Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Texas Tech Alumni Association (2nd nomination)

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 no consensus.  Sandstein  21:17, 10 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Texas Tech Alumni Association (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log)

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Fails WP:GNG without multiple third party references. The book cited was published by the university and can hardly be considered intellectually independent. Otherwise, all of the sources are either published by the university or the alumni association. TM 20:29, 2 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete Agree with nom that the lack of third party sources (edit: there's a single article in the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal. See WP:N: "Lack of multiple sources suggests that the topic may be more suitable for inclusion in an article on a broader topic.) fail to establish notability.--GrapedApe (talk) 23:21, 2 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep The only first-party reference in the article is from Texas Techsan, a Texas Tech Alumni Association publication. The Texas Tech Alumni Association is an independent organization affiliated with Texas Tech University according to the organization's bylaws (Article I, Section 2). As the organisation is independent from Texas Tech University, any Texas Tech University publication would be a third-party reference. Regardless, The First Thirty Years: a History of Texas Technological College was published in 1956, only since 1971 has Texas Tech Press (now the Texas Tech University Press) been the publishing office for Texas Tech University (Ref). The aforementioned book along with the references from Handbook of Texas , and the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal, give the article multiple third-party references, the issue in question for this AfD nomination. NThomas (talk) 01:18, 3 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I fail to see how the Texas Tech Alumni Association, Texas Tech University, and the Texas Tech University Press could be considered "Independent of the subject" as required by WP:N. Certainly, coverage in these closely related publications isn't an indication of the notability.--GrapedApe (talk) 04:39, 3 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I am not familiar with the specifics of TTAA, but wouldn't most alumni associations be somewhat independent of their parent institution? They might have official recognition, have an office on campus, but usually they are run by alumni and independent of the university/college administration. LoveUxoxo (talk) 18:27, 3 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The technical details of organizational independence are beside the point: one cannot say that these are independent fo each other for the purpose of WP:N.--GrapedApe (talk) 19:13, 3 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Reading through WP:N again, as two separate organizations, Texas Tech Press prior to 1971 would still be a third-party reference to Texas Tech Alumni Association. NThomas (talk) 23:20, 3 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I've already listed the rational why the Texas Tech Alumni Association is, and Texas Tech Press was until 1971, independent from the university. NThomas (talk) 23:20, 3 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Nowhere here in the Texas Handbook article you cite does it mention anything about the alumni association. It should be removed from the article no matter what because it does not even support the sentence it supposedly cites.--TM 13:26, 3 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The Handbook of Texas article cites the year that Texas Technological College was renamed Texas Tech University since the first references excludes the year the name changed. Maybe that citation would benefit from the addition of the quote parameter? NThomas (talk) 23:20, 3 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Organizations-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 01:50, 3 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The citation has absolutely nothing to do with the alumni association and should not be described as a source for the TTAA.--TM 05:42, 4 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Agreed. That leaves only 1 source that is not connected to the university. --GrapedApe (talk) 05:45, 4 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

As NThomas has explained above, that is debatable. It is certainly borderline, but the University itself is indeed independent of the alumni association. Falcon8765 ^(TALK) 21:07, 5 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep - As per NThomas, several independent sources exist satisfying notability requirements. Additionally, playing the main role in the difficult process of changing the name of the university also further implies notability. Falcon8765 ^(TALK) 21:07, 5 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]
• Weak keep. There is more usable, non-duplicated material here than there was the first time this went through AfD. I do think that material from the university can be considered independent of the alumni association, and I think that enough reliable sourcing has been shown to sustain this article against a non-notability finding; in any event, this material (including the history of the organization, its facilities, and its "services") is certainly appropriate for inclusion somewhere in the articles about Texas Tech. On a general note, it may be true that every university has an alumni organization, but that doesn't make them unworthy of coverage. For me, the question in these alumni association AfDs is whether there's enough such material to justify a separate article or whether coverage of the organization fits more comfortably within a more general article or articles. In this case, I don't have any real problem with the separate article standing on its own, but a thoughtful merger could be considered, as long as that merger preserves the edit history and doesn't result in the disappearance of substantial valuable content. That could be a subject for editorial discussion after AfD. On one point, I do agree with the nominator: I didn't see support in the cited sources to which we have online access (such as Texas Handbook) for the proposition that the alumni association played a role in the choice to keep "Tech" in the university name. I'd like to see better inline citations for that assertion. But as noted above, I think there's enough sourced content on other points to justify the article.--Arxiloxos (talk) 00:19, 8 December 2011 (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.