Talk:University of Massachusetts Amherst

Greek life

This part of the article is largely unsourced; the references are only to other lists and don't convey information of encyclopedic value. There are Wikipedia pages which list Greek life at any given university or college; this is not the place for them. I propose deletion. -- Melchior2006 (talk) 06:10, 18 May 2023 (UTC)

Since no one chimed in on this, I will go ahead and streamline. --Melchior2006 (talk) 18:34, 24 May 2023 (UTC)

I restored and improved the section. With a campus presence for some 150 years, and an average participation of 1,500 students annually, Amherst's campus Greek system is notable enough for a summary inclusion. Jax MN (talk) 06:19, 23 August 2023 (UTC)

I object to the recent edits Jax MN made, because they look a lot like whitewashing. If fraternity affairs at UMass Amherst make national news, then it is worth mentioning. Your relocation of the assertions basically amount to burying them in the fine print. This is problematic. --Melchior2006 (talk) 15:39, 23 August 2023 (UTC)

The section prose went from a few summary lines with statistics noting broad participation over 150 years to your immediate inclusion of the reasons a former chapter was closed and a minor story about opinions regarding an existing chapter that didn't result in any sort of closure or jurisprudence. This abrupt change in tone, from larger summary to minor, in what appears to me to be an attempt to besmirch the category of organizations because of the misdeeds of one or a few persons, is an example of undue WP:WEIGHT. I did, however place the two stories adjacent to their chapter listing on their national list pages. Not buried at all. Jax MN (talk) 17:00, 23 August 2023 (UTC)

Melchior asked me to have a look--I don't have much to say, but I do disagree with this edit, which looks like stuff is being swept under the rug. Drmies (talk) 16:09, 24 August 2023 (UTC)

Answering both, thank you for the dialog. Melchior2006, the article already notes persistent groups, like teams, bands and even "community service programs". It has three large paragraphs on campus safety. It has a large paragraph on a "permaculture initiative" from 2010, and lists the low-wattage radio stations and various campus media resources. I support some of these, covered in such fullness, and think perhaps that it is only modern societal trends that would press the need for such expansive treatment of campus safety or environmental issues. (lists of LEEDS-award buildings on such campus articles are common.) But I'm not moved to delete or pare those trendy subjects. While I would not support listing a Sci-Fi club - though I like Sci-fi - nor an ad-hoc group of nude bowlers nor a chess club, I think that in the balance, it is reasonable to include property-owning Greek chapters that serve 25% to 35% of the campus, and have done so for 150 years. Further, I think it could be deemed racist or some other "-ist" to omit those multicultural fraternal groups that may not own property, but which nevertheless exhibit similar permanency. The Greeks aren't just a transitory club.

Drmies, the two references to bad behavior were cherry picked from hundreds of "positive news" stories about the Greeks. Since one didn't result in a disciplinary action, I moved it to become a reference against that chapter on the list of chapters for that national fraternity. Melchior had placed it in the lede of the section, which was UNDUE. The other one might fairly become a reference against that chapter, but the chapter itself is gone from the list, it having been suspended. So I placed it on that fraternity's list of chapters to be picked up if they come back. Jax MN (talk) 21:56, 24 August 2023 (UTC)

FWIW, I think the additional sentence at the bottom of the section is fair, noting concern about general Greek Life safety issues. Jax MN (talk) 22:06, 24 August 2023 (UTC)

Excessive amount of images

@Jainman1 There is an excessive amount of images in the alumni section, hence my trimming. Just because another article has something doesn't mean its inclusion is justified on another article, per WP:WHATABOUT. GuardianH (talk) 16:17, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

• If that is a justification, then why don't you go around and delete unnecessary images from Harvard University, Columbia University and University of Pennsylvania and even in other British universities such as University of Edinburgh, London School of Economics and Political Science and so on. However, nothing from either of these universities will be ever deleted because your every edit like these will be reverted and you would be kicked off from these.
• What is the quantitative measurement of a lot of images in an article or even an alumni section? Who makes these rules? Is there a white paper document from Wikipedia on this?
• What I do not understand is instead of making constructive and creating more articles, why are things that already exist being removed and trimmed down for unnecessary reasons? Are these being done for being awarded medals in Wikipedia that don't matter in the real world and don't count anywhere.
• If rules exist, they should exist for all universities, not one public university. University of California, Los Angeles - there are lot of images there too. Where is the damn trimming done?
• Being selective and biased is not how Wikipedia should run

— Preceding unsigned comment added by Jainman1 (talk • contribs) 16:51, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

I'm not representative of all Wikipedia editors; I edit primarily articles involving higher education within Germany and Massachusetts. University pages on Wikipedia have a problem with WP:ACADEMIC BOOSTERISM because oftentimes they are edited by alumni or affiliates (in a WP:COI), which leads to excessively large alumni pages in an effort to boast or show off prominent alumni to boost the institution's reputation—this is unnecessary, especially for a university like UMASS, which doesn't need additional puff-ups to its reputation. I have already tagged the gallery in Harvard University and Columbia University, but I have not the time to go around and cleanup all universities for boosterism. UMASS does have this problem regarding its alumni gallery, not to mention any MOS:PUFFERY in the body. GuardianH (talk) 17:07, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

On an additional note, some of the aforementioned boosterism is already in the body if you do a cursory amount of digging. Prime examples are statements such as:

The UMass Amherst campus is known for its sustainability.

UMass Amherst implements a multitude of services to ensure safety on and off campus for all students. On-campus residence halls are constantly monitored and secured.

...It is viewed as a successful program by the department and the UMass community since the cadets are an important part of the police department.

The FAC brings nationally known theater, music and dance performances to campus throughout the year into its performance spaces...

One of the most important aspects of UMass Permaculture is that it comes from the students and is ecologically and socially responsible.

Numerous other examples of boosterism are in the body. GuardianH (talk) 17:22, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for your work, @GuardianH:, there is still a lot to be done in order to deflate the boosts and puffs in this article; your edits are a valuable contribution. --Melchior2006 (talk) 18:14, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

Listing so many Greek houses is data-hoarding

According to Wikipedia:Avoid data-hoarding, it is best not to overfill Wiki pages with information copied in a rote manner from university homepages or other self-promoting institutions. The proper place for such large amounts of data are the lists devoted to GLOs at a given university. A good example is here, where there is lots of space for details which don't belong in the general article. --Melchior2006 (talk) 16:10, 23 August 2023 (UTC)

Thanks. The Data-hoarding essay is interesting, but not really applicable here. --The truculent point being not to jam, for example, an artist's entire corpus of work into an infobox. Better to point to a page with such a list. However, conceptually, this essay does point to the direction that future editors for the F&S Project will likely go, as they port information about the Greeks to a separate page. Jax MN (talk) 16:52, 23 August 2023 (UTC)

I agree (and love the "truckling" point!). If we were to list all the hobby (and academic) student groups and band subdivisions and sports clubs, which come and go (as do GLOs), it would just be too much. So why did you revert my clean-up? --Melchior2006 (talk) 06:40, 24 August 2023 (UTC)