Talk:Southern Methodist University

I added information relating to the University Honors Program. The UHP is the 3rd largest organization on campus (after Residence Life & Student Housing and Panhellenic organizations), at around 1000 participants. It noticeably affects the quality of life on campus - for instance, a large number of non-Honors students read the campus publication Hilltopics, which was founded by an all-Honors editing staff. During any given semester, roughly 1/6 to 1/7 of the undergraduate student body participates in Honors courses. Nearly all Honors students share common learning experiences since they are all required to take Honors Rhetoric I and II, courses that cover a broad array of authors and modern philosophical thinkers. UHP students also attend the Gartner Lecture series and social events together as a group. Thus, for a large portion of the student body at SMU, Honors provides a cohesive, intellectual environment that encourages extra-curricular involvement and a life of the mind. Behemoth101 21 January 2006

This article has several series of indexed references that go to an identical source, such as http://www.cox.smu.edu/aboutcox/rankings/. That produced a cluttered References section. One could improve this by using named references, e.g. <ref name=coxranking>[http://www.cox.smu.edu/aboutcox/rankings/]</ref> where it first occurs, and then at each further location in the article simply <ref name=coxranking />. Note that " /" at the end of the repeated links. That gives one same ^[..] index number for each occurrence (which will no longer annoy the reader who already clicked five times on a different index number to find always the same url) and a single line in the references section (and the article takes less bytes). — SomeHuman 01 Sep2007 02:20 (UTC)

Mainly there because nearly a third of the article focuses on sport, and is dealt with in what I would call unnecessary detail for an encyclopedia article. The list of facilities is also extremely long and detailed; perhaps this is usual for articles on U.S. Universities and Colleges, I'm not sure. David_FLXD (Talk) 21:03, 20 July 2012 (UTC)Reply

No, it's not usual. I've had to revert addition of multiple promotional external links to every department of the school multiple times. That violates WP:EL, which states that we should minimize the number of external links. The official website is where readers should be directed - there they can find a list of schools and departments with the appropriate links. Wikipedia is not a directory to the school's website. Someone, probably affiliated with the school, continues to add promotional and detailed contact which is not appropriate for an encyclopedia article. Feel free to remove such detail sections which are not supported by references as required. Yworo (talk) 18:45, 29 July 2012 (UTC)Reply

I check pages listed in Category:Pages with incorrect ref formatting to try to fix reference errors. One of the things I do is look for content for orphaned references in wikilinked articles. I have found content for some of Southern Methodist University's orphans, the problem is that I found more than one version. I can't determine which (if any) is correct for this article, so I am asking for a sentient editor to look it over and copy the correct ref content into this article.

Reference named "colleges.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com":

• From Emory University: "U.S. News and World Report, U.S. News Best Colleges Rankings". Colleges.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com. Retrieved 20 October 2017.
• From University of Texas at Dallas: "USNWR America's Best Colleges-Top Public Schools". US News & World Report. Retrieved December 20, 2015.
• From University of Florida: "Top Public Schools U.S. News & World Report (2018). Retrieved Sept 13, 2017.
• From University of Maryland, College Park: "USNWR_Overall".

I apologize if any of the above are effectively identical; I am just a simple computer program, so I can't determine whether minor differences are significant or not. AnomieBOT⚡ 00:19, 5 February 2018 (UTC)Reply

I removed multiple images of former students added by User:Pprsmv. The photos were decorative, per MOS:IMAGERELEVANCE, because this article is about a university, and it is not a stand-alone list of notable people who have attended. There was a rough consensus here to not add galleries. Moreover, the photos that were removed had been taken in places far from the university, and did little to "collectively add to the reader's understanding of the subject", per WP:IG. Magnolia677 (talk) 17:56, 8 May 2021 (UTC)Reply

