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Scope of the Project, Notability Rules (clarification), and Syntax for the Watchlist are linked here: Watchlist Talk Page. A discussion on the types of chapter status is here: F&S Project talk page, Archive #7.

Cleanup project (updated)

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The main list of infobox issues can be found at Category:Fraternity articles with infobox fraternity issues.

  1. missing image size - Category:Pages using infobox fraternity with missing image size (89)
  2. missing |member badge= - Category:Pages using infobox fraternity with missing member badge (767)
  3. missing |chapters= - Category:Pages using infobox fraternity with missing chapters (38)
  4. missing |members= - Category:Pages using infobox fraternity with missing members (836)
  5. missing |website= - Category:Pages using infobox fraternity with missing website (149)
  6. missing |colors= - Category:Pages using infobox fraternity with missing colors (236)
  7. missing crest or coat of arms - tracked at petscan
  8. Missing country
  9. Needs color boxes (Helpful link, has colors, flags, and addresses of Baltic, Scandinavian, German, and Polish fraternities)
Rublamb (talk) 20:40, 10 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Should we add CleanupWorklistBot to our WP reporting? It produces a weekly report of all project articles tagged with various maintenance templates. Rublamb (talk) 05:59, 24 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Sounds like a helpful tool. Jax MN (talk) 20:11, 25 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Agreed.Naraht (talk) 21:43, 25 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Added WikiProject_Fraternities_and_Sororities to the master list. Looks like it runs on Tuesdays, so we'll see then.Naraht (talk) 07:22, 27 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks. On the first run, expect the list to be really long. Rublamb (talk) 12:20, 27 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

2024 Dec 31 Run

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Run is at https://bambots.brucemyers.com/cwb/bycat/Fraternities_and_Sororities.html . Yes, quite a few. A few like Post-nominal letters don't make sense to me that they are in the project. Lots of work to do...Naraht (talk) 18:15, 31 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Just in time for the new year... Post-nominal letters has a section on European fraternities and their use of Zirkels. I just added links to post-nominal letters to the Zirkel (Studentenverbindung) article; no idea why the links didn't go both ways. Rublamb (talk) 19:36, 31 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Looks like the primary sources tag is not included in this report. The petscan link I added above had 72 articles with that issue. I will go through later and see what else is not included. Rublamb (talk) 03:04, 3 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Ignore that. They show up under the Unreliable Sources sections. Rublamb (talk) 05:13, 3 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Article cleanup needed

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One of our main articles, Fraternities and sororities, has had a factual accuracy tag since March 2023. I just added a few sources, which is part of the issue. Since others have worked on this article in the past, you may have a better idea of what content is questionable. Rublamb (talk) 18:08, 9 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

There is also a discussion on the articles Talkpage about moving this to Collegiate fraternities and sororities. Rublamb (talk) 22:27, 12 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
We just discovered History of North American fraternities and sororities which was off the radar because it lacked WikiProject tags. The two articles relate in many ways. I could see a merger of the two and/or splitting the history and cultural content into two articles. It would be a big project since these are both long articles. Rublamb (talk) 23:45, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Awareness builder

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Editors with ties to some of the GLOs -- some of the bigger social fraternities and APO are examples -- brand their User pages with small banner tags noting membership. It might be a helpful long-term objective for the Project team to create these, one for each society in their colors, that they might be picked up by editors (typically, new editors) to drive Project participation. We could pin them to each Talk page, with instructions for use. Jax MN (talk) 17:50, 16 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

See Wikipedia:Userboxes/Collegiate sororities and fraternities Rublamb (talk) 02:58, 17 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I have updated the userbox template list on our Watch List so that it is easier to see which groups already have a userbox template. (I still need to check our list against the one linked above). However, some existing userbox templates are basically unreadable because of a lack of contrasting colors.
If we are going to add these to all articles relating to the GLO, my suggestion is the horizontal template that nests under the WikiProjects, rather than the verticle box that floats to the right of the page. I don't recommend putting the userbox code in a TalkPage comment as that could be auto-archived. Does anyone need to see examples of the two formats before commenting? I am willing to work on inserting the templates if there is agreement on style. Does anyone volunteer for template cleanup duty? Rublamb (talk) 18:16, 23 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Naming articles for Latvian, Estonia, Russian, and German groups

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We need to get a handle on naming conventions for student associations and corporations articles. We seem to have a mix of full foreign-language names, the Korp! nickname, the nickname without Korp!, and English translations. When working in this area yesterday, I found little consistency with Latvian and Estonian group names--the English Wikipedia article's names typically do not match the German Wikipedia name, sometimes using the formal name when that is not in use in German Wikipedia or the group's website. Also, the English translations may or may not be correct. This can eventually be fixed with redirects, but I am struggling to figure out the best common name format so we can be consistent across all articles. Refer to List of student corporations in Latvia and List of fraternities and sororities in Estonia for examples of the article name variations. (Note that I have linked to German Wikipedia if I could not find an article in the English version). Rublamb (talk) 22:13, 1 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

As these are (or ought to be) treated more comprehensively in their native language Wikis, I think we should include a link to the original language article and use a consistent naming structure, probably the 'full' name, not nickname. As long as these are treated consistently within the English language Wikipedia, I would be amenable to whatever of the options you list that you determine works best. Jax MN (talk) 22:52, 1 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
In most cases, using the full name is like naming an article "The Grand International Sisterhood of Moo Moo Moo, Incorporated", rather than "Moo Moo Moo" or "GIS Moo Moo Moo". (The later being what many of these corporations use on their websites, with "GIS" being common identifier for groups of that type). Since we already follow Wikipedia's naming guidelines and use the common name with US GLOs, I am pretty sure the article's title should be a shortened. It would be helpful to have a member of one of these groups or someone who speaks the language help us naviage what are and are not essential parts of the full name. For example, using "Korp!" may be akin to saying "Chi Psi Fratenity", with Korp translating as the unnecessary word "fraternity". Rublamb (talk) 23:25, 1 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Here's an exmaple I just found from a Swiss organization. Its full name is Katholische Deutsche Studentenverbindung Teutonia Freiburg i. Uechtland That roughly translates as "Catholic German Student Association Teutonia Freiburg i. Uechtland". All groups of this ilk (Catholic German Student Associations) use the abbreviation KDStV before the rest of their name, which is usually the city where the group is located. So, this organization's common name and the name used on its website is KDStV Teutonia. The name is not the city in this case because there is another group with the Freiburg name. Its English Wikipedia article is named K.D.St.V. Teutonia, with periods in the KDStV abbreviation. That appears to be non-standard.
With this example in mind, would you 1) use the full German name, 2) the translated name, 3) the German name with the prefix. I think we can assume that 4) number 3 with periods is clearly wrong.
In addition, would the related article by called Katholische Deutsche Studentenverbindung or Catholic German Student Associations? Rublamb (talk) 04:28, 22 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Updated list: notability or no ref tags

