Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/The Fenn School

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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 delete. Spartaz Humbug! 05:53, 25 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The Fenn School[edit]

The Fenn School (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log)
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Seems like just another private school. It does serve grade 9, but in a context more like a junior high school than a high school. Redirect or delete. Raymie (t • c) 07:01, 17 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

  • The generally accepted threshold for a high school is Grade 10 so the description as a 'junior high school' or 'middle school' is fine. TerriersFan (talk) 02:48, 18 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete See common outcomes. This is an elementary/middle school and no notability is demonstrated. If not deleted, it needs to be severely shortened as it reads like a school prospectus at the moment. asnac (talk) 07:59, 17 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Schools-related deletion discussions. — —Tom Morris (talk) 14:44, 17 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Massachusetts-related deletion discussions. — • Gene93k (talk) 19:33, 17 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep Looking at Education in the United States, Grade 9 equates to children aged 14-15. If this school was in the United Kingdom, then the school would be classed as a secondary (US = High) school, and would be notable. It seems that WP:SCHOOLS may need to revise its notability criteria to create a uniform standard worldwide. Mjroots (talk) 09:17, 18 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
    • This would go against WP:NHS - 'A high school is defined as a school that provides the earliest recognized certification of educational attainment, whether referred to as a school leaving certificate, high school diploma, High School Leaving Certificate, General Certificate of Secondary Education, or IB Diploma Programme.'. This school isn't a high school. asnac (talk) 18:01, 18 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
      • In some public school districts, junior high or middle schools — not secondary institutions like high schools — serve grade 9. A major Arizona school district recently moved its 9th graders back to high schools after 27 years of serving them in their junior highs. In some special cases, entire campuses are dedicated to 9th grade, usually due to capacity issues (see Humble High School — that district moved its ninth graders into new high school space from two dedicated campuses. One became a middle school and the other a new high school.) This institution serves grade 9 in a context more like a junior high than a senior high school. Raymie (t • c) 23:54, 18 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
        • OK, I should have put a question mark after "High" above. My argument still holds, WP:NHS does not give a uniform level of notability worldwide. I've raised this at Wikipedia talk:Schools. Mjroots (talk) 05:28, 19 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
      • NHS is not a rule. It's the fifth effort in as many years to convince inexperienced editors that there's some sort of magical notability rule for schools that exempts them from the actual rules if the students are teenagers. The actual rules can be found at WP:ORG and WP:NRVE. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:01, 19 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete - high schools are generally notable, and in the case of a high school, the assumption is that the article should be given time to develop. This is clearly not a high school. That said, even elementary or middle schools may be notable, but since this article has absolutely no referencing to demonstrate the nature of notability, I must assume at this time it is not notable. I am open to consider a claim of notability, but none is established here. LonelyBeacon (talk) 19:57, 19 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete - Yes some middle schools are notable, but this one clearly is not, there are no reliable independent resources (I am not counting an (clearly biased) article written in the NYT by a teacher of the school expressing an opinion as reliable). As such I cannot see that at this time this article meets the notability criteria, I am always open to reconsider if new sources come to light, however. GlanisTalk 21:53, 19 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep They're mentioned in the New York Time their emergency alert system. The Boston Globe interviews at teacher on audio books. In 1940, they were a leader in a community fundraiser. The founder retired in 1960. He died in 1988. They've got a marching band. The problem with the list of alumni and teachers is going to be narrowing it down, not proving that people attended it. The society columns in the older newspapers list dozens of people. This is not difficult. If you all would stop getting hung up on how old the students are, and actually look for evidence of notability, then you would see that it's perfectly obvious that this school is not merely notable, but actually famous. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:59, 19 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - With politeness, WhatamIdoing, I disagree with your findings. According to WP:GNG (quote): Significant coverage means that sources address the subject directly in detail, so no original research is needed to extract the content. Significant coverage is more than a trivial mention but it need not be the main topic of the source material.
Of the sources that you have provided, not one of them addresses the school directly and in detail. The emergency alert system article mentions the school once in the very last paragraph after talking specifically about safety systems. The Book on audio article is about a book, where one woman happened to work at the school who was being interviewed about said book. The other two articles address the founder of the school, not the school. The final article is a brief blurb about the marching band raising money. None of these articles establishes notability in the least definition of "significant coverage".
Furthermore, when you say: This is not difficult. If you all would stop getting hung up on how old the students are, and actually look for evidence of notability, then you would see that it's perfectly obvious that this school is not merely notable, but actually famous, I appreciate that there will be differing opinions on this matter, but it is out of line to imply that anyone with a contrary opinion as being lazy, or that we are somehow being ageist. The purpose of this inquiry is to determine consensus. You have your opinion, and others have theirs, and have an equal right to it without being mocked. Everyone here has explained themselves without mocking another opinion, and I would ask that you stick to presenting their case or refuting a case ... leave editors out of this! LonelyBeacon (talk) 22:11, 19 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Let's start with the basics: Do you have a paid subscription to the Boston Globe? And if you don't, how exactly are you deciding how much information about the school is in the (dozens of) articles about the school in that paper? WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:40, 20 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I was commenting strictly on the six articles that you provided as evidence of notability. If there are more out there, please bring them forward. Speaking for myself (and I hope everyone else), we are open-minded ... if there are significant, reliable, independent sources which meet the criteria for establishing notability, we'll look a them, and I suspect if that is met, we would all change our input. However, in the absence of those sources, the subject is non-notable, and shouldn't be the subject of an article. Just keep in mind, at least as a few of us have looked at the articles you have presented, they don't meet the "significant" threshold, so more articles like that really won't cut it (at least with those so far leaning toward "delete". LonelyBeacon (talk) 18:35, 20 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
WhatamIdoing has added a search link, which appears to show about 84 hits in the Boston Globe for the school. I invite anyone to joining me and assessing if the articles appear to meet the significance threshold to meet notability. LonelyBeacon (talk) 05:14, 21 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
And I'm asking a simple, yes-or-no question about those links: For the Boston Globe articles, did you read the WHOLE articles, or just the (free) BEGINNINGS of the articles? WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:13, 20 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I only read what was available, however, it is rarely necessary to read more than a short amount to determine if the school is the direct subject of the article, or not. It would be exceptionally odd for any journalist to not at least mention the direct topic of the article in the first few paragraphs. It could happen, but it is rare. To be used as a source, the subject needn't be the subject of the article, however, to establish notability, it pretty much has to be. LonelyBeacon (talk) 05:14, 21 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
No. Please read the actual guideline at WP:CORPDEPTH. To be useful for notability purposes, the source must talk directly about the subject—but it need not be the primary or sole subject of the article. The actual guideline says, "The depth of coverage of the subject by the source must be considered. If the depth of coverage is not substantial, then multiple independent sources should be cited to establish notability." This means that small bits of information scattered about dozens of separate publications can actually add up to the equivalent of a smaller number of longer sources (assuming—as they do in this instance—that these sources all say different things about the school. A hundred sources that all repeat the same fact is counted as one source).
So you have rejected sources based on your ignorance of their contents, a guess that they don't say much, and an erroneous belief about how the guidelines say you should address this situation. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:29, 21 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