With respect for your position, I would urge you to reconsider your stance on a feature that has emerged as a common enhancement of university pages. The discussion you link to doesn't show a rough consensus but an open disagreement--and from four years ago. Since then, without the establishment of a clear policy, the addition of relatively limited image galleries for very prominent alumni and faculty has become a norm for university pages. The photos and captions are not decorative but informative, as institutions of higher education are composed not just of the people who have taught and learned there. That these galleries have emerged as a norm is a clear demonstration of their usefulness and relevancy--as is the fact that I put these galleries together based on information from Darwin Payne's One Hundred Years on the Hilltop, the definitive history and overview of the university. Unsurprisingly, much of the book is devoted to notable faculty and alumni. Having read other dated discussions on the gallery issue, I believe the standard objections are baseless: there is no evidence that they cause formatting issues or produce disagreements over who is "prominent." Further, some cite images of buildings as relevant but people as not--to me, this suggests narrow and unhelpful view of what a university is. Pprsmv (talk) 18:41, 8 May 2021 (UTC)Reply

For just a small sample of these galleries, see Dartmouth College (note this is a featured article), Brown University, Cornell University, Pennsylvania State University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology Pprsmv (talk) 18:47, 8 May 2021 (UTC)Reply

Dartmouth College achieved FA in 2007, and was nominated for FAR last month, with noted issues including poor image layout, out of control galleries. The alumni gallery was not part of the article at the time that it received FA status. Schazjmd (talk) 18:25, 16 May 2021 (UTC)Reply

A single discussion from four years among a few editors with no clear consensus is not a very strong argument for reverting another editor's good faith edits. A more recent discussion at Talk:Stanford University about the photos of people in that article reached a rough consensus to avoid galleries and instead focus on adding images of alumni, faculty, staff, and other people in sections of the article where their contributions or impact is most relevant. That might be a helpful approach here. ElKevbo (talk) 19:04, 8 May 2021 (UTC)Reply

Thanks for this, ElKevbo (talk)! The Stanford consensus makes sense, though from browsing some other university pages and giving this more thought, I am still partial to the view that these galleries can be a valuable, accessible, and streamlined way to center people as constitutive of the university, which is far more than a campus. I went and re-read WP:IG, and I am encouraged by the fact that the galleries I have been building are very similar to the example presented of a well-made gallery--Women's suffrage in New Zealand. Until the university project does achieve a definitive consensus on this issue, I would propose that unless a gallery creates actual issues in a particular case (e.g. disputes over prominence), it be permitted to follow the informal norms established by the aforementioned entries (including, like I mentioned, the featured article on Dartmouth College and remain. Pprsmv (talk) 23:39, 8 May 2021 (UTC)Reply

I look forward to continuing this conversation, but in the meantime I am re-adding and improving the galleries. I think that in the absence of a genre-wide consensus, there is precedent, an established norm, and informational benefits to their inclusion. I am glad to remove them (or support their removal) if there are ever significant disputes over who should be included or if a wider consensus is reached, by I see little evidence from other pages that this will come to pass. Further, I believe the benefits are significant. Pprsmv (talk) 02:37, 11 May 2021 (UTC)Reply

Should the Notable People section contain galleries of notable faculty and alumni? Pprsmv (talk) 18:34, 11 May 2021 (UTC)Reply

• Yes, the images are clearly not "decorative" (consulting a big dictionary might help some here) but illustrative. When I retrieved the gallery from the history, it was both smaller & more distinguished than I had feared. It seems fully in line with policy, for a large university. Galleries are actually a good approach, after maybe spreading some images around, and have long been the standards on visual arts articles, including FAs. But some editors still have a prejudice against them. Johnbod (talk) 14:25, 16 May 2021 (UTC)Reply

Galleried lists of people, especially living people, are different and the standard has been to avoid them. University, sports-team and entertainment pages attract "fans" prone to adding a lot of non-encyclopedic information (such as photo galleries), so the mere fact that it's sometimes done should not license the same across Wikipedia or turn it into a precedent. WP:GALLERY and WP:PUFF are relevant. 73.89.25.252 (talk) 17:28, 16 May 2021 (UTC)Reply

