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you Ian. -- Marchjuly (talk) 02:53, 8 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Hi. It looks like some of the students on these courses haven't been warned about the Wikipedia:No original research guidelines, or maybe just haven't understood. It would be helpful if this advice could be reiterated to them. Deb (talk) 07:45, 6 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

• Hi Deb - thank you for letting us know about this, however I don't see the specific course you're referring to. Can you link to one of the students or their work? Shalor (Wiki Ed) (talk) 13:06, 8 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Sorry for delay in responding. I'm specifically talking about this user, who has had some of her work deleted already. Deb (talk) 16:26, 8 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Helaine, I am in the History of science course and I worked with Shalor on my first article and I was wondering if you could look at my second article in my sandbox and give me some feedback on how to improve it.Ab3l100 (talk) 23:43, 26 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Shalor (Wiki Ed) Can you look at this student's work? Thanks. Helaine (Wiki Ed) (talk) 20:40, 29 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

• Done and done! Shalor (Wiki Ed) (talk) 20:54, 29 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

User:Alisontrinh, who i beinevce is in this course where you are listed as Wiki-ed staff, has had some negative reactions to his or her editing, particularly on the article Web Developer. I think some of these are beign overstated by other editors, but copyright issues are involved, and a block from editing could conceivably result. I urge you to review the user's contributions and talk page, and discuss with the user and/or the instructor. DES ^(talk)_{DESiegel Contribs} 20:18, 26 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Ian (Wiki Ed) Can you look into this? Thanks. Helaine (Wiki Ed) (talk) 19:51, 2 December 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Any help you can give to get the attention of User:Bassmaster1822 would be appreciated. Thanks. Magnolia677 (talk) 22:12, 4 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@Ian (Wiki Ed): Can you look into this? Thanks. Helaine (Wiki Ed) (talk) 18:22, 7 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]

User:MarvellousIgwe posted at the Teahouse today, asking about getting s draft accepted, which si fine. The draft looks better than many that AfC reviewers see, although there are some format issues. But I suspect thsat the tiemfram for AfC revciew and acceptancve has not bene made clear to thjis student, and perhaps not to others in University_of_Kentucky/African_American_History,_1865_to_the_Present_(Spring). It is not reasonable to expect AfC approval while a single-semester class is still in session, as you no doubt know. An individual experienced editor, such as myself, might be able to get this reviewed more rapidly. DES ^(talk)_{DESiegel Contribs} 16:49, 8 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@Shalor (Wiki Ed): Can you look into this? Thanks. Helaine (Wiki Ed) (talk) 17:14, 8 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

To be clear, @Shalor (Wiki Ed):, I am offering to help here with the draft. I have done a fair amount of AfC reviewing, I have done soem mentorinmg, i worked with a few cvlases back when the courses module was deployed, and I am a fairly experienced editor and admin here on en.Wikipedia. The draft is not that far from being ready to approve. I raised this here mostly because I think there was a communication failure which is always a risk with campus editors, and perhaps even m,ore so now with everything being remote. DES ^(talk)_{DESiegel Contribs} 17:56, 8 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

• @DESiegel: this is usually done by accident, by students who use the draftspace and think that they're contacting us rather than putting it through AfC. It also sometimes happens when they start a draft in their userspace and use the sandbox draft template (not the WikiEd) one that allows them to submit it to AfC, as they'll also click that thinking they're contacting us. I try to catch this and add the proper template as soon as I can, but sometimes I'll miss some. I will review our training modules and see if this can be more clearly specified, though. Shalor (Wiki Ed) (talk) 19:00, 8 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I was quite concerned to read the plan posted at [[Talk:Mouth-to-mouth resuscitation #Osmosis Wikipedia Editing Course June 2020. Can you make sure that the students understand WP:NOT, please? It seems that student was unaware of a fairly fundamental policy.

Looking at your dashboard in the Peer review an article section, I think there's a word missing from "Make sure sources are primary" that could leave the students with the wrong impression of WP:MEDRS.

