Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Baker Memorial Girls High School

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was keep. (non-admin closure) Scorpions13256 (talk) 07:37, 4 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Baker Memorial Girls High School (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log)

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Does not pass criteria set forward by WP:NSCHOOL. There is not a single reference is there to prove the notability and existence.— Preceding unsigned comment added by Eagle eyer333 (talk • contribs) the nominator has been blocked as a confirmed sockpuppet, Atlantic306 (talk) 03:17, 17 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Kerala-related deletion discussions. Spiderone^{(Talk to Spider)} 12:49, 16 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Schools-related deletion discussions. Spiderone^{(Talk to Spider)} 12:49, 16 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Education-related deletion discussions. Spiderone^{(Talk to Spider)} 12:49, 16 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• Automated comment: This AfD was not correctly transcluded to the log (step 3). I have transcluded it to Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Log/2021 February 16. —^{cyberbot I}_{Talk to my owner:Online} 13:03, 16 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Delete. Searching yields ~3700 results and no news results. It is unlikely that there are any reliable sources at all. ~ Ase1este_{charge-parity}^time 14:38, 16 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I just updated the article with two independent english language sources and cleaned up a bit of the prose. What do you think now? ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 15:01, 16 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Keep. Considering similar articles (see List of schools in India#Kerala), the sources provided here is relatively notable when comparing with similar articles. I think adding the secondary sources here and some primary sources solely for the school's basic information might be enough. ~ Ase1este_{charge-parity}^time 04:05, 17 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep I found two decent sources, a statement from the Governor of the area about the school and an article in The Hindu discussing the statement and visit from the Governor. If those two sources are in english I expect there's a significant number of other sources in Hindi. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 14:49, 16 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

  I updated the article with the two sources and cleaned up the promotional language. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 15:02, 16 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

  • Well, I would expect the citations to cover more than two sentences. However, considering the school is Indian, there might be a significant number of sources in Hindi as you said. It would be nice if someone could search using the native name and report the result. ~ Ase1este_{charge-parity}^time 16:00, 16 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]
    • From Google Maps, the native name is ബേക്കർ മെമ്മോറിയൽ ഗേൾസ് ഹയർ സെക്കൻഡറി സ്കൂൾ. I have just tried searching for that and found even fewer results. 1260 for all results and still no news results. ~ Ase1este_{charge-parity}^time 16:03, 16 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]
      • If someone knows Hindi, please help determine whether there exists non-English sources. ~ Ase1este_{charge-parity}^time 16:10, 16 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

    Another source about the bicentennial. I think with the claim that they're the first girl's Christian high school and the claim that they're the first school in India to have a Girl Guides chapter makes them notable, and there's enough independent coverage to establish that notability even in English. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 17:55, 16 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

    Per WP:MULTSOURCES, the subject should be covered by multiple sources (different publishers), and I do not think one publisher (the Hindu) covering the school is enough. Another thing, I am still thinking about whether being the first in something calls for an exception. ~ Ase1este_{charge-parity}^time 18:41, 16 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

    If there is one more source from a publisher with reliability similar to the Hindu but not related to Hindu, then I think I will be convinced. ~ Ase1este_{charge-parity}^time 18:49, 16 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

    The statement from the governor of the state I linked above doesn't cover that? I'm looking to see if I can find anything else but it's difficult with english sources. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 19:31, 16 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

    I've also found three books which mention the school and it's 150th anniversary, but alas my ability to go to the library and borrow obscure english language Indian books is pretty limited. Specifically Polity, Society, and Women has several pages dedicated to the school. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 19:41, 16 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

    Another book that mentions the founder and the school on 336 and can be viewed in google books as more than just the search result. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 20:02, 16 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

    The book only has three results when I tried searching for "Baker Memorial". You can check it out by going here and type the search term. It seems to be a passing mention, but the preview is pretty limited. For the other book, it also looks like a passing mention. ~ Ase1este_{charge-parity}^time 03:51, 17 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

    I was looking at List of schools in India#Kerala and clicking on some random schools to see how many references are enough to be kept. It turns out, the requirements are pretty low. For example, take a look at Brook International School, Sasthamcotta and Infant Jesus School, Kollam. Considering this, I think the sources you have provided might be enough. ~ Ase1este_{charge-parity}^time 03:59, 17 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete: This school is in Kerala,India. But no reliable sources are there. 27.61.23.239 (talk) 01:35, 17 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep - per WP:HEY as it is a weak keep, but for gazetteer subjects like schools, that should be enough. IMO, there's been way too much deletion of gazetteer subjects over the last year. It does bear note that the range of available sources doesn't end at the same place Google does. That applies even more in parts of the world where data digitalization hasn't got as far as it has in others and contributes to systemic bias on Wikipedia. 174.254.192.137 (talk) 04:15, 17 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete This fails the notability guidelines due to lacking multiple, independent, in-depth reliable sources about it. As far as the "systemic bias" thing goes, about 55% of Kerala where this school is located has access to the internet and it's the 13th largest state in India. Which is on par or better then a lot of places in more "developed" countries like America. So, I don't think it's an issue in this case. Otherwise, it wouldn't be acceptable to delete an article on anything in India. Maybe if the population and (or) the percentage of people who have access to the internet was smaller there, but it's hard to make a case for the potential of bias being the cause of lacking sourcing when when the place has over 15 million people connected to the internet. More then likely there's no good sourcing because this school just isn't notable for anything. --Adamant1 (talk) 09:30, 17 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