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Delete: I added two sources but can't find significant coverage. Content has sources now, but mostly from its website. It is now included in both the African American and LGBTQ list articles, with a source. Rublamb (talk) 07:04, 24 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Delete: Not even sig coverage by the university
Delete: can't find secondary sources Rublamb (talk) 20:13, 24 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Merge with List of Greek umbrella organizations
Delete: no off-campus sources, founded in 2007 so no history to look for
Move: the law firm does not meet notability for an organization. However, there are enough sources for an article on the Anti-Hazing Hotline. So, one option is to move the article and subject, with a redirect for the law firm which manages the hotline. Or, we can go with a new article on the hotline. The newsletter, the original focus of the article, is not significant.
Delete: I found some articles in the campus newspaper but no significant coverage elsewhere. It is now included in List of social sororities and women's fraternities Rublamb (talk) 23:50, 19 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Delete?: I added some sources and expanded/updated the chapter list. However, all of the sources I found are clearly from press releases. There is almost zero presence of this group on its host colleges' websites; I even found one that lists this as a non-recognized organization. A Reddit discussion notes that the group has used a copy of UNC's letterhead without any affiliation. Now that I have expanded the chapter list, I hate to say this--but it does not really meet notability. I suggest including it in the Honor society article but going for an AfD unless one good source shows up. Rublamb (talk) 01:01, 30 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Merge into College of William & Mary secret societies; I've searched the state library, the VA newspaper database, and the usual places and can't find off-campus sources. The logo and some info seem to be pulled from its Facebook page. Rublamb (talk) 22:13, 25 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
https://gpa.eastview.com/crl/elmundo/?a=d&d=mndo19571224-01.1.8&srpos=1&e=------195-en-25--1--img-txIN-%22Zeta+Phi+Beta%22----1957----- this article from 1957 from El Mundo mentions it was founded

Harvard College social clubs

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IMO, all groups mentioned in the Harvard College social clubs List below should be in a category under cat:Harvard and cat:Student_societies_in_the_United_States . comments? Naraht (talk) 16:37, 19 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Makes sense to me. We need some consistency in how we handle collegaite senior societies and final clubs. Rublamb (talk) 19:44, 19 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
For now at Harvard one cat, but I could see a cat for only the senior societies later (don't quite understand the difference between the senior societies and final clubs.
Done. Naraht (talk) 06:00, 20 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I think they are the same thing. Final club seems to be used at Yale. Rublamb (talk) 15:21, 20 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I know in some places that there is a difference between groups that are selected into multi-year groups vs. those where one class of seniors selects the next group of incoming seniors and as such the group on campus only consists of seniors. Is that the difference at Harvard?Naraht (talk) 16:37, 20 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
An article in the NYT says that a Harvard final club is the "final social club before graduation (having already passed through a freshman club and a waiting club)." So, it is the same as a senior society, an honorary only open to seniors. This also means that these groups can be divided into freshmen, waiting, and final clubs. Fun fact: the clubs were formed when Harvard banned GLOs. However, GLOs are now allowed on campus. Rublamb (talk) 03:22, 6 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
A 1958 article in the Harvard Crimson says that these are called final clubs because once joined, you cannot join another group. Meaning it is the final club a student can join. A 2015 article mentions recruitment for one of the final clubs taking place during the sophomore year, which doesn't really fit the three-tier model described by the NTY. Rublamb (talk) 16:53, 27 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I think you have captured the distinction here. As was the case of Cyrus Northrop, he had been a member of a freshman fraternity, a "waiting" club or 2nd-year fraternity, and a junior/senior fraternity, many of which evolved into "final clubs" after breaking away to "go local". Jax MN (talk) 21:50, 27 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Redirects

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I have not found all of the redirects that lack a WP tag, but I have found many redirects that should be deleted. These are spelling or capitalization mistakes, unhelpful article title phrasing, etc. I know this is not a priority project but I am sharing here so that we will not forget the need. Rublamb (talk) 17:37, 21 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

List of potential redirects for Discussion

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So far *just* those containing Alpha, from either a title search with / alpha/ or looking at the section starting with Alpha in Category:Redirects from miscapitalisations (and the one to *possibly* keep due to being a short name)

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I'm not sure it is policy or not, but I work under the following rule. For a specialty GLO, especially one that is in a graduate school like Law or Medicine, I link to the specific graduate school if there is a page, so for a GLO for law schools, if University of Guam School of Law exists, then that is the link rather than University of Guam and I don't even pipe link to make it show as University of Guam. Feelings? Naraht (talk) 14:50, 26 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Of course the other question is if the GLO died in 1950 and the University of Guam School of Law was renamed as John Filbert school of Law in 2002 whether to pipe trick it to say University of Guam School of Law or not.Naraht (talk) 14:54, 26 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
In general, I agree. However, if I am creating a table for a preexisting list that is already set up with the main college's name, I don't always update the institution name because you never know for sure without going back to the original source. I just worked on a list for a group that was a weird hybrid of medical schools and regular colleges; the GLO's own list included many regular college names because it served both medical and pre-medical students at one time. I looked at the date of formation of some of the professional schools and found that some were established after the charter date of the chapter. There was no source to confirm that the chapter moved locations or ever existed during the era of the professional school. In that instance, it seemed best to go with the source and list the main college name. In other words, follow the source when possible.
School name changes can really be an issue, especially with defunct chapters and groups. Many of the older professional school names do not have redirects. If the chapter list is long and many redirects are needed, I don't always take the time to create the redirects. Previously, we have discussed using the school name at the time of closure of the chapter or at the time of its formation, but not updating to the modern/current institutional name. This means we would not update the Guam name and, technically, should add a redirect. I freely admit to be lazy about redirects for college divisions; I tend to focus on main institutional name changes. Rublamb (talk) 17:59, 26 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
FWIW, I prefer that the school name is linked to the subordinate graduate school article, if there is one. Readers can always click to read about the main school, from there. Once a subordinate school page is written it is unlikely to be rolled back, and merged. Jax MN (talk) 20:27, 26 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, but the link should be made through a redirect so that our articles can have the historically correct name. In this instance, many of the chapters predated (and went defunct) decades before the current graduate schools were named or established. In some cases, half a century or more. Furthermore, just because the fraternity says it had a chapter at General State University does not mean that we can infer that the chapter was actually located at General State Medical College which was established in another city decades later. Some of these early professional fraternities were not just for graduate students but were open to anyone interested in the field, including undergraduates. I have come across two of these medical GLOs in the past two weeks; one which still has undergraduate and graduate chapters (and not always chapters for both levels at the same university). If the organization says the chapter was at General State University, I think it is a major jump to change that name and link to General State Medical College without a source or further investigation. Rublamb (talk) 21:15, 26 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I think in the chapter list, the current school name should be preferred. Where a chapter was first established when that school had an earlier name (Duke, Samford, Trine...), where it isn't obvious, I've often added the other school name in parentheses. Now, for FOUNDING schools, this implies a more likely interest in the historical context, not just "Is this fraternity at my school?" type of inquiries. Therefore, in the lede, historical summary and infobox, both names could be denoted. I guess I'd judge each case separately, based on how obvious the shift was. Jax MN (talk) 21:32, 26 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
There is possibly a difference between a current/active organization and a defunct organization. For the latter, my caution is that the current professional college may not be at the same location and may have no connection to a former chapter. For example, Duke and Wake Forest both moved their entire campus. SUNY formed a medical college in a different city. If a chapter was short-lived, a newly named or newly established graduate school and its location may be incorrect. Thus, it would be inaccurate to link to a modern medical school.
Here's a random example that I came across the other day. An early women's honor society had a chapter at Newcomb College. Recently, Newcomb merged with Tulane. Would we skip a link to the article H. Sophie Newcomb Memorial College and replace the chapter list with Tulane? If the chapter is active, I would use Tulane with an efn about Newcomb. If the chapter went dormant while Newcomb was still operating, I would use Newcomb and would either follow your example of (now Tulane) or include that info in an efn. Obviously, it would be historically inaccurate to say that an all-male college had a women's society. Rublamb (talk) 22:34, 26 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@Naraht: Should have said, I am pretty sure I know the article you are thinking about. I was lazy and did not fix the data when moving it to a table. No offense will be taken if you make corrections or add pipe links. Around the same time, I had worked on another article where chapters were at both medical and regular colleges (for pre-med students)——so I was hyper-aware of the need to use caution and not make assumptions. Rublamb (talk) 16:49, 19 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
And now, I can't remember which one I was talking about :(, I'm pretty sure it was Med schools or Dental schools given I used law schools in the example...Naraht (talk) 17:01, 19 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
It was a medical frat. I can't remember either but will track it down. LOL. Rublamb (talk) 17:05, 19 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
It was List of Alpha Omega Alpha chapters. Cheers. Rublamb (talk) 17:23, 19 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I took care of it. There are some medical schools that do not have an article or a redirect; I used the medical school name and linked to the primary university. Rublamb (talk) 18:39, 6 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