Let me know if you are having any problems, or post at The Doctors' Mess – I know the regulars there are keen to help proactively prevent problems, rather than cleaning them up afterwards. Cheers --RexxS (talk) 22:31, 15 June 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for this message. Looping in the professor @AminMDMA: who has been running Wikipedia assignments for years and who will be happy to address any concerns you have. Helaine (Wiki Ed) (talk) 23:05, 15 June 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for catching that typo in my course dashboard. I work closely every week with my students to ensure adherence to Wiki editing norms, including Wikiproject Medicine's manual of style. I insist they post their workplans on the talk pages (instead of privately to me) so that all Wikipedians can be welcoming of our new student editors. I will be working closely with this cohort of students tomorrow and will happily remind them of the policies. Cheers. AminMDMA (talk) 00:09, 16 June 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@AminMDMA and Helaine (Wiki Ed): thanks for the quick responses. It might be worth your while introducing yourself to the WPMED folks and just giving a heads-up about the ongoing course. If I can just be pedantic for a moment, WP:MEDRS is a site-wide guideline, not belonging to WPMED of course, and it applies to medical content anywhere in Wikipedia. Cheers --RexxS (talk) 00:25, 16 June 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, it appears that one of the students in the Wikipedia:Wiki_Ed/Ohio_State_University/Research_Collaborative_on_African_Scientists_and_HIV-AIDS_(Summer_2020) wrote this article and submitted it to Did You Know?. I just reviewed the article and find that it is completely based on primary references and does not seem to meet GNG. The page creator has not edited since June 17, so unless someone wants to adopt the DYK nomination, it will probably be closed as unsuccessful. Thanks, Yoninah (talk) 21:59, 15 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Yoninah Thanks for bringing this to our attention. I'll reach out to the instructor and see what we can do. Helaine (Wiki Ed) (talk) 22:24, 17 July 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Hello, and welcome to Wikipedia. This is a notice that the page you created, Wikipedia:Wiki Ed/TEST123/Test (TEST3fw2), was tagged as a test page under section G2 of the criteria for speedy deletion and has been or soon may be deleted. Please use the sandbox for any other tests you want to do. Take a look at the welcome page if you would like to learn more about contributing to our encyclopedia.

If you think this page should not be deleted for this reason, you may contest the nomination by visiting the page and clicking the button labelled "Contest this speedy deletion". This will give you the opportunity to explain why you believe the page should not be deleted. However, be aware that once a page is tagged for speedy deletion, it may be deleted without delay. Please do not remove the speedy deletion tag from the page yourself, but do not hesitate to add information in line with Wikipedia's policies and guidelines. If the page is deleted, and you wish to retrieve the deleted material for future reference or improvement, then please contact the deleting administrator, or if you have already done so, you can place a request here. DannyS712 (talk) 00:56, 11 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Women Scientists course says Hi from Portland OR. You are named as a mentor yet it appears that only WikiEd Ian is active so I thought a fresh person would be OK (avoid his burnout?) I chose to practice my new WP skills with an edit on WP scientist Georgia_Mason. After a careful search of the suggested secondary and tertiary sources we have at our Univ library I was not able to find additional source material. How do I "refute" or argue against the assertion? Researchers can only attempt this a "reasonable" number of times before we quit trying? To my way of thinking, the accomplishments are well documented and her work is adequate to remain notable...Thanks Cafe.doppio (talk) 16:06, 22 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, if you cannot find the necessary secondary sources to support notability, then I'm afraid you'll run into issues even if you think the person is notable. This is all too common with women scientists. Ian (Wiki Ed) anything to add? Helaine (Wiki Ed) (talk) 16:43, 22 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks Helaine-this is a known and accepted person so I do not have to jump any hurdles; wondering how a researcher should document their perception/effort that no other citations-references exist? Should one do this and will it save another "futile" search?Cafe.doppio (talk) 21:38, 22 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Cafe.doppio, sadly, if there aren't reliable sources we can't write an article about someone, even if their work in important. That's the unfortunately reality of Wikipedia editing. Ian (Wiki Ed) (talk) 22:19, 22 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Helaine: would you please look over my Georgia Mason talk page entry https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Georgia_Masonand my sandbox proposed new page (just references) [[2]] and commentCafe.doppio (talk) 23:38, 24 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