  The school is notable for being the first girl's school in India, which is asserted in the sources I've provided above. There's also several books which cover or mention the subject. "Polity, Society and Women" has a three page section on the missionary family who started the school under the heading "Women's Education in North Travancore," which states that the founder of the school was the pioneer of girl's education in North Travancore. There are more sources discussing the school, but unfortunately I don't have the ability to get my hands on a lot of the books that cover it. There's another book called "Above the Heron's Pool" that covers the family and the school, but the only places I can see that have it are a few scattered college libraries. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 12:05, 17 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

  For the systemic bias point, I think there are more factors affecting the bias than just the Internet penetration rate, so even with a relatively high Internet penetration rate, there is likely still significant systematic bias due to other factors. ~ Ase1este_{charge-parity}^time 03:28, 18 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Putting aside the internet penetration rate, according to ScottishFinnishRadish there's more sources that discuss this then a lot of high schools in the United States. So, how exactly does systematic bias play into this particular AfD then? You can't have it both ways where there are supposedly multiple sources that discuss it (enough for it to be notable), but then also "oh yeah and systematic bias if those aren't good enough." Doing this fairly, you have a source that discusses the missionary family who started the school. Which likely wouldn't be usable due to not being directly about the subject if it was an AfD for a school somewhere else. So, how does it suddenly become usable in this case "because systematic bias"? In other words, "systematic bias" works as an argument against deletion when it can be used as a reason for there being no or hardly any sources. Not when it comes to situations where there are sources, but they just aren't up to the standards though. --Adamant1 (talk) 06:34, 18 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Reading the first mention of systematic bias, which is from 174.254.192.137 (talk · contribs · WHOIS), the IP states that deletion of this article contributes to systematic bias, and systematic bias is bad, so instead we should avoid deletion of this article to avoid contributing systematic bias. As far as I can see in the guidelines for WP:NSCHOOLS, this is not a valid reason for non-deletion, so I think systemic bias here won't work well anyway. ~ Ase1este_{charge-parity}^time 07:07, 18 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Makes sense. Thanks for the details. I'm never sure where it's an issue and where it isn't myself. I guess it doesn't matter though. Since it's not a part of AfD or notability policy anyway. --Adamant1 (talk) 07:42, 18 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep. I have added some info and refs and think it is very likely that there is further coverage in paper sources of this school, given its long history. Tacyarg (talk) 08:35, 20 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep Added references are good enough for WP:NSCHOOL. - The9Man ^(Talk) 10:00, 23 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep - notability and significance established through multiple sources now added to the article; meets WP:NORG and WP:GNG Spiderone^{(Talk to Spider)} 15:48, 23 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete Not enough coverage JaiMahadev (talk) 03:08, 26 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • The user is blocked for sockpuppetry. ~ Ase1este_{charge-parity}^time 10:43, 28 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]
• DeleteComment After giving this a week to see if anyone could come up with anything and looking over the sources currently in the article, I am forced to go with delete. Mainly because the sources as clearly in the article obviously up to par. Just to give a breakdown, two references are from government sources and are therefore not independent of the subject. Plus they are rather trivial. Two sources are not even about the school. Therefore they do not address it directly or in-depth as is required. The only might work, "ADDRESS AT THE BICENTENARY CELEBBRATIONS OF BAKER MEMORIAL GIRLS’ HIGHER SECONDARY SCHOOL AT KOTTAYAM", doesn't because it is a non-neutral blog post. That doesn't even mainly discuss the school anyway. So, I'm not really seeing what makes this pass either WP:GNG or more importantly WP:NORG. --Adamant1 (talk) 03:37, 26 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • Amending 'delete' to 'comment' as Adamant1 has already voted in this discussion. Spiderone^{(Talk to Spider)} 17:26, 2 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@Spiderone: Thanks. I thought I looked through the discussion to make sure I hadn't voted already. Must have missed it. --Adamant1 (talk) 21:59, 2 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete This article has sat for 10 years with no sources at all, which is a very clear violation of Wikipedias' verifiability rules. A quick google search turned up no reliable sources at all. 223.228.161.135 (talk) 10:18, 26 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • This IP is now blocked due to sockpuppetry Spiderone^{(Talk to Spider)} 17:24, 2 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep Nominated by a sock, which is never a good sign, but discussion is far enough along now. I think the sources establish notability and there are other mentions we haven't uncovered yet as well such as https://www.jstor.org/stable/4408460. SportingFlyer T·C 23:02, 2 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.