References

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I have started a new page Wikipedia:WikiProject Fraternities and Sororities/Library for GLO references, now linked through a tab on the WP mainpage. If you have some favorities, please add to the list. Rublamb (talk) 04:24, 30 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Inactive essay

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The essay Wikipedia:WikiProject Fraternities and Sororities/Notability is noted as dormant because the discussion about it ended before it was approve. Do we want to revisit it? Rublamb (talk) 11:14, 30 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I commented on that article's talk page. Thanks, Rublamb, for the extensive organizational work you have done on the project's pages. Jax MN (talk) 21:46, 30 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
IMO, the NFRAT article focuses on Greek Letter Organizations (or closely related like FarmHouse) based at colleges. The recent expansion of the WikiProject to include groups in Eastern Europe, in Africa or were never college related (Loyal Order of the Moose, etc.) means that we almost need to start from Scratch (and based on that, it may make sense to move groups like Loyal Order of the Moose to a different Wikiproject.Naraht (talk) 23:41, 30 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
In its current form, the essay does not set limitations on the type of fraternal organization or a requirement to have a Greek letter name or a collegiate connection. The article is inclusive of "fraternities, sororities, and other Greek letter organizations" and "college Secret societies and student clubs". General and community-based fraternal organizations are covered by the terms "fraternity" and "sorority". The recent WP expansions that are not specifically mentioned (and should be) are honor and literary societies. Defining notability and the scope of the WP are two different topics that should be covered in two different essays/pages. Rublamb (talk) 00:54, 1 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Naraht brings up a reasonable point where other editors may inquire as to scope.
To summarize for readers, here are the cut-off points which logically could make sense for us.
1. Every notable group, past or current, which has or had a Greek Letter name, and those operating as such. (Acacia, FarmHouse), AND literary societies, AND secret societies, AND those in the Masonic family. This includes community-based fraternities, and non-collegiate military fraternities. We could aim to identify these globally.
2. North American only: Every notable group, past or current, which has or had a Greek Letter name, and those operating as such. (Acacia, Farmhouse), AND literary societies, AND secret societies, AND those in the Masonic family. This includes community-based fraternities, and non-collegiate military fraternities. BUT limited to North America.
3. N.A. and collegiate only: Every notable collegiate or once-collegiate group, past or current, which has or had a Greek Letter name, and those operating as such. (Acacia, Farmhouse), AND literary societies, AND secret societies. DISCLUDING those in the Masonic family. DISCLUDING community-based fraternities, and DISCLUDING non-collegiate military fraternities. Limited to North America.
There is a dormant project for Collegiate secret societies in North America, and a vigorous List of Masonic Grand Lodges (start there, many sublinks. We've only scratched the surface of these). But to my knowledge, there ISN'T a project for literary societies. We've picked up the collegiate ones, but there are examples of non-collegiate literary societies that have existed in the US since 1849 which we've not picked up. Nor is there a project or list of ancillary organizations to the Masonic fraternity: We (Freemasons) call them either Appendant Bodies or Subordinate Bodies. There are many, many hundreds: These include the Shrine, the Scottish Rite (which in some countries is a de facto grand lodge), and stretching further, non-Masonic groups like the Odd Fellows or Woodmen of the World. There is no home for military fraternities, besides us. Nor for community-based groups like those in Indiana (Tri Kappa) or the various new LGBTQ groups, mostly non-collegiate. We started with the Puerto Rican and Philippine collegiate fraternities, added fencing fraternities in Europe, then the gang-like Nigerian confraternities. We are looking for consensus on where our project draws the line of inclusion.
Which path do we take? We could blaze a trail to be trackers of ALL fraternal activity globally, tracking every group in option #1 above. This appears to be our current heading. In this, we'd aim to create the definitive list. Not voting yet, but I personally like the clarity this provides, so that groups choosing a name don't tread on others with the same name. Or, Naraht may be right, that a split is necessary; maybe the Masonic project needs a push to create a list of their subordinate / auxiliary groups. There may be some 5,000 individual Degrees, jurisdictions or groupings of degrees that have current or recent activity and which are part of the Masonic world. Counting just grand lodges alone, (first three degrees, some geographical bounds) these number maybe 2,000 themselves. That would offload some of our work.
FWIW, merely on grounds of clarity I would rather not lose track of Greek letter groups outside of North America. I'm more comfortable offloading the Masonic entities, because they have an active project group. I could be convinced to limit our scope to collegiate only. Jax MN (talk) 03:00, 1 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I really want to keep these as two conversations and projects--scope and notability. The Notability essay should be fairly easy as we are just supplementing the well defined Wikipedia guidelines. I am going to restart scope as a different thread. Rublamb (talk) 03:21, 1 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I wanted to circle back to this. @Jax MN, could you merge your more recent list into the essay? I like the idea of this content being in an essay, rather than a Talkpage discussion. We will be able to link the essay through a tab, making it more visible. And I still think we can update the essay without bringing in the wider conversation on what is included under WP:FRAT or, at least, with an agreement to ignore that issue for now. If we are not going to update the essay, it should be AfD, but my preference is to update it. Rublamb (talk) 16:32, 19 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I will. My regular duties interfere, but I'll get to this. Good idea to make it a tab. Jax MN (talk) 21:31, 19 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