You should direct these types of questions to Ian (Wiki Ed). Thanks. Helaine (Wiki Ed) (talk) 17:16, 26 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@MethanoJen: I previously posted this at User talk:MethanoJen#Biogeochemical Cycles, where it was ignored:

Please see my edit of Wikipedia:Wiki Ed/Georgia Institute of Technology/Biogeochemical Cycles (Spring 2019). I believe my fix cleans up the display of this article and it fixes an Unclosed quote in heading lint error. I realize this article is created from another source, viz: [3]. I encourage you to make the corresponding fix there. —Anomalocaris (talk) 09:37, 10 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Now, please see my edit of 07:33, 16 November 2020‎ and my edit of 23:10, 3 December 2020‎, both of which which clean up the display of this article and fix an Unclosed quote in heading lint error. I realize this article is created from another source, viz: [4]. I encourage you to make the corresponding fix there. This is necessary to solve a serious issue. Please go to the article history and look at your version. Everything in the table of contents after Assignment 3, and the entire body of the page, is in bold italics. I fixed this, but it needs to be fixed in the source page. —Anomalocaris (talk) 23:23, 3 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Anomalocaris: thanks for letting us know. Looks like it was a case of buggy conversion from HTML to wikitext (which the Dashboard does using Pandoc). I tweaked the formatting on that block on the Dashboard, and it looks like that removed the linting error.--Sage (Wiki Ed) (talk) 16:53, 4 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Sage (Wiki Ed): MethanoJen recreated the page at 21:04, 13 January 2021‎, and the error has returned. Please fix the source page and re-create the target page. If the whole page (following Assignment 3 in the Table of Contents) is in bold italics, you haven't fixed it. I don't use watchlists, so please ping me when you are done.—Anomalocaris (talk) 09:09, 14 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Anomalocaris: fixed.--Sage (Wiki Ed) (talk) 16:41, 14 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Sage (Wiki Ed): Thanks! Another suggestion, which very likely applies to other pages in your universe as well: There are three mentions of "four tildes" followed by signatures, which leads me to suspect that markup intended to display four tildes (~~~~) actually is four tildes, which get converted to a signature. Fix this by escaping the 2nd or 3rd tilde with ~. —Anomalocaris (talk) 21:17, 14 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Helaine Just a quick note if you're moving a page to somebodies sandbox, it needs to be a "/" to distinguish it as a subpage, i.e. User:Logitech322/North American Indigenous hairstyles--Jac16888 ^Talk 17:40, 1 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Oh thank you for this. I totally missed that. Helaine (Wiki Ed) (talk) 17:48, 4 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I've just renamed the account of a student enrolled on https://dashboard.wikiedu.org/courses/UCSF/Foundations_II_(Summer_2021) where the students are advised :

Account name specifics: Include your FIRST INITIAL and LAST NAME in your account name (we do not recommend using your first name). If you have a common last name, you can add special characters, spacing, or additional information to generate a unique username,...

This is contrary to the advice of WP:REALNAME. It's also not the first time I've encountered students who thought they MUST use their real name to edit Wikipedia. Could you ensure that Wikiedu's advice/requirements are aligned with Wikipedia's? Cabayi (talk) 07:56, 8 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@Cabayi: thanks for letting me know about this. I will reach out to the instructor. We do not recommend this at all. Helaine (Wiki Ed) (talk) 17:53, 8 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I note it also says If you happen to have a Wikipedia account already, we recommend creating and using a different account just for this course. That should at least include a caution to read the multiple account policy and ensure to comply with it. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 18:06, 8 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

thanks.Helaine (Wiki Ed) (talk) 18:51, 8 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Another request, from a student on the same course, has come in:

Need to use an account throughout my college education to edit Wikipedia and it needs to reflect my last name and year of graduation. Thank you.