(indent) I'm sorry that you feel that I am ignorant. Quoting from ORG:
The depth of coverage of the subject by the source must be considered. If the depth of coverage is not substantial, then multiple[1] independent sources should be cited to establish notability. Trivial or incidental coverage of a subject is not sufficient to establish notability.
Trivial coverage is not enough to establish notability. All of the sources in theBoston Globe search seemed trivial. I found three that seemed like they might be worthy of consideration. Ultimately, that is going to be the point of this discussion: are there sufficient non-trivial sources to meet notability? If you feel that I missed any non-trivial sources, please list them ... if you feel that in our inability to see the whole article ... please give some partial quotes and put these articles in context. ... or add the sources to the article and expand the article. LonelyBeacon (talk) 05:34, 22 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

  • Further comment, first on the question of whether it's a 'high school', the school itself says that it prepares its students for high schools, so clearly it is not a high school itself. Notability would be rare for a middle school, though we'd all be happy to keep this article if someone can provide sources that show its notability according to WP guidelines, in particular those highlighted by LonelyBeacon. I've been trawling for 'significant coverage'; the first few pages thrown up by Google give what you'd expect of lots of schools - educational websites and directories, own publicity etc., but nothing independent that meets the 'significant coverage' gold standard. News search doesn't help either. asnac (talk) 07:51, 20 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
    • Notability under the actual guideline, which is ORG, is pretty common for middle schools. It's only under the "magic high school exemption" proposal, which the community has repeatedly rejected, that a middle school is not treated exactly the same as any other school. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:15, 20 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment - I have reviewed the 84 or so hits that WhatamIdoing has provided. My thoughts are that a vast majority of the articles are trivial hits (obituaries of alumni, tryouts for plays, films playing at the school, articles about people who attend(ed) or worked at the school). I found three articles that didn't fit those descriptions:
[1] - this is an article about the controversy regarding the installation of artificial turf at the school
[2] - I am pretty sure this will not establish notability since it is an Op-Ed piece written by a teacher from the school.
[3] - This is about a science course on birds taught at the school, including the construction of bird boxes at the school.
As I see it there are two articles that might fit the bill. This is one person's opinion, so I would hope others check these out and submit their thoughts as well. LonelyBeacon (talk) 05:45, 21 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
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.
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