WP Scope

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This continues the discussion started above. I have copied some relevant comments here. Rublamb (talk) 03:26, 1 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]


The recent expansion of the WikiProject to include groups in Eastern Europe, in Africa or were never college related (Loyal Order of the Moose, etc.) means that we almost need to start from Scratch (and based on that, it may make sense to move groups like Loyal Order of the Moose to a different Wikiproject.Naraht (talk) 23:41, 30 November 2024 (UTC)Reply
Naraht brings up a reasonable point where other editors may inquire as to scope. To summarize for readers, here are the cut-off points which logically could make sense for us.
1. Every notable group, past or current, which has or had a Greek Letter name, and those operating as such. (Acacia, FarmHouse), AND literary societies, AND secret societies, AND those in the Masonic family. This includes community-based fraternities, and non-collegiate military fraternities. We could aim to identify these globally.
2. North American only: Every notable group, past or current, which has or had a Greek Letter name, and those operating as such. (Acacia, Farmhouse), AND literary societies, AND secret societies, AND those in the Masonic family. This includes community-based fraternities, and non-collegiate military fraternities. BUT limited to North America.
3. N.A. and collegiate only: Every notable collegiate or once-collegiate group, past or current, which has or had a Greek Letter name, and those operating as such. (Acacia, Farmhouse), AND literary societies, AND secret societies. DISCLUDING those in the Masonic family. DISCLUDING community-based fraternities, and DISCLUDING non-collegiate military fraternities. Limited to North America.
There is a dormant project for Collegiate secret societies in North America, and a vigorous List of Masonic Grand Lodges (start there, many sublinks. We've only scratched the surface of these). But to my knowledge, there ISN'T a project for literary societies. We've picked up the collegiate ones, but there are examples of non-collegiate literary societies that have existed in the US since 1849 which we've not picked up. Nor is there a project or list of ancillary organizations to the Masonic fraternity: We (Freemasons) call them either Appendant Bodies or Subordinate Bodies. There are many, many hundreds: These include the Shrine, the Scottish Rite (which in some countries is a de facto grand lodge), and stretching further, non-Masonic groups like the Odd Fellows or Woodmen of the World. There is no home for military fraternities, besides us. Nor for community-based groups like those in Indiana (Tri Kappa) or the various new LGBTQ groups, mostly non-collegiate. We started with the Puerto Rican and Philippine collegiate fraternities, added fencing fraternities in Europe, then the gang-like Nigerian confraternities. We are looking for consensus on where our project draws the line of inclusion.
Which path do we take? We could blaze a trail to be trackers of ALL fraternal activity globally, tracking every group in option #1 above. This appears to be our current heading. In this, we'd aim to create the definitive list. Not voting yet, but I personally like the clarity this provides, so that groups choosing a name don't tread on others with the same name. Or, Naraht may be right, that a split is necessary; maybe the Masonic project needs a push to create a list of their subordinate / auxiliary groups. There may be some 5,000 individual Degrees, jurisdictions or groupings of degrees that have current or recent activity and which are part of the Masonic world. Counting just grand lodges alone, (first three degrees, some geographical bounds) these number maybe 2,000 themselves. That would offload some of our work.
FWIW, merely on grounds of clarity I would rather not lose track of Greek letter groups outside of North America. I'm more comfortable offloading the Masonic entities, because they have an active project group. I could be convinced to limit our scope to collegiate only. Jax MN (talk) 03:00, 1 December 2024 (UTC)Reply
It is complicated. If we cut to just collegiate groups but keep the same WP name, we would be showing a bias suggesting that only college fraternities are "true fraternities" and that community-based groups are somehow inferior. Same with limiting the geographic area to America or North America; I cannot think of a greater way to show a pro-American point of view in an encyclopedia that is supposed to serve all English speakers. That being said, after working on many different types of student organizations currently under the WP, some are a better fit than others to the concept of a fraternity and could be dropped. In the past, I have questioned the inclusion of community-based American GLOs, European academic corporations, and Nigerian confraternities but have been willing to work on these articles following WikiProject discussions to include them. Some general thoughts:
  • Masonic: I don't favor adopting Masonic groups/articles in full because of the other WP, but don't have an issue with some overlap of a few key articles about the main groups if we are going to retain community-based fraternal organizations. Or we can boldly go and exclude because this info is covered elsewhere.
  • General fraternities: Many, many general fraternities from the late 19th and early 20th centuries are not Masonic. Most are defunct and do not have Wikipedia articles but do have secondary sources if someone wants to create an article. These belong if the WP is generically fraternal, but I could also see cutting off non-collegiate groups and sending them over to WP Organizations. Note: unless the WP and its main overview articles change to indicate collegiate-only, we will continue to have other editors link these groups to the WP and its lists.
  • Literary societies: There are some literary societies that became fraternities. However, the early literary societies and the still active groups are not fraternal in the traditional sense. I would be in favor of cutting all that don't have a direct connection to a fraternity or sorority, even if they have a Greek letter name. They would then fall under WP Organization, just like any other random student group. If we keep them, there are potentially a ton of articles to write.
  • Academic associations/Student corporations: With their ethnocentric, political, and militaristic (or Catholic) slant, these groups are an uncomfortable fit with traditional fraternities. Almost all of them went dormant at their original college and functioned as expat political arms, reforming after the fall of the Soviet Union. This is the first category I would cut from our list, even though it means changing many infoboxes.
  • Nigerian confraternities: Most are based at colleges, have chapters, and all the trimmings of traditional GLOs. However, their slide into crime sets these apart from traditional GLOs. However, some are beginning to disassociate the college division from the community/crime organization, making it harder to discount these groups. But, since these have a distinct culture and name, we could easily say these don't fit. As the group expert on this topic, I am good either way.
  • Other countries: if it is a collegiate GLO/fraternity/sorority, it should be included, regardless of country. However, this does not mean that every variation of foreign student organizations falls under the WP. Just those that are actual GLOs.
  • Greek letter names: Just because a group has a Greek letter name, does not mean it fits under the WP umbrella. Just saying...
I am realizing we should probably discuss each category separately so that the archived record will be easier to follow. On the other hand, we could simply identify the articles that we potentially want to drop and discuss those. Rublamb (talk) 05:23, 1 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Having said all of that, I don't have an issue with continuing to include all fraternities and similar student groups except the full Mason article collection (which is covered by another WP). Compared to most WikiProjects, our article list is very small. Also, we may attract new editors to our group as we expand the number of articles or potential articles. Thus, I see the benefits of continued expansion and narrowing the focus. Rublamb (talk) 16:20, 1 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Is this a sorority?