• No. Ideally the section should consist of a sentence or two from the lead of the main article it links to: List of Southern Methodist University people. Unfortunately that lead is useless so we only have a link. I don't think there is a need to illustrate this section in any way. – Finnusertop (talk ⋅ contribs) 15:10, 16 May 2021 (UTC)Reply
• Wrong place for an RfC. Local consensus at one school's Talk page can't decide a stylistic question that affects thousands of other school articles. A better location is Wikipedia_talk:College_and_university_article_guideline (where a discussion of this very issue is currently taking place) or Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Higher_education, or some even more general page about education or institutions or the use of photos. 73.89.25.252 (talk) 17:07, 16 May 2021 (UTC)Reply
• Oppose inclusion - The photos were decorative, per MOS:IMAGERELEVANCE, because they had little relevance to this article. The article is about a university; it is not a stand-alone list of notable people who have attended. Moreover, all of the photos were taken hundreds of miles away from the university, and none of the photos showed any part of the university, so how can these photos "collectively add to the reader's understanding of the subject", per WP:IG? There has also been a rough consensus here and here to NOT include galleries of alumni. Magnolia677 (talk) 17:47, 16 May 2021 (UTC)Reply
• Yes, but qualified. A university is not a collection of buildings. It is, mostly, people. To not represent them is a disservice to the university. A gallery, though, is not necessary. One can also include photos of people in the sections in which they are mentioned. Attic Salt (talk) 18:07, 16 May 2021 (UTC)Reply

The photos of people, unlike photos of the campus, provide no information about the university (unless they are taken at the university or have some other direct connection). They provide information about the people, such as their physical appearance, but nothing about the school that isn't already revealed by a list of Notables without any photos. Indeed, having it in gallery format limits the amount of information that can be added under each picture, unlike a textual list where some entries can be longer. 73.89.25.252 (talk) 18:45, 16 May 2021 (UTC)Reply

What information is conveyed by pictures of buildings? Have a look at the galleries at Harvard University. In chronological order they tell a story of influence. I think pictures of SMU people could do the same, especially for Texas. Attic Salt (talk) 18:55, 16 May 2021 (UTC)Reply

Less-informative pictures of buildings should indeed be discouraged compared to pictures of iconic, famous or architecturally distinguished pieces of the campus (or a representative sample of ordinary buildings showing what the place looks like). But with pictures of people, we know that there is literally zero information conveyed about the school beyond what is written in text about the person. It is purely clutter. 73.89.25.252 (talk) 20:42, 16 May 2021 (UTC)Reply

One of the primary purposes of a college or university, at least in the modern U.S. liberal arts tradition, is to education people. An article about a college or university with little or no information about the people who are educated and the people who educate them is criminally incomplete and a profound disservice to readers. Therefore it is completely reasonable for editors to discuss whether and how best to include images of those people. ElKevbo (talk) 19:24, 16 May 2021 (UTC)Reply

First, Attic Salt, the gallery at Harvard University is not in chronological order, it is in alphabetical order, and it is even more unnecessary than the gallery in this article because all those images at the Harvard article should be moved to List of Harvard University people. I also agree with the IP editor that the photos of people need to have some direct connection to the article (a consensus about this has already been reached at MOS:IMAGERELEVANCE). Second, ElKevbo, this RfC is not about whether we should add information about people; it is about whether we should add their photo in a gallery at the end of the article. In other words, how does NOT including this photo of Lamar Hunt, taken 450 miles away in Dallas, act as a "profound disservice to readers"? Magnolia677 (talk) 19:58, 16 May 2021 (UTC)Reply

Of course, the Harvard alumni gallery is in chrono order. The faculty gallery is not, you are correct. Attic Salt (talk) 20:50, 16 May 2021 (UTC)Reply

My preference would be to (a) include images of people - faculty, staff, students, and others - in relevant sections of the article with a handful of images used in this specific section (instead of trying to stack up a whole bunch of them in just this section, whether that's in a gallery or not) and (b) establish criteria for including people in this article, including their image, that is not just "they have a connection with the university and some Wikipedia editor wants to add them." ElKevbo (talk) 20:10, 16 May 2021 (UTC)Reply

I agree with our unregistered colleague that a broader discussion at a more centralized location (e.g., WT:UNI) would be more helpful as this is an issue in many articles and not just this one. In fact, we're long overdue for a broader discussion about these sections ("Notable people." "Notable alumni," etc.) in general, including the role and placement of relevant images. I would strongly support suspending this RfC to hold a project-wide RfC on this topic or the broader topic of these embedded lists.

