Wikipedia talk:College and university article advice

Backstory:

WP:CATMAIN allows 3 options on how to categorize an eponymous category and it's child article which includes:

1. Keep both the eponymous category and the main article in the parent category. This is used in Category:Countries in Europe to allow that region's country articles to be navigated together.
2. Keep just the child article. This is used in Category:British Islands, to prevent a loop.
3. Keep just the eponymous category. This is used for Category:Farmers in Category:People by occupation. Such "X by Y" categories sometimes cover a limited navigational set, not a topic (see § Category tree organization below), thus there is no logical article content.

Categorization states that Editors should decide by consensus which solution makes most sense for a category tree.

Which brings us to the following:

The Category:Colleges and schools by university currently lists an incomplete list of the colleges and schools (and for some departments) of certain universities. For most schools listed, only the child article is listed, which allows for a consistent view of how many schools or colleges each university has.

@Bearcat brought up a fair point that categories shouldn't be emptied and should be replaced especially if there's only one category. (Please correct me if I misinterpreted this!)

Which brings me to the first question to use as an example:

1) Would it more appropriate and streamlined to place Category:Georgetown University Graduate School of Arts & Sciences as a subcategory for: Category:Georgetown University while placing just Georgetown University Graduate School of Arts & Sciences under Category:Georgetown University schools for easier navigation and consistency?

I believe this approach improves consistency within Category:Colleges and schools by university and ensures the eponymous category remains linked to the broader university structure which I believe will help people locate information more efficiently.

My second question is the following:

2) Is there a way of how we should be classify subunits of colleges? Wake Forest University School of Divinity is listed under Category: Educational institutions established in 1999 but Wake Forest University School of Business is listed under Category:Universities and colleges established in 1969. Harvard Extension School is listed under neither.

Curious to hear others’ thoughts! Wozal (talk) 19:36, 28 February 2025 (UTC)

Summarize Timeline Top Qs Fact Check

I was in a discussion on a university article and realized there is an issue with the current college and university naming guidance.

The article guidance states:

Colleges and universities should always be named using the common (not necessarily official) name of the institution. This can often be determined by looking at current branding of a university via their website, published documents, and advertisements.

However, MOS:FIRSTCORP guidance states:

Regardless of the page title, the lead sentence of an article on a company or other organization should normally begin with its full legal name (the current one or, if defunct, the final one).

This creates inconsistencies across wiki in how university names are presented. The current college/university guidance doesn't specify whether the "common name" guidance applies only to the article title or to the lead sentence also. Editors have reasonably interpreted this differently, leading to inconsistencies:

• Stanford University uses the legal name "Leland Stanford Junior University" in the lead, per MOS:FIRSTCORP
• ETH Zurich or the "Federal Institute of Technology Zurich" uses the common name in the lead

Both approaches have merit. Following MOS:FIRSTCORP ensures consistency with other organisation articles. Using the common name prioritises readability and matches reader expectations.

Could this wikiwide guideline be clarified to indicate which approach is to be used for the lead and title university names so we can gain a consistent university name presentation approach across wiki articles? Mikecurry1 (talk) 18:58, 4 January 2026 (UTC)

I think that this advice article is intended to state that the the titles of articles about colleges and universities should always be named using the common (not necessarily official) name of the institution; I think it's just a restatement of WP:COMMONNAME and not advice about how we refer to the institution in the lead section or throughout the article. So I think it's just a poorly written statement that should be fixed, not a contradiction between this advice article and the guidelines in the Manual of Style. ElKevbo (talk) 22:25, 4 January 2026 (UTC)

I think ElKevbo’s reading is correct. However, it might be worth noting that articles are normally on the institution not the corporation of the institution, and these sometimes do not have the same name. Robminchin (talk) 05:31, 6 January 2026 (UTC)

I also think your reading is correct ElKevbo. "I think it's just a poorly written statement that should be fixed" - I agree.