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Yesharah Society is a social organizatino for former LDS female missionaries. It has some connections to colleges, but was mostly community-based. I believe it has the WP:F&S tag because of its affiliation with The Friars Club, which later became the LDS Church fraternity Delta Phi Kappa. However, I am not seeing enough evidence to prove that Yesharah was a sorority. It is called a "social organization" in LDS records, while Friars Club/Delta Phi Kappa is called a "fraternity". But I wanted other opinions before removing it from our list. Rublamb (talk) 20:41, 8 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not seeing it treated that way by the Banyan (BYU's yearbook). Would checking the yearbooks of the other Utah Universities with chapters make sense? (And the fact they were called chapters still makes me wonder.Naraht (talk) 21:58, 8 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Previously, I checked a couple of yearbooks looking for an image. I found it under organizations, rather than being in the GLO section. I don't know if other campuses had a chapter but it might be worth looking. Rublamb (talk) 22:16, 8 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Depends on whether there was a fraternity section in that yearbook that included Delta Phi Kappa. Do we have an example of that?Naraht (talk) 00:38, 9 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
We can look. I think Yesharah had closed its collegiate chapters before Friars Club became a fraternity, so that may or may not work. Rublamb (talk) 22:33, 10 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Concilio Interfraternitario de Puerto Rico

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I went ahead and created Concilio Interfraternitario de Puerto Rico citing 3 articles from El Mundo, there are a lot more but those mostly mention donations or tournaments. Could not find any other citations, there is a Page in Facebook, with post and a logo, but I am not sure if we can cite it. El Johnson (talk) 20:34, 11 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Great! It is fantastic to have the help of someone who can translate El Mundo. There are some allowable ways to use Facebook as a source, but I try to avoid it as it can be red flag for deletionists. However, we can use the logo from Facebook under Fair Use. I will go ahead and upload it to the article. Rublamb (talk) 21:56, 11 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
There is a copy of newspaper article in their Facebook, here. Maybe that also has useful details. Rublamb (talk) 22:21, 11 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Alpha Beta Chi

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Looks like only Alpha Beta Chi lacks an article of the CIPR. Originally deleted as a copyvio, but found a good chunk of it in a Puerto Rico Senate Resolution. Is this a good place to start? https://senado.pr.gov/document_vault/session_diary/1649/document/082301.pdf Naraht (talk) 16:10, 17 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The page is protected and only an administrator can create the article El Johnson (talk) 18:20, 17 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Eljohnson15 the admin in question hasn't been active in over a decade, so reached out to an admin that I've had some contact with before who is active.Naraht (talk) 21:10, 17 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Who suggested posting to WP:AN, which I did.Naraht (talk) 21:18, 17 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Based on WP:AN, the block has been listed. Rublamb (talk) 23:46, 17 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
itym, lifted...Naraht (talk) 09:49, 18 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Alpha Omicron Sigma

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It appears that the sorority uses an Omicron with a bar above it, and while the article has a latin O with a bar in it, I don't see an Omicron with a bar example anywhere in Greek diacritics, so I'm not sure what we should have in the {{lang|grc|xxx}} to make it entirely greek.Naraht (talk) 20:04, 19 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

That may simply be someone's attempt to ensure it is pronounced with the long "O" sound, in English. Jax MN (talk) 20:50, 19 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
This has officially become Puerto Rico day. When I look at their graphic, it looks like a lower case Omicron to me. We could skip the language template in the infobox so that a mix of Greek and Latin letters can be used OR just not worry about it and use the plain Omicron. If you like, there could be a redirect with the mixed letters. Somewhat related, I just found that the article title for Ricardo Alegría, the founder of the PR fraternity Alpha Beta Chi, auto updates to Alegria as the article title--this is not a redirect. So I guess somewhere there is a MOS guideline indicating that is is okay to ignore foreign letter preferences. Rublamb (talk) 22:16, 19 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
True, though in Greek, Omicron would be used for short and Omega for long. (and "Oh"micron sounds horrible to me). This leaves it as even a wierder mix than Chi Hereot.Naraht (talk)
I think i has been more like Puerto Rico week in the project lol. I don't edit as much as I used to in this last decade, but I have sort of being looking after those articles for the last couple of years, at least deleting vandalism and such. If it is not too much trouble, could the project take a look at the errors in the citations in the Phi Sigma Alpha article? El Johnson (talk) 20:06, 20 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@Eljohnson15: I believe I have fixed all of the problematic citations in Phi Sigma Alpha. Please review and let me know here if I missed any. Rublamb (talk) 18:11, 6 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

List of founders to dotted list, number ?

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I'm looking for X, Y in a proposed policy. "If the organization has more than X founders, then they should be included as a dotted list instead of in prose. Multiple approximately columns should be used if the number is greater than Y founders"

  • Joseph A
  • Michael B
  • Robert C
  • John D

... My first feelings on X and Y are 5 and 10. Based on the changes to Kappa Kappa Psi, I'm planning on changing Alpha Phi Omega and I was looking for guidance longer term.

Also, do we have any groups with greater than 20 people mentioned as founders?

