Wikipedia:Education noticeboard/Incidents

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If you encounter new editors who appear to be students in a class project, but they have not identified their class, you can place Template:Welcome student (or, where appropriate, Template:Welcome medical student) on their user talk pages.

Possible student having a hard day[edit]

I'm just a regular editor unfamiliar with Wikipedia's education program, but have come across what appears to be a student -- who may be in a small amount of distress at the moment. I have no idea how to tell if they're in a registered class. The student -- Lobzang412 -- is in danger of having their article Restructuring of power sytem (sic) deleted. Any non-admin teachers would not be able to see the contribution history. Is there anything special I can/should do to help this person? --Larry/Traveling_Man (talk)

• I'd suggest userifying or draftifying the article. At the very least, the page can be worked on with some peace rather than edited mercilessly as appropriate in mainspace. -- Ricky81682 (talk) 00:05, 22 April 2016 (UTC)
• @Traveling Man: Students in a registered class should have an incoming link from their course page, so 'what links here' can help figure that out. (Students in Wiki Ed classes should have a template on their user page, or in the page history). That said, not everyone actually registers. Regardless, I'd favour userfying, since it's, maybe not a notable topic, but at least viable section within a page. Ian (Wiki Ed) (talk) 00:20, 22 April 2016 (UTC)

• Thanks to both of you! --Larry/Traveling_Man (talk) 00:23, 22 April 2016 (UTC)

Apparently a course from University of Notre Dame in Australia?[edit]

See:

• Ryleedellabosca (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)
• Nakita Blanco291 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)

Both of these users are adding references with links to that university's library site and are editing about health (badly), and are completely nonresponsive. I have already reported one to WP:EWN and am about to report the other. Don't know if there is some course involved here. Jytdog (talk) 00:49, 18 May 2016 (UTC)

No incoming links to their talk pages, so it doesn't look like they're registered on a course page of any sort. Hard to deduce from the topics what the course might be. One positive - it looks like there's a DOI in the url of their university proxy links, so their sources probably could be deduced. Ian (Wiki Ed) (talk) 03:49, 18 May 2016 (UTC)

Maybe someone can help microbiology course[edit]

See Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#Sockpuppet investigation. Nil Einne (talk) 16:56, 29 May 2016 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Education program/B K Shah Medical Institute[edit]

Students from this course are actively editing/creating medical articles in mainspace and ~appear~ to have received no training; they are adding COPYVIO content, badly sourced (fail both MEDRS, RS, or both) or unsourced content, incomplete citations to the point where they cannot be used to verify content, etc. Please intervene. Thanks. Jytdog (talk) 18:11, 6 September 2016 (UTC)

It looks like Netha Hussain is involved with that class. Have you tried to get in touch with them? Ian (Wiki Ed) (talk) 18:22, 6 September 2016 (UTC)

PamD and I posted at the project's talk page yesterday; no response and students are still working so I came here. Jytdog (talk) 18:24, 6 September 2016 (UTC)

I've had no response to User_talk:Netha_Hussain#Student_assignments of 21 August, and she has not edited since 19 August. PamD 21:06, 6 September 2016 (UTC)

Presbyphonia was first created as pure copyvio, deleted, then recreated, and it now looks as if the editor has copied their supposed references from their sources, unread. When I queried the "telephone interview conducted 2014" (ref 3 of this version) they just removed it. No edit summaries, ever. PamD 21:11, 6 September 2016 (UTC)

• Transoral robotic surgery has been a mess of copyright violations - I've reverted some, but goodness knows how little of the text is actually by the supposed student editor in their own words. PamD 22:51, 12 September 2016 (UTC)

• Note - I am going to start moving the new articles created by this class to draft space; editors in this class are not being responsive to notes about sourcing etc... Jytdog (talk) 21:55, 13 September 2016 (UTC)

• Jytdog, I had a similar experience with this class in its 2015 incarnation via AfC. Completely non-responsive student editors, no apparent monitoring of their work by the instructor, and massive copyright violations with material copied largely from textbooks. I agree about moving them to draft space, but note that their modus operandi in 2015, was to simply cut and paste their drafts into article space when the drafts were rejected. I suggest you keep all the ones you move on watch. They probably all need to be checked for copyvio too. The writing is often garbled because they copy verbatim and then proceed to remove random words or substitute them with inappropriate, misspelled synonyms in an attempt at "paraphrasing". Sigh. Voceditenore (talk) 07:22, 14 September 2016 (UTC)

Thanks. Is there any way the Education Program can work on the instructor and if they remain nonresponsive, ban them? Maybe that is an ANI thing but I don't want to jump there. Jytdog (talk) 07:25, 14 September 2016 (UTC)

I have moved the articles to draft space that had not been worked over by the community, from this year and last year. Jytdog (talk) 02:01, 18 September 2016 (UTC)

Sorry for pitching in really late. I and the course instructor had an extensive discussion about this. He thinks that some students went on with the copyvios even after being warned to not do so. He has advised them against plagiarism again, and we hope it will stop now. To give the students a clearer picture of the writing style on Wikipedia, I have placed a grant request to conduct a one-day workshop in B K Shah Institute. Hopefully, this will solve the problem. -- Netha (talk) 20:00, 19 September 2016 (UTC)

• @Netha Hussain: Have the students been directed to the existing online tutorial material? Have the instructors involved read any of the online giidance on running student assignments? Has anyone from their department made any attempt to monitor the students' efforts? Has it been pointed out to the college authorities how badly these poorly-written, copyvio, falsely referenced etc etc edits reflect on the academic standards of the institution? PamD 06:25, 20 September 2016 (UTC)

Yes, they are directed to at least some of the existing online tutorials. The instructors involved were sent the links to online resources on running the assignments. At least one person in the department is monitoring the students' edits, but I am unsure if the department does anything to revert harmful edits. However, the students have been instructed about copyvios and referencing. I had no contacts with the department until round 1 ended. Before Round 2 began, I discussed with the head of the department regarding the benefits and risks of participating in the program. The project page was created after obtaining his informed consent over e-mail. -- Netha (talk) 20:26, 22 September 2016 (UTC)

• Damn it, one of the students recreated the article in main space that I had moved to drafts; I marked it for speedy. See Masked mastoiditis and Draft:Masked mastoiditis, and left the student a note here Jytdog (talk) 02:11, 26 September 2016 (UTC)

@Netha Hussain: The students may or may not have been instructed about how to write for the encyclopedia, but the student who created this version of Masked mastoiditis, at least, appears not to have heard anything:

• Copyvio: "Clinical features" (and most of the rest, now I come to look) is lifted from this book
• No sources cited
• No links
• No standard lead sentence (starts with "It is...")
• Poor English ("The condition often result from inadequate antibiotic therapy" "but mastoidectomy show extensive destruction" etc) - apparently poor copy-typing from the book where the text appeared, by someone not careful to reread what they have typed, or not familiar enough with English to spot the mistakes. PamD 07:33, 26 September 2016 (UTC)

• @Netha Hussain: I've just looked at one of the 2015 course articles: Arytenoid granuloma is entirely copyvio from this book. I hope the student was not awarded a pass for the course. If they were, then the instructors need a big "fail" mark from the Project! PamD 13:18, 26 September 2016 (UTC)