The advice on the course page hasn't changed. If anything, the additional specific and year of graduation implies tha same requirement is still being forced on the students elsewhere. I have no desire to pile unnecessary stress on the student who is trying to comply, so I'll carry out the renaming, somewhat reluctantly.

Pinging the instructors, AminMDMA (talk · contribs), DLuong, OEIS (talk · contribs), Health Economics and Policy (talk · contribs), Health policy (talk · contribs), HermistonM (talk · contribs), Mijatr0n (talk · contribs), SlySAG (talk · contribs), in the hope they'll take this on board. Unfortunately, we once again have a set of instructors who are (for the most part) inactive on Wikipedia instructing students how to do so. On past experience, inactive equates to being unresponsive to the wider community. Cabayi (talk) 05:51, 24 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

A username request from a student on https://dashboard.wikiedu.org/courses/Palo_Alto_University/Foundations_of_Clinical_Trauma_Psychology_(Fall_2021) stating:

My class requires that I use my first and last name as my username

Could you steer them right regarding WP:REALNAME please? Cabayi (talk) 07:20, 10 September 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Just reached out to the professor. Thanks. Helaine (Wiki Ed) (talk) 16:29, 10 September 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• Another user being strong-armed, this time from https://dashboard.wikiedu.org/courses/DePaul_University/Bilingualism_in_the_Spanish-speaking_world_(Autumn_Quarter_2021)

Could you work your magic, please? Cabayi (talk) 06:49, 16 September 2021 (UTC)[reply]

 You are invited to join the discussion at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Lisa Couturier. -- Marchjuly (talk) 02:56, 8 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Helaine. Just letting you and Ian (Wiki Ed) know about this as courtesy since the article in question was created by a student participating in Wikipedia:Wiki Ed/Texas Tech University/Introduction to Livable Futures (Fall). -- Marchjuly (talk) 02:59, 8 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks Marchjuly. I get notifications on student work being AFD'd. While I will sometimes give advice to students on how to fix the problems that got the work nominated, I don't believe that it's appropriate to weigh in except to correct misconceptions about student work. I believe that advocating for inclusion or for any particular content to stay in Wikipedia would raise COI issues (it would raise a question of whether I am acting the best interests of Wikipedia, or of my employer). In addition, making this a bright-line issue is important for our relationship with program participants - being able to say "we can't advocate for any particular content" is important. In particular, if a donor was able to say "I've given you money, now fix this article about me", our programme would be in an untenable position. (I'm speaking in a personal capacity here, not on behalf of the organisation, but I think this is pretty much the org's position.) Ian (Wiki Ed) (talk) 15:42, 8 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Ian. Thank you for responding. FWIW, I wasn't notifying you and Helaine about this to try and get one or both of you to go WP:!VOTE in that AfD. This student in question also created Draft:Lisa Couturier about the same time and submitted it for AfC reviewer a few minutes after creating the article. I'm not sure if this meant that the student felt they created the article prematurely by mistake or whether there was another reason for doing so (e.g. told so by their instructor or classmate). Anyway, I thought that someone from Wiki Ed might be better at figuring out why this happened. I should've been more specific about that in my original post and apologize for not doing so. -- Marchjuly (talk) 00:12, 9 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]

The 12 Days of Wikipedia On the 12th day of Christmas Jimbo sent to me 12 BLPs 11 RFAs 10 New Users 9 Barnstars 8 Admins Blocking 7 Socks Socking 6 Clerks Clerking 5 Check Users Checking 4 Oversighters Hiding 3 GAs 2 Did You Knows and an ARB in a pear tree. -May your holiday season be filled with joy, laughter and good health.--ReaderofthePack(formerly Tokyogirl79) (｡◕‿◕｡) 13:51, 29 December 2021 (UTC)[reply] This message was generated using {{subst: The 12 Days of Wikipedia}}