I'm also making the assumption that if a group was founded by the merger of the some number of local(-ish) organization (example, Gamma Sigma Sigma) that the schools/organizations should either be a dotted list or a table.Naraht (talk) 18:27, 21 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Yet another item for our much-needed style guide. In a discussion a while back, I recall that five was the number landed on. Meaning a list of five or less should be included in the text, while a list of five or more should be a bulleted list. Again, based on my memory, MOS defers to style guides in this area. The APA style guide (and my high school English teacher) says that lists need to include three or more items. The number five was a compromise as bulleted lists call attention to what are, in many instances, otherwise non-notable individuals. I know we have opinions at both extremes, that these lists are and are not worthy of inclusion. Rublamb (talk) 19:04, 21 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
You've said five or less for prose, five or more for bullets. Which way should five go? (and Alpha Phi Omega has 14 founders, so I'm wondering what the record is. :) )Naraht (talk) 23:30, 21 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I think three is suitable for prose, and four or more should be bulleted. Jax MN (talk) 23:40, 21 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
See, still "controversial". IMO, a list of four names can look odd if the article is short, as four is not enough for columns and creates a lot of white space if placed in a list. I like being able to go either way with five as that allows us to leave things as created and not be as draconian, but if I had to decide, my vote would be a bulleted list with five items. As to the highest number of founders: there is one with 20+; I think it is an honor society that listed founding members, rather than actual founders. Rublamb (talk) 01:00, 22 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
As to the number needed for a table, it depends on whether they fall under two or three columns, based on the length of names or other content. I tend to go with what looks right given the entire section and article. Even then, most people are using phones to access Wikipedia, so we can't really control what the viewer will see. That is why I prefer the self-adjusting column templates, rather than tables. I think ten is a higher number than is normally used. @Jax MN probably has a better sense of this than I do as I previously hated tables but was convinced to use them by discussion. Maybe we could identify several variations to look at? Rublamb (talk) 02:28, 22 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Some existing variations, selected at random:
Rublamb (talk) 02:52, 22 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I know I'm always going to be a stick in the mud about this, but I find lists of non-notable founders to be pointless (and somewhat antithetical to the MOS guidelines on lists). I just took a peek at Iota Phi Theta and I'm not horribly offended by the 12 founders listed in prose, particularly since only one of them is bluelinked. If the founders are all (or almost-all) notable, then a list is fine (4+ or 5+ I don't really care) but if they're redlinked keep 'em in prose, regardless of how many there are. Primefac (talk) 13:07, 22 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Primefac notes a preference for plain text versus a redlink if a founder doesn't have an article. I agree, although I like the bulleted lists because they break up walls of text. I'd further note that it is unlikely that a redlinked founder will gain an article many years after their collegiate exploits, solely on that basis rather than because of a later, professional accomplishment or some notoriety. In years to come, when the Inclusionists win the long war against Deletionists, then maybe we'll revisit this and Wikipedia will expand to allow articles about each of these founders, given whatever information we have. Jax MN (talk) 20:23, 22 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@Primefac: Reviewing MOS:LIST is really a good suggestion. MOS prefers text over lists: "Embedded lists should be used only when appropriate; sometimes the information in a list is better presented as prose." MOS:USEPROSE provides an example that is comparable to our founder lists, indicating that "articles can be improved by converting unnecessary lists into encyclopedic prose". "Unnecessary" is probably the main takeaway as layout is not going to be enough to justify a bulleted list. This takes us back to @Naraht's original question: is there a set number of names that becomes so unwieldy in text that a bulleted list is needed for clarity? Based on MOS, it seems like my idea of five may be too low--that number was probably programmed into me by a teacher back in the day, amplified by being in the fundraising profession that loves donor recognition lists. However, as I said some time ago before I was convinced to use embedded lists for founders, bulleted lists may call undue attention to individuals who are otherwise not notable. Since I regularly convert lists of symbols to prose, it only makes sense to go back to converting lists of founders to text, as a general WP:FRAT guideline. Rublamb (talk) 20:49, 22 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Looking at MOS:LONGSEQ, that has preference for nine entries being a bulletted two column list. I'm wondering why we would have a list of founders in prose longer than that.Naraht (talk) 13:21, 23 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
MOS:LONGSEQ says: "Some material may not be appropriate for reducing or summarizing using the summary style method." Thus, this determination is based on the content itself, rather than the number of items. This circles back to @Primefac's point: does a collection of names meet the standard for an embedded list?
You found the answer in MOS:LONGSEQ: only if is too complex to understand as text. One could argue that a list of names is rarely complex, whereas overly long sentences with many commas are often confusing and too complex to easily understand. When I was a graphic designer, I looked at how many rows a sentence or paragraph covered, as there were guidelines backed by studies on how people perceive chunks of data. This is at the heart of @Jax MN's preference for embedded lists. I address this in Wikipedia by dividing text into many short paragraphs, following the rule of at least three sentences for a paragraph. However, a sentence with 12, 15, or even 20 names is as long as a paragraph visually and, by most people's standards, is too long and overly complex.
If we must set a guideline for WP:FRAT, I don't have a problem applying the example in MOS:LONGSEQ literally, and moving nine or more names to a list. My preference may be for a lower number but it does not look like that is supported by MOS. Although MOS:LONGSEQ provides an example with columns, it does not specify columns based on the number of items, so that can still be up to the individual editor. Rublamb (talk) 18:24, 23 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
One other stylistic point. Where an infobox is long, but the first sections in a main article are thin, this occasionally results in a gap before the start of a later section, with its own subheader. Readers might see that large gap, and not realize an article continues "below the fold" -- to use a newspaper term. Thus, when we include the bulleted list of founders its presence tends to lengthen the article somewhat, and again, helps draw the eye through the page. While that rule is in the MOS, the MOS is nevertheless a guideline, and practical implementation can be modified in specific situations if there is a rationale. Jax MN (talk) 00:18, 24 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Ironically, MOS specifically mentions not using lists in short articles because these articles need more text to be long enough for publication (my translation is enough text to not be a stub). Lately, I have noticed how many articles have a complete infobox but no symbols section or mention of these details in the article. Making sure we add the infobox content to the body of the article will solve the issue you mention while also adding value. For those who don't know, MOS says that the infobox is supposed to a summary of the article, not a place to introduce new information. Rublamb (talk) 00:39, 24 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Use of Infobox Fraternity for umbrella groups?

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It seems like using Infobox Fraternity for umbrella groups is a bit shoehorny. The NPC (to pick one) seems to be closer to needing Infobox Organization than Infobox Fraternity. It certainly doesn't have a pin for example. Naraht (talk) 13:29, 23 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I brought this up earlier, but we never made a decision. The main advantage of using Infobox Fraternity is that the articles pull into petscan reports. As part of our cleanup project, I found several umbrella groups that we had missed for our watchlist and also discovered that most umbrella articles lacked an infobox. I made the decision to go with Infobox Fraternity bacause it put these in our petscan reports and would also let us include quirky fraternal data like emphasis and colors that are not components of Infobox Organization. The European umbrellas' data that is almost identical to that of US GLOs and would be difficult to fit into Infobox Org. That being said, I am fine either way. Rublamb (talk) 18:52, 23 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Do we want to change the US umbrellas to Infobox orgnization and leave the European umbrellas (essentially fraternities and sororities) as Infobox fraternity? Now that we know these are all on the WP watchlist, the infobox type is not as important. The only downside would be that they will no longer show up in the petscan report for missing content. This may not be a big deal if we go ahead and add all that can be found when making the change. Rublamb (talk) 05:18, 28 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@Jax MS: do you have an opinion on this? Rublamb (talk) 18:46, 6 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

cleanup idea

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I did a search for the occurrances of *just* the 1927 Baird's from google books that are currently in the form of ref external links rather than in a cite template. ([https://books.google.com/books?id=Z1vOAAAAMAAJ) would changing those and similar to cites (using https://citer.toolforge.org/ ) be a reasonable thing to compile as a cleanup idea?

