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[edit] Major Edits

When I first encountered this article, it was not quite up to quality standards. I have re-written nearly the entire article. I believe that the original article had some factual errors and did not appear to be purely neutral. I have organized pros and cons into a list; uploaded photographs, and I am now tracking down as many citations as possible. Nimur 17:07, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

The article is still not up to quality standards, but is now more neutral than it was when I revisited the article. I plan more edits in the near future along with adding citations specific to the pros and cons. --WesWalker 15:58, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] NPOV: Regarding Edits

This issue has been a controversial one in many areas. However, it is important to keep several important Wikipedia principles in mind:

The purpose of this article is to inform readers about Year Round Education. This is an encyclopedia article. This is not a message board of pros and cons, nor is it a forum for argument.

• Wikipedia:Neutral Point of View Please note that this is not merely a guideline, but an official policy on the Wikipedia:
• Wikipedia:Reliable sources In addition, these guidelines are also suggested.
• Wikipedia:No original research to prevent adding your own web-pages as citations, for example.

Several sources were recently added by editor WesWalker which are clearly of his/her own creation:

• http://www.geocities.com/weswalker99/NCStudy/McMillen1.htm
• http://www.geocities.com/weswalker99/memdm.htm
• http://www.geocities.com/weswalker99/rmitchell/MTYRE_Paper1_Chicago_Formatted.htm

This is not appropriate for inclusion in the article, as these sources are neither neutral nor reputable as per the Wikipedia guidelines cited above. Wikipedia does not permit original research as a matter of official policy. Note that the other sources cited in the article come from reputable third-parties, such as government education departments or school districts, and they use statistics, facts, and real data to make their point. This is precisely what is meant by "neutral."

Many edits inserted the word "claim" in front of various sentences. It is considered bad style to do this. Either the fact is true, or not true; it should be kept or removed; but it should not be described as a "claim" every time it is mentioned.

The edits by WesWalker during this time frame also removed photographs of a Year-Round School. Images were specifically requested to improve this article's quality, and should not be removed without a very good reason.

The season, "summer", is written with a lower-case "s", unless it is a person's name.

During the course of this article's history, the phrase "disputed" was removed regarding findings about academic merit because no reliable sources could be found which dispute these findings. One of these edits misquoted the Los Angeles Assistant Superintendent, attributing quotes by the author of an LA Weekly article to the superintendent. Such edits are clearly unacceptable.

In summary, let's work to make this article an informed and reliable source of knowledge for people who are seeking to learn about Year-round school.

Please use the Discussion Page to post comments regarding your major disruptive edits. Further reversion, incorrect quotations, and removal of the photographs will be treated as vandalism. See the above discussion for full explanation of all edits in question. Nimur 13:08, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

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Your accusations are without merit. If you would take the time to read the policies that you state, you would find that these edits are in compliance. Just because someone has asked that pictures be added does not mean that they have to be your picures, or that any pictures at all need to be added. I could just as easily request that they be removed. I surely will as soon as I learn how.

I believe you to be a year-round school advocate based on the edits that you insist upon. I highly recommend that we get some kind of arbitration as you have sunk to the level of making personal accusations.

You have used my name in your edits in false accusations. Doing so again will be treated as libel.

Lets work together. I will need some time to familiarize myself with the Wikipedia tools. I have been an active opponent of year-round education for no less than ten years so I know the subject extremely well. Please be patient with me and I will be patient with you. I am perfectly able to be neutral - which is to show both points of view. I have been approaching this by stating both points of view since there are only a few facts that are proven about year-round school. Most of them are effects on populations that are forced to use it. If you wish, I will reorganize the page to show only facts and no issues. This would remove all content that is currently listed as pro and con along with the links at the bottom. It will describe single-tracking, multi-tracking, balanced calendars, modified calendars (BTW, all year-round schools are modified calendars), alternative calendars, and will be renamed from year-round school to its proper term, year-round education. An article like that will tell the reader absolutely nothing that the NAYRE website does not already say on their advocacy site.

In order to comply with one of your wishes, I will delete all references to Wake County since they are currently under conflict concerning this issue.

If you truly think that I am out of compliance with policy, please quote from the policy or policies that you refer to. After reading though the policies, I find that my edits are in compliance and am very curious as to what text in the policies you are referring to.

Thank you for all the work you do. I know that this is time consuming but I think we can end up with a good quality article on year-round education if we can stop the accusations and go by facts. I consider issues surrounding year-round education to be part of the subject. If you believe this not to be so, then that is another point we are going to have to work on. But simply editing out my changes is only going to result in contention. I think two engineers can do better than that.

[edit] Persistent Vandalism

This page has become target of many vandals in recent weeks. I will keep it on my watchlist; hopefully we will not need to resort to protecting the page. Nimur 20:07, 21 March 2007 (UTC)