"I think that this advice article is intended to state that the the titles of articles about colleges and universities should always be named using the common (not necessarily official) name of the institution." - I agree

This section should also specify whether to use the legal or common name for the opening lead sentence. That way, there is consistent styling across the wiki university articles in how they are presented, in the same way all university titles are all now using the common name. As discussed above, currently, the lead sentence styling for which name to use is quite inconsistent on wiki. I previously gave that example of the legal name being used for the lead sentence of Stanford University (Leland Stanford Junior University) while the common name is being used for ETH Zurich (Federal Institute of Technology Zurich). The current image, "No one calls it "the Leland Stanford Junior University" adds to the confusion, when the legal name Leland Stanford Junior University is being used to open the lead sentence in the actual Stanford article. Therefore, this College and University article advice section should clarify and be specific on Manual of Style guidelines of whether to use the legal or common name - for this lead sentence. That way, we have sufficient College and university article advice justification to make adjustments to the lead sentence name of university articles towards common Manual of Style guidelines. We all agree, this university lead sentence guidance is currently poorly written. Therefore, consistent style guidelines on this university article advice page would be useful here for this lead sentence. Mikecurry1 (talk) 17:48, 13 February 2026 (UTC)

This isn't the correct section for that, as this is in the section on naming articles. We actually want to add something to the section on the lead, a bit further down. This currently states:

The lead should include basic information: the name(s) of the institution, location (city name; describe multiple campuses if present), founder and founding name, and affiliation with any larger university system or major local affiliate network, if applicable. Give other names for which the university may be known (e.g. Cal) and bold them, too. Use italic text for names that aren't in English.

(with some further stuff below that isn't relevant to this discussion). I would suggest updating this to something like:

The lead should include basic information: the name(s) of the institution, location (city name; describe multiple campuses if present), founder and founding name, and affiliation with any larger university system or major local affiliate network, if applicable. Per MOS:FIRSTCORP, the lead section should start with the legal name of the institution (which may not be the same as the legal name of the corporation that carries on the institution), if it has one. Give other names by which the university may be known, particularly the official name used by the institution, the common name (if different), and well-established nicknames (e.g., Cal), and bold them too. Per MOS:FOREIGN, use italic text for names that aren't in English, preferably using the {{lang}} template (see MOS:NOTLATIN for details on handling non-Latin scripts).

How does that look? Robminchin (talk) 19:45, 13 February 2026 (UTC)

You are getting there. The second sentence should mention bolding, since the next sentence indicates to "bold them too." In the third sentence, "and bold them too" should be "also bolded". Better yet, create a new sentence that is along the lines: Bold the first use of the institutional name, common name, and nicknames. The last sentence needs work. Italics should not be applied to the {lang} template as it automatically places the foreign word or phrase in the correct format; that is, in italics if appropriate. However, MOS:FOREIGN notes "Wikipedia does not apply italics to names of people, places, or organizations, the alternative template {langr} can be used to apply the language markup without italicizing". Therefore, {lang} should be used for a non-English form of a university motto, while a non-English university name should be placed in {langr}. At least, that is my read of MOS. Rublamb (talk) 21:07, 13 February 2026 (UTC)

I think the footnote to MOS:FOREIGN, which says "Such a proper name may be italicized when contrasting it with a conventional English form: Munich (German: München)", which just makes it even more complicated. More reading of the MOS has revealed more stuff that should probably be advised, so I'm thinking that we want to split this into a whole paragraph on names rather than just expanding the sentence on names in the current paragraph:

The lead should include basic information: the name(s) of the institution, location (city name; describe multiple campuses if present), founder and founding name, and affiliation with any larger university system or major local affiliate network, if applicable. A thumbnail sketch of the dominant and distinguishing characteristics should be given in the lead and expanded later. Attributes should include public/private, religious affiliation if applicable, type (liberal arts college, multi-school university, vocational school, research institution, community college, etc.), and location. It should be mentioned whether it is an undergraduate-only institution, or if graduate programs are present (and if so, specific stand-alone programs like medical, law, and divinity schools should be mentioned). Do not include images in the lead; they should be placed elsewhere. Individual notable alumni should be mentioned only in extraordinary cases; typically, statistics such as X Nobel laureates are preferred. The lead should not include information not covered in the main body of the article. Summarize the rest of the article without giving undue weight to any particular section (such as rankings) and mention distinguishing academic, historical, or demographic characteristics. The lead should be a concise summary of the entire article – not simply an introduction.