I completely disagree, however, with the assertion that this RfC is inappropriate or its results cannot be used because it's limited to one article. In the absence of a larger consensus, local consensus is just fine. ElKevbo (talk) 18:51, 16 May 2021 (UTC)Reply

This topic spans multiple projects. I have posted this RfC at Wikipedia talk:Image use policy, Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Images, and Wikipedia talk:College and university article guideline. Magnolia677 (talk) 19:22, 16 May 2021 (UTC)Reply

Thanks. I continued to believe that it would be of much greater utility to have a discussion about advice and a general approach for all college and university articles instead of just this one. ElKevbo (talk) 20:07, 16 May 2021 (UTC)Reply

No Images of people should be added to the sections where they are most relevant, not just concentrated in one place in one section. And there should be some kind of reasonable, transparent criteria for the people and images that are included. ElKevbo (talk) 20:12, 16 May 2021 (UTC)Reply

There already is an inclusion criteria for images in article at Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Images. It applies to all Wikipedia articles, including universities. Magnolia677 (talk) 22:36, 16 May 2021 (UTC)Reply

That is not nearly precise enough to be useful here - I think they entirely meet it, & you clearly don't. Johnbod (talk) 01:58, 17 May 2021 (UTC)Reply

The galleries fail almost every condition in Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Images#Pertinence_and_encyclopedic_nature (and WP:PUFF also applies, the articles are not meant to be advertisement brochures for the schools). Exactly what added value does a gallery provide beyond a textual list of the same people, that would balance the increased size and loading time of the article, the visual distraction, and the limit on the amount of text under each picture compared to what is possible in a list? 73.89.25.252 (talk) 20:30, 17 May 2021 (UTC)Reply

Yes The photos and captions are not decorative but informative, as institutions of higher education are composed not just of the people who have taught and learned there. That these galleries have emerged as a norm is a clear demonstration of their usefulness and relevancy--as is the fact that I put these galleries together based on information from Darwin Payne's One Hundred Years on the Hilltop, the definitive history and overview of the university. Unsurprisingly, much of the book is devoted to notable faculty and alumni. Pprsmv (talk) 21:19, 17 May 2021 (UTC)Reply

No, this places undue weight on just the fact that certain people happened to go to school there. Ideally, I would want to see "Notable alumni" sections moved away from lists of people who happened to attend there, and instead discuss in prose those students for whom attendance at the institution was a significant factor in their lives, as specifically confirmed by reliable sources. Additionally, there is a "List of Foo College People" article for this school, so some images could be put there instead. Even if there weren't, however, I'd still oppose such a gallery. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 21:32, 17 May 2021 (UTC)Reply

• No. Like Seraphimblade I am convinced that this places undue weight on individual persons and their physical appearance: which has nothing to do with the Uni. I also think that alumni should only be included if they have a significant connection to the school as discussed in RS and not just because we can verify their attendance. (t · c) buidhe 02:09, 23 May 2021 (UTC)Reply
• Yes, I think the photos add to my appreciation of the University. When I see several photos in a list of politicians I've heard about, I think, "Well that must be an effective teaching establishment". But I do want them to be in a bespoke list separate from the main university article. ArbieP (talk) 10:52, 25 May 2021 (UTC)Reply

The RfC is about a gallery inside the article. So your !vote appears to actually be "No" to the RfC question, but "Yes" to having images in separate list articles.

If the photo galleries are functioning as advertising for the schools that is another reason to not include. It gives the articles the flavor of a brochure and is a lure for fans, alumni and paid editors to slant the page and compete in a literal beauty pageant against other schools. 73.89.25.252 (talk) 17:06, 26 May 2021 (UTC)Reply

• No; these galleries are WP:UNDUE weight. There is a lot of encyclopedic information to cover about the university. A single prominent alum may rise to the level of importance of warranting a mention as part of the noted people list, but they aren't so important that a whole bunch of them need photos. I also agree with the IP above that this issue should be considered at a more generalized forum so that it can apply beyond just this one case. {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 07:29, 8 June 2021 (UTC)Reply

This page clearly identifies that Jay McGraw attended this University. It also describes in detail the many accolades of this school. However, I do not see where Mr. McGraw earned a degree from this higher educational establishment, or any other for that matter. 2600:1700:F8F0:1830:C815:11C4:4732:3848 (talk) 07:49, 18 May 2023 (UTC)Reply

Ok 203.171.100.189 (talk) 14:31, 9 January 2024 (UTC)Reply