Result of using citer is <ref>{{cite book | last=Baird | first=W.R. | title=Baird's Manual of American College Fraternities | publisher=G. Banta Company | issue=v. 11, pt. 1927 | year=1927 | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Z1vOAAAAMAAJ | access-date=2024-12-27 | page=}}</ref> side effect is that both the q= and dq= are dropped, so search terrms are gone, which is a good thing. Naraht (talk) 14:41, 27 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Can you explain why this matters—external links vs. the site template? I need to know more about to make an informed decision. Now that VE has a citation generator that uses webpage addresses or Hathi Trust and Newspaper.com links, I expect more external citations. Because this is a simple cut-and-paste into the citation generator, it is easier and quicker for most people.
Based the above, there are some flaws in the citation generated by the cite template in this example. I am not worried about the citation style, but rather its content that should be: Shepard, Francis W., ed. (1927). Baird's Manual of American College Fraternities (11th ed.). Menasha, Wisconsin: George Banta Publishing Company. p. , via Google Books. So, we are not getting the correct editor's name, are missing the location of publication, have a shortened form of the publisher's name, and the edition is showing as a volume.
Also, I like it when the citation link goes to the exact page referenced. Not so much with Baird's 11th in Google, but with the earlier editions of Baird's that are available through Hathi Trust, you can generate a stable link that is for a specific page rather than the book. Since the digitized page counts do not always match the actual page number, I find that I end up scrolling through a range of pages to find the needed entry with a link to just the book. Going to the exact page seems like a helpful upgrade. Rublamb (talk) 05:09, 28 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
In general cites are preferred for giving Consistency as to the format of the information linked to including not having everything as one big link. It would also make easier the ones that don't actually have a link like those that are recent (1977). Pages are always preferred, Often when the google link has a search it leads to 4 or 5 pages including the ones from the index and often the table of contents. If we find something that citer is doing wrong, we can check with the people who wrote citer or send a reponse to google books.Naraht (talk) 18:06, 31 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
In fixing citation issues found in the new report, I ran into a problem with the cite book template and could use some suggestions. There were cases where the url in the cite book citation was a perm dead link. If a new link cannot be found, the quickest fix is to remove the bad link--at least with citation not created through cite book. However, if you remove the url from cite book, you get another error message stating that a url is required for cite book. I had to recreate the citation in a different way, in order to clear the error message. Any ideas for a quicker or easier way to solved this problem? Rublamb (talk) 22:11, 3 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Kappa Pi Kappa (formerly Kappa Kappa Kappa) members

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Working on Kappa Pi Kappa because it was the only one in the cleanup report that had Cleanup list, which was used for a mostly unreferenced list of Notable Alumni. I've been able to reference most of the ones that I've looked for so far and hit an article in the Dartmouth Alumni magazine on those attending the 70th anniversary celebration, so that probably means adding more. I'm starting to hit an issue that I saw many years ago where someone (half joking) proposed excluding members of the New Hampshire House of Representatives from the Notability criteria that covers all other first level subnational legislatures. (It has been larger than the US Congress on several occasions, hitting a maximum of 443 members in 1942 before a state constitutional amendment required it to be between 375 and 400 members, and right now it is 400 members.)

When I'm done, it probably should end up split off into a separate page. (current count is 33 (29 with pages) as UG members, 8 as honorary) I don't *think* we have any list of member pages for a local social fraternity, does anyone see a problem with that? I'm also assuming that even though it went through name changes from KKK to KXK to KKK to KPiK that this wouldn't affect the generation of the list of notables other than perhaps a member at the top of the split off page.Naraht (talk) 20:05, 1 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

As a standard practice I'm OK with this. I do think there is rampant puffery with the Ivy League articles in general, and take a dim view to Dartmouth's (and others') many spin-off locals. But, fine... Jax MN (talk) 00:44, 2 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Oddly, the 100th anniversary book (https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=umn.31951000948350v) is either really modest or really *not* modest, and I can't really tell which. While the individual name entries (and they have *all*) contain information on the men, there is no place that lists all of the members that held any sort of significant office. So the men who became State Governors are next to those that became small town lawyers. A list is there of brothers who were Presidents and Officers of the Dartmouth Press Club (and certain other Dartmouth organizations) are there. So, modest in all brothers are equal or *not* modest in that what occured *at* Dartmouth is more important than any later honor or accomplishment, you decide. :)Naraht (talk) 16:03, 2 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Done for now. A few number are referenced to the 100th anniversary book only (which has been *incredibly* useful). I think that is a good enough source.Naraht (talk) 19:46, 2 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I don't have a problem with a spinoff page per se. However, since this article and its notable list are both fairly short, there is no urgency to creating the new article. Rublamb (talk) 00:36, 3 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, no urgency. If the rest of the article was as long as the notable alumni. I'll swing back when I have the chance to check for any members of state legislatures I missed (prior comments on the NH House notwithstanding)Naraht (talk) 14:10, 3 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Category Structure for founders, etc.

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Right now, we have Category:College fraternity founders , Category:College sorority founders and Category:College honor society founders as well as Category:College fraternity members in Category:Lists of members of United States student societies and none of them *really* belong there because they simply aren't lists. I'd like to move all four of them out of the Category. I'd like to create Category:Founders of student societies in the United States in Category:Student societies in the United States and put the first three in it and remove the cat for Category:College fraternity members (it would still be in Category:Fraternities and sororities.

In addition, one of the groups in Category:College fraternity founders is for Sigma Pi (literary society) and that has two founders. If I find one more founder of a literary society, that should probably create a Category:College literary society founders in Category:Founders of student societies in the United States as well.

thoughts?Naraht (talk) 14:25, 3 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Additionally, I think either Category:High School honor society founders or Category:Secondary honor society founders would make sense for the founder of Cum Laude Society.Naraht (talk) 19:16, 3 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Looks like the Wikipedia article is called Secondary school, with a redirect for high school. Let's stick with that language (which also matches the Honor society section header). Rublamb (talk) 21:37, 3 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Makes sense. I don't remember there being many, but it will not take long to run through the list of literary societies on our watchlist. We will just have to figure out what to do with the founders of literary societies that became traditional fraternities at a later date. Would those founders get both categories? Rublamb (talk) 21:39, 3 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Category:Secondary school honor society founders then? and I noticed neither of you objected to Category:Founders of student societies in the United States, so that is a go.Naraht (talk) 22:33, 3 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Category:Founders of student societies in the United States created, will move the Cum Laude founders cat.Naraht (talk) 18:37, 6 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I have added both to our watchlist Rublamb (talk) 18:51, 6 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Unfortunately, while the article is Secondary school, the article on the societies there is Category:High school honor societies. Which way should we straighten things out?Naraht (talk) 18:56, 6 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Hmm. Wikipeida's guidelines are to go with the common name. High school is the common term in America, but not so much elsewhere. I think that is why the main article is called Secondary school. Can catagories be moved easily like articles? I looked and there is not a move option in VE, as with articles. My gut is that it should be Secondary not High School. I guess a redirect would be better than nothing. Rublamb (talk) 19:11, 6 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Did not answer this question before. To me, Category:College fraternity members would be for individual biographical articles. I was expecting a horribly long list of people who belonged to a fraternity that lacks a member category. However, the articles currently using Category:College fraternity members are lists of members of the individual fraternities. Those make more sense to be under the Category:Lists of members of United States student societies or something similar. Is that what you were thinking? Do we want to keep Category:College fraternity members as a category for individuals? Rublamb (talk) 19:21, 6 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Honor society?

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I was looking at Cannon and Castle and while the infobox calls in an honorary, the membership selection process seems to not qualify for that.

Each year, Cannon and Castle elected six members from the junior class. These members were selected for their "character, knowledge as reflected by general academic achievements and achievements in military science, and leadership qualities as demonstrated by performance as a cadet in the Reserve Officers Training Corps, and by contributing to the Yale Cadet Battalion." The six men would in turn, nominate twelve additional men for membership. Members were identified with a braid that could be worn on their uniform.

