Talk:List of graduate student employee unions

Initial Peer Review

Hi @Repumped, @Bduke, @Shushugah, @LoomCreek, Manville jeffrey, and all other interested people: I've tried my very best to draft this new Wikipedia article for the table of grad worker unions. Can you please help me make it worthy of publishing?

I'd LOVE to get this article published ASAP!!! The information needed to get out to the public a long time ago.

AJVincelli (talk) 16:53, 22 July 2023 (UTC)

Let me start by saying that my links with academic unions are a long time ago. I retired 20 years ago. My links before retirement were with Australian academic unions and much earlier with United Kingdom academic unions. My first thought is that this article is far too detailed for the two countries it covers and totally inadequate in only covering those two countries. I think details are needed for at least a dozen or so countries before it can fly. --Bduke (talk) 01:17, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

Thank you for taking a look @Bduke! I would love to add more sections. Do you know the names of any academic unions in Australia or the UK? I’d be happy to email them to inquire about grad worker union members. Thanks very much! AJVincelli (talk) 05:42, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

National Tertiary Education Union in Australia, University and College Union in UK and Tertiary Education Union in New Zealand. As you see, they all have Wikipedia articles. I do not think I can help you for any other country, but you need to have at least a total of say 10 or 12. --Bduke (talk) 07:23, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

The Category:Tertiary education trade unions may help you. --Bduke (talk) 08:59, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

Thank you Bduke, I will definitely check these resources out! It may take me awhile, but I definitely want to include grad worker unions from more countries.

Fix Citations

Hi @KylieTastic, thank you for helping me format so many citations properly! However, some of the links are now broken. Could you please fix the links that used to work? Thanks very much!! I really appreciate your help. — Preceding unsigned comment added by AJVincelli (talk • contribs) 04:13, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

Secondary sources

Hi @Freedom4U, thank you so much for encouraging me to find appropriate secondary sources to cite. I'm new to Wikipedia authorship and I'm just learning as I go. I just added a few references to the other lists on the Internet that I compiled to make these tables, they are citations #1 - 8 here. Do they help the article at all? Are they what you were referring to as good secondary sources? If not, can you give me an example of what you recommend as an appropriate citations? Thanks very much again for your help!! AJVincelli (talk) 05:55, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

@AJVincelli A lot of the new sources are good changes! I would scrap listing the exact number of unions because that is always going to be original research, which isn't suitable for Wikipedia. What you're really looking for are sources like this one that you added. If a union isn't getting secondary coverage like that, that would be grounds for removal from the article. :3 F4U (they/it) 15:05, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

Aha, I see! So to verify the information in the table, it's best to cite info NOT from the union itself. Hm, that makes sense. I can do this! It just might take me some time.

So, for each union, I envisioned having a link to their website so that people could find them easily. But is that not really appropriate for Wikipedia? Or can each union have their website linked in addition to the third-party citation of their existence?

Thank you for your advice! AJVincelli (talk) 15:43, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

@AJVincelli There should not be external links to their website. See the external links guideline here. Outside of that, it would also likely clash with the What Wikipedia is not policy page. :3 F4U (they/it) 15:46, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

Ah yes, I was looking at the External Links guidance earlier, because it was on the External links section of the main page and seemed potentially applicable. But then I saw that an External links section shouldn't become a "linkfarm." If I have an External Links section on my page with 1 website per unit, is that a linkfarm?

I have to admit, the ENTIRE reason for me creating this Wiki page was so that the active unions were listed somewhere, with a means to verify that they do actually exist and are active. To me, an old news article doesn't necessarily mean that the union still exists, or is actually active. To me, that union's website (and/or social media sites) prove that they exist and are active.