Hi Helaine,

My name is Amalia and I am currently enrolled in Biochemistry I with Professor Haffa. As a part of class we are required to update a wikipedia page on a protein or protein complex. Are we allowed to use primary sources when editing wikipedia? I am having trouble finding cited articles pertaining to my protein complex. — Preceding unsigned comment added by ASeigel (talk • contribs) 19:31, 22 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]

HI there. Literature reviews are definitely the preferred source, but if you're unable to find any, there are cases you can use primary research. You want to make sure that any primary articles you use are well-accepted within the academic community. @Ian (Wiki Ed):, can you advise? Thanks. Helaine (Wiki Ed) (talk) 21:22, 22 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@ASeigel It depends on what you mean by "cited articles" and "primary sources". Secondary sources are preferable, but research articles that, e.g., elucidate protein structures are usable in articles about protein structure. But it's important not to go beyond what the article reports - ignore the speculation in the discussion section - the mights and the maybes. Ian (Wiki Ed) (talk) 15:29, 23 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Hi. This article was deleted for numerous reasons but User:Casanova0 does not seem to understand why. It would probably help if you could discourage students from putting their work straight into article space when they have barely started. They should use Wikipedia:Articles for Creation. Deb (talk) 06:46, 16 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for letting me know. @Ian (Wiki Ed):, can you look into this?Helaine (Wiki Ed) (talk) 18:30, 16 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@Deb I left them some feedback. I don't think they shouldn't be creating a new article at all, and it looks like they haven't gone through our trainings or use our tools for drafting. Ian (Wiki Ed) (talk) 18:49, 16 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Hi. Further to that, I've just draftified a couple of articles by students that were moved straight from their sandboxes into article space. There are still some in article space that are borderline. Are the students being encouraged not to use Wikipedia:Articles for Creation or is someone with appropriate experience actively reviewing all their work? Deb (talk) 18:43, 23 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:Wiki Ed/Northern Arizona University/CRISIS COMMUNICATION (Fall 2022). Were you aware there was a public relations professional who attempted for many years to edit Wikipedia, openly as a paid editor, under the terms of a prp code of behavior? See User:CorporateM. David may be willing to be a case study or other resource. The nicest fellow, and an accomplished wikipedian (and all of his edits are in page history...) Just thought his case should be on your radar. BusterD (talk) 01:41, 22 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I noticed this because one of your students has chosen McKinsey as a subject matter, and David is a guiding contributor to that page, editing openly as a paid editor. It's a unique and intriguing opportunity for examination. BusterD (talk) 01:54, 22 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I would hope WikiEd would do better. Chris Troutman (talk) 02:05, 22 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I'd be glad to engage with you on this, Chris, but this is probably not the best forum in which to disagree, other than linking our discussion for transparency. Every editor has their faults, but my interactions with David were excellent. I believe my OP here is 100% accurate. Was he an influential editor on McKinsey? Yes. Was he an excellent and productive wikipedian? Yes. Did he try to do the right thing? Absolutely. If you'd like to engage, please take this to my talk. BusterD (talk) 17:23, 22 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Since Chris has chosen so far NOT to engage further (than vague dissing here) on this subject, I'll opine that because such well-known and experienced editors as Chris troutman and I should disagree about this user's behavior makes it even more intriguing to investigate from the standpoint of public relations professionals. Note I brought this to the attention of the cooperating teacher, not the student... BusterD (talk) 10:54, 23 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I've struck my comment as it appears I misunderstood your point. Chris Troutman (talk) 14:36, 23 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Hi @BusterD. I think I was vaguely aware of his work, but I certainly had no idea that he had done as much as he had. Helaine, by the way, manages the programme; she isn't actually the instructor - that would be @Zhanjenxu. I think they might find this interesting, but as a first-time instructor they also might not be aware of things like WP:PAID (which is important context here).