Honestly, this seems to be what Baird's dropped into the Recognition Societies, which is a term we generally don't use on Wikipedia.Naraht (talk) 20:27, 3 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Jax MN has worked on the military honor societies and may have insight. Many of what we call honor societies select members based on academic achievement, leadership, volunteers service, morals/character, etc. Since Cannon and Castle specifies academic achievement in military sciences, along with character and leadership, it seems to follow that pattern, replacing other academic fields with military science. It also has a limited number of members and a specific selection process, rather than an open membership. This follows the pattern of the most exclusive honor societies. Did Baird's discuss the difference between honor and recognition societies? I suspect a mixture of both belong to ACHS today. Rublamb (talk) 21:30, 3 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I don't know of a specific discussion about the distinction, in Baird's, but it always struck me that recognition societies were less picky, and that one could choose to petition them for membership. The lines blurred: some honor societies are, today, quite suspect as 'money making organizations'. The bulk of ACHS societies are discipline specific with more significant criteria, and a few of the oldest are multi-disciplinary and also highly selective. It appears that the local campus recognition or honor societies tend to vary on these points. Jax MN (talk) 01:54, 4 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Category:College honor society founders

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I've been through all of Category:College honor society founders . I think the only groups with more than one entry among the people in the cat now are:Casque & Gauntlet, Cannon and Castle (honorary???) and Omicron Delta Epsilon (three between the two groups that formed ODE, Omicron Delta Gamma and Omicron Chi Epsilon. I'll make the subcats with a day or so.Naraht (talk) 21:24, 3 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. I cannot promise that I identified all honor society founders but I did go through all articles listed in Honor society. As we work on the Articles for Creation list (most founders listed there are for honor societies), we can keep an eye on others that need categories. My general observation is that more of the honor societies founders are notable or have the potential for an article because they were academic department heads, deans, and college presidents, instead of being random students. This also means that these articles should be pretty easy to pull together. Rublamb (talk) 21:35, 3 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Previous name redirects, History section?

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I've been reading the history of Sigma Pi's history that caused the name change from Tau Phi Delta to Sigma Pi (quite bizarre!). However the thought occurred to me that the redirects for name change like that should be to a history section, so instead of Tau Phi Delta being <nowiki>#REDIRECT[Sigma Pi]]<nowiki>, it should be <nowiki>#REDIRECT[Sigma Pi#History]]<nowiki> or similar (for Tau Phi Delta, I think Sigma_Pi#Founding_and_early_history_(1897–1908).

For other name changes, I think similar section redirects should be done. Not a high priority, but as a general concept? Naraht (talk) 14:03, 4 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I fully agree. I also recall there may be a MOS guideline that says the same thing. If not, then there should be. Jax MN (talk) 17:05, 4 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Frankly very surprised at how few of our Redirects are from previous names [1]. Found out that Kappa Alpha Nu wasn't in the project, so added that to the project, will adjust target when I have a chance. Naraht (talk) 20:07, 4 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I added Kappa Alpha Nu to the watchlist. Agreed, as to the nature of most of our redirects. I think we are ready to make the call on whether or not a group should be a redirect or have its own article. That is, defunct locals and former names are never going to be notable enough for their own article. We should add this to the list of projects. Rublamb (talk) 20:19, 4 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Helped wanted

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I have been working on List of Sigma Phi Epsilon chapters, merging state tables, adding locations, correcting numbers, adding the full charter dates, and ordering the list by charter date. I have also started and plan on finishing the addition of dates and efn from the Almanac. However, it would be great if someone wants to work on the structure of the table, giving each cell its own row. The text jumble is annoying. Also, I am assuming it doesn't need date templates because all dates are in the same format. Rublamb (talk) 20:40, 5 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Right now, the dates are out of order, my guess is because there are *some* dts entries. Right now, the ones up to 25 that have DTS will sort, but the rest end up alphabetized starting at April and ending at September. I'm not sure if all of those are removed whether it would be able to figure out the order. The *one* thing I like the Visual editor for is adding vertical columns to a table, so if a column is desired after the city/state so it could be split, that should be done there.
Not sure why Clarion University of Pennsylvania is unlinked, Clarion University of Pennsylvania is a fine link.Naraht (talk) 21:02, 5 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@Naraht: The date issue makes sense. There were around 25 that had the full charter date; I just finished adding the rest (without date templates), using their magazine as the source. The magazine was ordered by roster number, not by charter date. I fixed those that I discovered but got distracted by at least half of the list having the incorrect number. I think someone put the list in charter order and, then, added the numbers without using a source. I will double-check the year with the Almanac and move as needed. Rublamb (talk) 21:14, 5 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@Naraht: What would happen if we removed the date templates from those 25? Would it then sort by date? Just wondering because that would be easier than adding templates to 350 entries. Although, I would not want to spoil your fun. Rublamb (talk) 21:18, 5 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I could help with table structure, adding line breaks. Just let me know when you take a break from it being IN USE. I edit either really late at night (I'm on Central Time) or very early in the morning, depending on what I'm up to. I would need 24 hours to turn this around. Jax MN (talk) 22:36, 5 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Removing the DTS would work if all of the dates are understandable by the sortable logic. If any of them are something like "Fall 1966" then *everything* falls apart and we are back to alphabetized months. Let me know if you want me to copy to a test page tonight to see if that would work.Naraht (talk) 22:55, 5 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
That would be great (a test). All dates are the "normal" month, date, and year format. Rublamb (talk) 23:01, 5 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Dates issue

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The problem is that while an entry of February 8, 1945 would be sorted correctly February 8, 1945 - 1970 or February 8, 1945 - September 3, 1970 aren't properly treated as dates even if the column is forced to sort as dates. The solutions appear to be add the DTS template to each line around the initial chartering date *or* add an additional sort criteria like List of United States representatives from California does.Naraht (talk) 05:02, 6 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Bummer. One a positive note, I recently learned that you can use the dts template around the date format September 9, 1972, without having to change the date to numbers or divide it into day, month, year. I did a test and it sorted correctly here. If only each date was on its own row.... Rublamb (talk) 17:38, 6 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, dts|September 5, 1968 and dts|1968|9|5 and dts|1968-09-05 all do the same thing as far as I can tell. Let me know if you want everything dts wrapped for the chartering date.Naraht (talk) 18:53, 6 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, please proceed. Rublamb (talk) 20:31, 6 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Another Higher Honor Society Level and rearrangement?

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In Category:Honor societies, we have Category:High school honor societies (possibly to be moved to Category:Secondary school honor societies ) and then the main category is for Collegiate honor societies. Given the existence of groups like Alpha Omega Alpha, it feels like Honor Societies should be split into Four subcats with *most* of the organizations in the main category moved to a undergrad collegiate category and Alpha Omega Alpha either moved into a category with in a grad collegiate category or a subcat under that. There will be groups that cross some of the four subcats. Mu Alpha Theta belongs in both Secondary school and two year and ACHS will cross at least two year and four year (Psi Beta is two year) but it is unclear to me whether now that Alpha Omega Alpha is gone whether ACHS includes organizations that are only at post graduate schools. like Law Schools and Med Schools (Phi Lambda Sigma in pharmacy)Naraht (talk) 19:40, 6 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

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