How can I properly cite active unions without violating the Original Research or Linkfarm rules? Do I have to create a Wikipedia article for every union? Or am I doing this whole thing completely wrong??? Eek!! AJVincelli (talk) 18:00, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

@AJVincelli Wikipedia is always going to be a few months or even years behind, but that's what how we have to work to comply with our verifiability policy. I'm gonna be honest, the links on Graduate student employee unionization are likely inappropriate as well. What would be appropriate is having those external links on the union's own Wikipedia article (but first, the union needs to meet the notability guidelines for organizations and corporations to have an article).

It would be inappropriate to link to their own websites in this list, however you can add a redlink (like that) to unions that you believe are notable, and you or other people can go ahead and fill them in my making new articles. :3 F4U (they/it) 20:24, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

Hmmm, this all makes sense to me. I suspect that I’ve done this article all wrong, unfortunately. I can think of a few solutions: 1) Create Wiki stubs for all 170ish unions, and then link to those stubs in my article; 2) Partner with somebody credible and independent to actually publish the list, and then cite my publication in my Wiki article; 3) Find secondary sources for each of the 170ish unions; 4) Delete my article and instead expand the Example Unions section of the Graduate Student Employee Unionization article; 5) Delete the table entries of non-notable unions; 6) Delete my article and instead find another Wiki that is more appropriate for this info. Do you have any other solutions that I haven’t thought of? I’m all ears! AJVincelli (talk) 04:04, 9 August 2023 (UTC)

@AJVincelli

(1) Some, but not all of the unions here are notable (see the notability policy on companies/organizations), so it wouldn't be possible to just create stubs for all of them, you'd need to write an article that demonstrates that the specific union has received more than "routine" coverage (examples of routine/trivial coverage would be coverage of industry events, changing of staff, participation in trade fairs, or brief/passing mentions).

(2) If a list of graduate unions like this is published in a reliable (from a publisher with a reputation for fact-checking) secondary (independent of the unions) source, you could use it as a citation, however if you do do so, I would ask that you be mindful of the policy WP:SELFCITE and the policy on COI editing. I would strongly suggest that you don't personally any citations to yourself or people you're affiliated with, and instead make an edit request. You would also have to disclose your relationship with the author/publisher first.

(3) I do think that this is ofc the best option (outside of creating articles for the unions), but obviously a very time-consuming process.

(4) I don't think this article qualifies for deletion, and since its been significantly edited by the community, there would need to be a discussion before it is deleted. It certainly wouldn't qualify for WP:TNT, if that's what you're suggesting.

(5) There is a specific policy for the notability of stand-alone lists (see WP:NLIST). The individual entries do not have to be notable (although them being notable near guarantees their inclusion), but they need to have been discussed as a set in reliable secondary sources.

(6) You can always do that and everything on Wikipedia is licensed Creative Commons 4.0 so all you have to do is link to this page. If your goal is simply to create an indiscriminate directory of every graduate union, then perhaps Wikipedia is not the best place to host that. :3 F4U (they/it) 13:07, 9 August 2023 (UTC)

Hi @Freedom4U, thanks for this great info! I had assumed that if I didn't fix the article, it would be auto-deleted because it violates Wiki rules and regs. But if you're saying that deletion would be a longer process and involve discussion, let's skip to the discussion part to see if the article can be fixed!  :)

I'm not totally overwhelmed by Option #3... In fact, I found most of the unions in citations #1-8, which I think/hope are secondary, independent, reliable, etc. Would I just cite the same secondary source over and over again for every union I found in that source? Would that just look like a linkfarm, citing 8 references for 170 unions?

Also, though the secondary source proves that the union existed at that time, I think the union's website/social accounts prove that they still exist and are active. I think we need both if I want to adequately support my claim that these unions exist AND are active. Right?

Since @LoomCreek, @KylieTastic, @Repumped, @Shushugah, and @Bduke have all been very helpful on my journey with this article, can I ask what you folks think?? The more opinions, the better!

(F4U, the small backstory is that the idea for this article was spawned in the Graduate Student Employee Unionization's Talk page, starting here and continuing here.)