I do think the handful of white-hat PR people on Wikipedia would make an interesting case study. Ian (Wiki Ed) (talk) 14:19, 24 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for pinging the person with a reason to be aware, or perhaps interested, in the situation. Thanks for helping me understand the organizational chart a bit, as well. I've wondered for a while, and sometimes asked other Wiki Ed folks, how those of us on the ground might be of service to Wiki Ed's mission, without unduly skewing the data. I'm certain there are long timers who's prefer NOT to (or should not) be group mentors/teaching assistants. I would think there are willing older contributors like myself, folks who expect to be spending more time at keyboard over the next few years, already trusted by the community, and who have every reason to see Wiki Ed succeed. BusterD (talk) 17:24, 24 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:Wiki Ed/Siena College/Traditional Chinese Medicine (Fall 2022), a page which you created or substantially contributed to, has been nominated for deletion. Your opinions on the matter are welcome; you may participate in the discussion by adding your comments at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Wiki Ed/Siena College/Traditional Chinese Medicine (Fall 2022) and please be sure to sign your comments with four tildes (~~~~). You are free to edit the content of Wikipedia:Wiki Ed/Siena College/Traditional Chinese Medicine (Fall 2022) during the discussion but should not remove the miscellany for deletion template from the top of the page; such a removal will not end the deletion discussion. Thank you. jps (talk) 00:59, 5 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, Helaine. I'm a long-time Wikipedia editor active in WikiProject Mexico and Texas. I'm very interested in helping at Wiki Edu as a facilitator / staff member in a variety of topics including history and social science. Several years back I used to help out Dr. Chat Tew (User:Crtew) and his students from the University of Southern Indiana write articles about Mexican/Latin American journalist bios and press freedom topics.

I tried to log-in through the portal and see if there was an option to sign up as a facilitator / staff member, but I only saw options to proceed as Instructor or Student.

What's the process to formally help you and others at Wiki Edu? I'm happy to answer any questions you may have, speak offline, and/or share more information on my background and areas of expertise/interest. Kind regards, Morogris (✉ • ✎) 05:54, 23 February 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, thanks so much for reaching out and for your offer of help! We no longer have formal ways for volunteer editors to help out, but you can of course provide feedback to students working on articles in your volunteer capacity. Friendly voices are always welcome! Helaine (Wiki Ed) (talk) 19:52, 23 February 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Chapmansh, Helaine (Wiki Ed): Wikipedia:Wiki Ed/Chapman University/Jewish Life from Napoleon to Hitler (Spring 2023) included several lint errors, and I fixed them, but the fixes will get overwritten unless someone fixes the source, and I don't know where that is, so I am writing to you two to encourage someone to fix these issues in the source.

Wiki markup does not allow bold ('''...''') and italics (''...'') to wrap newlines. Opening bold or italics without closing results in a missing end tag lint error. These are the sorts of errors I fixed. You can go to the page history and click on "prev" next to my edit to see my changes, and then copy them into the source. I see that Jonesey95 also fixed errors, probably in a way even better than I did, but their changes were overwritten.

Except for one bold markup that started in the middle of a word, all I fixed was lint errors. But there are other changes that should be made. The Manual of Style calls for using the en dash (–) for ranges and to indicate abrupt changes of thought. I'd encourage someone to look for space hyphen space (" - ") and change such occurrences to space en dash space (" – "). Use unspaced en dash for ranges such as 18th-19th centuries, 2-3 Wiki pages, 300-500 word essay. Cheers! —Anomalocaris (talk) 06:41, 27 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Anomalocaris, also see this discussion. – Jonesey95 (talk) 13:14, 27 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Jonesey95: Thanks. I added a comment to that discussion. —Anomalocaris (talk) 18:28, 27 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]