Names

Per MOS:FIRSTCORP, the lead section should start with the legal name of the institution (which may not be the same as the legal name of the corporation that carries on the institution), if it has one. Give other names by which the institution may be known, particularly the official name used by the institution, the common name (if different), and well-established nicknames (e.g., Cal). Significant historical names may also be given, but (per MOS:ALTNAME) no more than three alternative names should normally be included in the first sentence to avoid clutter (other names may be footnoted). The first use of any of these names should be placed in bold. Per MOS:FOREIGN, italic text may be used for organization names that are not in English (preferably using the {{lang}} or {{langx}} templates) when these are contrasted with conventional English names (e.g., "Cardiff University (Welsh: Prifysgol Caerdydd)", but non-italic text is used when no contrast is drawn (e.g., "The Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, commonly referred to as the University of Munich"; here the German name is also presented first as the legal name of the institution); the {{langr}} template can be used to apply the language markup without italicizing. Names in non-Latin scripts must romanized; see MOS:NOTLATIN for details on handling non-Latin scripts.

(The only edit to the first paragraph here – the current text in the article – was to remove the sentence on alternative names. There may well be other things in there that we should change, but that's probably best kept for a separate discussion.) Robminchin (talk) 22:32, 13 February 2026 (UTC)

Summarize Timeline Top Qs Fact Check

I changed the section titled "Noted people" to "Notable people" as that is the term currently commonly used for both embedded lists and stand-alone list articles, along with "Notable alumni" and "Notable faculty". However, I wanted to provide an opportunity to discuss this variation so that everyone is on board for consistency. If there is any interest, I can gather data on the frequency of use for both versions. Rublamb (talk) 15:47, 4 February 2026 (UTC)

Notable people is probably better, as it embeds the concept that this only includes people that meet Wikipedia notability. I think it's also what I've seen most commonly used. Robminchin (talk) 17:55, 4 February 2026 (UTC)

We could refer to WP:ALUMNI in this section, as it has more detailed and useful instructions. Rublamb (talk) 22:03, 4 February 2026 (UTC)

I don't think WP:ALUMNI, which is written for schools rather than universities, is useful here. Some of it flat-out contradicts the advice here for universities, such as "limiting the explicit list to very well-known persons" (for old/large/prestigious universities where a list would otherwise be excessively long) vs "All alumni meeting the criteria for inclusion are to be included on an alumni list, regardless of how much time they have spent on a school roll, from one day to several years, and whether or not they graduated" (for schools). We certainly don't want that for embedded lists. Practice has also been to give preference to people who actually graduated in determining the "very well-known persons" lists in articles, rather than those who attended briefly. It would be better if our advice gave a range for what we mean by "excessively long" in this context (somewhere between 30 and 50 entries would be my working range, with articles that have a separate stand-alone list being towards the bottom of that range). Robminchin (talk) 23:20, 4 February 2026 (UTC)

Good points re WP:Alumni. I thought since the essay Notable alumni is inactive, it would be great if we could share content, especially as they have claim to WP:Alumni. Nevermind!. We use 50 items as the splitting point for WP:FRAT, but sometime go with 40 with notables. I have applied this to WP:UNI as well. The caveat is sourcing, which seems to be overlooked with college alumni lists. This is another way to reduce the possible entries. Regarding graduated vs. attended, it doesn't matter to me simply because of the athletes who go pro before graduating but can still have a high public association with the institition and can be "very well-known". Rublamb (talk) 02:18, 5 February 2026 (UTC)