A million thanks,

AJVincelli (talk) 20:52, 9 August 2023 (UTC)

Oh, I have an idea. What if I added another column to the tables, with the header “Active?” And then I could enter “yes” for every union, and cite the word “yes” with their website. Then it’s clear that the primary citations are just to prove their active status. What do you think? AJVincelli (talk) 00:36, 11 August 2023 (UTC)

Hi! Sorry about the delayed response. Freedom4U is right, ideally each union has secondary sources such as a newspaper. Which is why I provided some help in finding them for the first 10ish unions.

It seems like most have at least a little coverage although some digging might be needed. It's typically university newspapers which would still meet the independent criteria.

Lists are slightly more flexible with their criteria than articles. Ultimately a list of graduate student unions as a group definitely meets notability criteria.y LoomCreek (talk) 13:15, 11 August 2023 (UTC)

Thank you LoomCreek! Do you think citations #1-8 are good secondary sources? They are the lists I used to create my list. If so, I am still unsure how to use 8 sources to cite 170ish unions properly. It would be very repetitive. AJVincelli (talk) 14:32, 11 August 2023 (UTC)

Generally for a reliable secondary source it should fulfill one of two aspects. Either it's published through a respected institution such as citation #7 and #8. (To be clear 1-6 still have usability, but the close connection to the subject somewhat undermines credibility. Even so it still solves the O.R problem)

Or in some rare cases (particularly for lists) if the self published material is by an expert in the field who has other works in the field published by respected institutions (keep in mind even in this case it can be contentious). Someone with a PhD and published papers in labor organizing history for example. For a good example see Starbucks Workers United and it's use of this compiling list. I recommend looking at the talk page discussion around that to get familiar with it.

If your concern is link tree policy, I wouldn't worry to much about repetitive citations. Such a policy is in place to prevent promotional material and prevent links from getting in the way of text flow/readability. In the circumstance of a list, as long as you avoid the promotional aspect, you'll be fine. Given that you've added those sources to the intro sentences for each table, I'll remove the O.R label. Putting those sources in the intro sentence should be enough, without having to individually cite each. Similarly Canada should also have secondary sources for it's unions.- LoomCreek (talk) 04:51, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

Hi @LoomCreek, thank you for your advice! Goodness, let's avoid the unpleasantries of the Starbucks Unions NLRB Data discussion, and proceed to solutions. I'm committed to doing this right.

I think I'm understanding your explanation: primary sources (such as the union's website) are biased and of limited utility as reliable citations, and secondary sources should be independent, peer reviewed, and reputable (such as citations #7 and 8, and news articles that are as independent and trustworthy as possible). It's okay to put citations #1-8 as a group at the beginning of each country's section, it will be understood that they are generally applicable to the entire table and don't need to be re-cited 170ish times throughout the table. I also need to add a similar group of citations for Canada, which is currently missing.

To extrapolate, I think I'm also hearing that it would also be best to cite another strong secondary source for each of the 170ish unions (thank you so much for your help on the first 10ish!). This seems reasonable to me. I would definitely like to keep the primary citation (website) for each of the unions because it proves their active status, but that would be in addition to the strong secondary source. I don't think I would need another column called "Active" just to cite the website, I think I could just have the 2 citations for each union by their name.

Does this sound right? If so, I shall proceed accordingly. It might take me some time, but I'll get it done eventually!! AJVincelli (talk) 18:37, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

Yes, that all sounds like a good plan to me. - LoomCreek (talk) 18:41, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

Alberta Graduate Student Unions

Hi folks, would appreciate someone who is more familiar with Alberta graduate student unions to verify the information I added on U of Calgary and U of Alberta's student labour unions. The structure is different than the unions I am familiar with in Ontario, so I am not entirely sure what the status of these unions is beyond having active ratified collective agreements. A double check would be appreciated! 17dsrd (talk) 21:55, 22 February 2024 (UTC)