@Jonesey95, @Anomalocaris, and @Helaine (Wiki Ed), anything I should be doing on my end? Thanks! Chapmansh (talk) 15:23, 31 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Chapmansh: If you have access to the page(s) that get(s) converted to Wikipedia:Wiki Ed/Chapman University/Jewish Life from Napoleon to Hitler (Spring 2023), fix it/them as discussed here. —Anomalocaris (talk) 15:56, 31 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Draft:A Nuance Approach to Restorative Justice in US, a page which you created or substantially contributed to, has been nominated for deletion. Your opinions on the matter are welcome; you may participate in the discussion by adding your comments at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Draft:A Nuance Approach to Restorative Justice in US and please be sure to sign your comments with four tildes (~~~~). You are free to edit the content of Draft:A Nuance Approach to Restorative Justice in US during the discussion but should not remove the miscellany for deletion template from the top of the page; such a removal will not end the deletion discussion. Thank you.

This draft seems to have been written as part of a WikiEdu course, Equitable Futures - Internet Cultures and Open Access (Spring 2023), where you are listed as staff. Your input would be appreciated in the discussion. Thank you. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 15:59, 6 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]

We've reached the end of October's start-of-courses period and this season I have not come across any WikiEDU students being coerced by their professors to change their usernames. Many thanks to you and to Ian (Wiki Ed) for your efforts to get this sorted. Cabayi (talk) 13:02, 2 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Glad you didn't see any instances of this so far. Helaine (Wiki Ed) (talk) 15:26, 2 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]

There is currently a discussion at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents regarding plagiarism and copyright violations by User:Sedvabs, who is a member of a WikiEdu course on which you are listed as staff. The thread is Plagiarism and copyright violations by User:Sedvabs. Thank you. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 21:42, 6 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks very much for the heads up on this. We're looking into it. Helaine (Wiki Ed) (talk) 22:45, 6 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

[5]? Doug Weller talk 14:59, 11 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Polygnotus (talk) 05:38, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Hello! Have we ever worked with the First Nations University of Canada? I've had a chat with an expert of education in Canada and I discovered that the Squamish language is being taught to hundreds of speakers with funds from Squamish nation. And also the university has a program teaching teachers in various indigenous languages so that there are up to 10 grades being taught fully in indigenous language. This means thousands of students who could be enlisted to translate on translatewiki.net and then maybe get active on the Wiktionary language editions we have in some (but surprisingly few) of those languages.

(I'm asking you after I found an old article of yours.) Nemo 15:57, 2 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

We do have one class there but would love to work with more if you know of any people we can be in touch with.Helaine (Wiki Ed) (talk) 16:24, 2 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks! I'll let you know if I hear more. Nemo 05:35, 20 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, the current run of the Wikipedia:Database reports/Polluted categories report is picking up an extremely large number of user sandbox pages associated with the Renaissance Art WikiEd project which are showing up in categories despite WP:USERNOCAT specifying that user sandbox pages aren't allowed to be filed in categories.

Since you're listed as one of the WikiEd coordinators for that project, could you please take a moment to ensure that the students in that project know not to place their sandboxes in categories? Thanks. Bearcat (talk) 16:57, 5 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Hi @Bearcat, Apologies for this. Our trainings instruct students to not copy over entire articles. I've emailed the instructor to make sure we're on the same page about this. Ty! Brianda (Wiki Ed) (talk) 20:40, 8 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Just to be clear, it isn't necessarily that they've "copied over" entire articles — it's just that they're placing categories at the bottom of their draft works. Categories should be added only if and when the page is actually being moved into mainspace as a real article, and can't be on the page while it's still a work in progress in their own personal sandbox. Bearcat (talk) 20:45, 8 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Hello, I came across this page and noticed a typo. It seems be be replicated from here but I'm not sure how to edit that.

"Students are charges with writing an entry as part of our class Wikipedia Campaign Entry."

Thanks, OXYLYPSE (talk) 22:17, 23 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

It's fixed. Thanks. Helaine (Wiki Ed) (talk) 20:07, 24 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]