I think it's an appropriate change that aligns with common practice. It shouldn't be common practice - our notability guidelines are explicit that they should not be applied to the contents of articles - but it is and experienced Wikipedia editors refuse to update those guidelines so we're stuck with this very common practice. ElKevbo (talk) 03:36, 5 February 2026 (UTC)

It's not just a common practice, it's written into the content guidelines. WP:LISTPEOPLE makes it clear that notability can (and normally should) be used as part of the inclusion criteria for lists of people. Robminchin (talk) 06:02, 5 February 2026 (UTC)

@Robminchin, that guideline is for stand-alone lists, which would be more like "List of Foobar University people" rather than the list on the Foobar University article, which is what the section here is about. Also, note that it states In other cases, editors choose even more stringent requirements ... This is commonly used to control the size of lists that could otherwise run to thousands of people, which per my comment below is the exact situation often encountered here. Cheers, Sdkb ^talk 06:10, 5 February 2026 (UTC)

The embedded list guidelines point back to the same place (via WP:NLISTITEM, which is also clear that notability is acceptable as part of list selection criteria). My point is that using notability as part of the selection criteria is something that isn't just common practice but is written into the Wikipedia guidelines.

I'm not opposing that there should be more stringent requirements; see my comments above where I suggest that we have an explicit definition of "excessively long" rather than having editors argue that a list isn't excessively long if it needs to be that long to put in everyone they want to mention. Robminchin (talk) 16:51, 5 February 2026 (UTC)

Whether not an article is too long is addressed in WP:LENGTH. For lists, the guidelines are basically to split when they get too long for functionality. I like defining what is "too long" for the main university article, as that will create uniformity. Rublamb (talk) 16:58, 5 February 2026 (UTC)

I oppose this change. Just because something has become common practice doesn't mean that it ought to be, and an advice page like this should reflect best practice rather than common practice.

"Noted" is better than "notable" for these sections, because we would be using "notable" in the generic sense rather than the wiki-jargon sense, and we don't want editors to confuse the two. Despite what the advice says (I suspect it was written when we had many fewer biography articles than we do today), we almost never actually want to list every notable affiliated person in the university article, because that would be undue. Most schools have dozens if not hundreds or thousands of alumni with Wikipedia articles, which is why we spin off "List of Foobar University alumni" articles all the time. And beyond space limitations, it takes a lot for a single person having attended an institution to warrant a mention on a page about that institution's entire history/operation/etc. (We run into this all the time with alumni galleries, which tend to get added as a kind of trophy case.) The threshold for how notable (in the generic sense) someone has to be to warrant listing can and almost always should be higher than the NBIO threshold. But if we title the section "Notable alumni," editors see that and immediately assume that we're talking about Wikipedia notability and that it's therefore okay to add anyone who meets NBIO. Ultimately, it contributes to alumni list bloat.

There are plenty of synonyms for "notable" that don't have this problem, "noted" being a perfectly good one. @Rublamb @Robminchin @ElKevbo, I'd love to hear if this is persuasive to you. Cheers, Sdkb ^talk 05:17, 5 February 2026 (UTC)

The problem is that you are trying to apply a criterion that is subjective--these alumni are "famous". How do you determine which individuals are "noted" or the most famous, other than personal opinion? Surely, it is not desirable to limit alumni lists to entertainers, politicians, and athletes, ignoring alumni who are not household names? In contrast, "notable" is an established criterion within Wikipedia based on sources. Applying the established standard for notability across all standalone biographical list articles (colleges, localities, organizations, etc.) provides consistency and removes personal bias, which is a key standard within Wikipedia.

Based on Wikipedia's guidelines, there is no reason to exclude anyone who meets NBIO and falls under the subject of the list, unless there is no source connecting the individual to the institution OR there is consensus to exclude non-graduates or individuals without an article. There are plenty of examples of FL alumni articles listed as part of this article that do not have established limits, yet remain a reasonable length.

