Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion Wikipedia - any experience?

Hi everyone,

Does anyone have any experience writing Wikipedia articles? I just created a new entry for the Davidson Institute here. As you can see, there isn't too much to the page right now. I attempted to create a page a while ago but it was deleted due to the fact that I made it sound too much like an ad (and I pretty much copied and pasted text from our website ). If anyone has written for Wikipedia in the past, do you have any advice on how I can expand on this without it being deleted? Also, if anyone wishes, feel free to help with this entry as well and expand on it. I know it's supposed to be neutral and it may be better if parts of it are written by a neutral party.

Thank your for any thoughts, advice, or contributions!

Hi Mark,

My biggest suggestion is to write it as though you were writing an article for a newspaper.

You could also add some of the following information:

* Create separate subsections for the Young Scholars program, the Academy, and other activities run by the DITD.

* I've seen a lot of definitions of "profoundly gifted." You may wish to write an introduction that gives the DITD's definition of the term. I would include IQ levels. Also, are IQ requirements for global/full scale scores or do individual subtest scores count? What about other tests? Which ones are accepted? What are cutoff scores? Are they by age or grade level?

(FYI, this information isn't fully clear to me even now.)

* Make sure you're clear about the definition and that it applies to students who are cognitively gifted. You can sound less "elite" by indicating that the academy doesn't specifically serve students with other types of gifts, such as athletic ability or artistic ability.

For subsections:

* DYS

* Why was the program created?

* Give information about what the DYS program provides.

* Note that the program is free of charge.

* The academy

* When was the academy founded? How many students enrolled originally? How many are enrolled in this academic year?

* Mention that it's a free school.

* Why was the academy founded? This section can be a place for lots of citations of studies addressing the needs of cognitively gifted students (e.g. A Nation Deceived). It can also be a good place to reference state policies that ignore the needs of gifted students or that don't fully address them. How do these policies damage gifted students?

* How are classes structured? What kinds of classes are offered? Mention the fact that students can take courses at the university.

* You may want to mention that the academy allows students to take courses that meet their academic needs while also allowing them to interact with people their own ages, thus also meeting their social needs.

I realize that a lot of this information is already on the DITD website, but the point of the Wikipedia article is to provide the information in another place. People who are interested can go to the website for more information.

Val

I'd suggest looking at the Wikipedia articles for organisations such as universities - or, if you know of organisations more directly comparable to Davidson, so much the better. I like the ideas already suggested, and I'd also suggest including a section on the history (when was it founded, how big then, how big now?) and one on alumni, if you are in a position to point to people who already have Wikipedia entries who've been DYSs (I actually don't know how old it is or whether that's realistic!) I'm not so sure that writing as though for a newspaper is a good tip, given that your danger here is not being considered generally notable - newspaper articles only have to be interesting, not notable. Write as though for an encyclopedia!

Thank you both Val and ColinsMum. Val, I was thinking about writing it with different subsections with all our different programs like you mention. I'll try to build this article slowly but surely, and carefully so as to not get it deleted.

Thank you again!

Mark

Just to give you an idea here's the Wiki article for the gifted school here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louisiana_School_for_Math,_Science,_and_the_Arts

Hi everyone - here is what I came up with for the Davidson Institute Wiki page: link

I tried to keep it short and simple for the most part and would definitely like to expand on it in the future, but I'm still trying to make sure it doesn't get deleted. Thank you all for your suggestions! If anyone has any further suggestions, just let me know!

Have a great day,
Mark

I think that's an excellent start.

Are there any kids at the Academy who are itching for some extra-credit? They'd be a great resource for expanding the article.