For top universities; the solution of length issue has easily been resolved by splitting lists by academic divisions or affiliation. For example, with Harvard, there is:

• List of Harvard University people
• List of Harvard University non-graduate alumni
• List of Harvard junior fellows
• List of Harvard Law School alumni
• List of Harvard University politicians
• List of University Professors at Harvard University
• List of Harvard Medical School alumni
• List of Radcliffe College people
• List of Harvard Extension School alumni

The vast list of categories related to Harvard's alumni provides plenty of options for additional divisions. Thus, the length of the alumni lists can be maintained for functionality, while also being inclusive of anyone who meets notability. Rublamb (talk) 16:16, 5 February 2026 (UTC)

I think the questions are:

1) At what size should a list in an article on a university be split off into a separate list article

2) What should remain in the parent article

At the moment, we say that a list in the parent article should not be "excessively long" and suggest linking to categories (rather than stand-alone list articles) for "very old, very large, or very prestigious schools", and "limiting the explicit list to very well-known persons (heads of state, historical figures, etc.) and adding a narrative summary of statistics on such things as Nobel Prizes, other prestigious awards, and so on"

So we are currently advising what sdkb suggests – limiting the list in the article to only the best known people. Per WP:SPLIT and WP:SUMMARY, however, what should be left after a section is split off is a summary of what is in the split-off article, not a shortened version of the list cut down to its most significant members. The narrative summary of statistics might be a better way to go, with individuals only named if they are part of a small category (e.g., "two astronauts (Buzz Lightyear and Will Riker)"), but not all 25 Nobel prize winners.

Harvard#Notable people would be a good example of this, if the galleries (which are particularly terrible if viewing on a phone, like most people do) were removed. Galleries should not be included in notable people sections. Robminchin (talk) 17:08, 5 February 2026 (UTC)

I believe this article is specifically addressing the content of embedded lists, rather than standalone lists. I like the way WP:ALUMNI separates the two, providing different criteria. WP:ALUMNI also notes that photos can be included in standalone alumni list, but not with the embedded lists. (Again, noting the difference between the two types of lists). It woul be helpful to provide at least one example of what should be left behind in the main university article after the split. For most colleges and universities, it is really difficult to find an independent secondary source for alumni or faculty stats of the nature suggested, which is why I often leave this section empty when making a split.

@ElKevbo, since I know you and MOS would prefer a summary in the main article's notable section when there is standalone alumni list, do you know of specific examples that we should aspire to? We list many examples of FA alumni lists, but no examples of GA articles that provide the needed content. Looks like there are four current styles 1) summary text with stats (3 president, 10 Noble prize winners...) 2) selected list of most famous alumni 3) photos, or 4) combination of these three. I don't have a specific preference of 1 over 2 than to include a secondary source to avoid institutional puffery and editor bias. Rublamb (talk) 17:48, 5 February 2026 (UTC)

I put quite a bit of thought into what warrants someone being listed in the noted people section when I was bringing Pomona College through FAC. It's separated into noted alumni and noted faculty, with the latter having this hidden comment: Please add only the very most significant faculty here; others can go at List of Pomona College people. As a rough rule of thumb, there should be a chance that a random person with no special interest in the listee's field might have heard of them. Be particularly picky about professors who taught only in brief visiting roles. Yes, there is a component of subjective editorial judgement involved when deciding who is most significant, because there are so many ways that someone can be significant that it's impossible to operationalize (not that some places haven't tried). But that's not particularly different from plenty of other editorial decisions we have to make all the time. For instance, when making due weight decisions about which aspects of a topic to cover in what depth, technically we're looking at the amount of reliable coverage in secondary sources, but that's extremely hard to measure, so in practice it becomes an editorial call. It's the same with alumni lists — technically we could say we're looking at the amount of coverage to determine who's most significant, but in practice it's going to be more "that guy was a U.S. Sentator and the other guy was a small city mayor, so we'll include the Senator and shove the mayor off to the stand-alone article." Sdkb ^talk 19:54, 5 February 2026 (UTC)

Certainly, what we're saying here is for embedded lists, but this can't be divorced from the question of when a list should be split off and what should be included if there is a separate list.

There's no particular justification given for not including photos in embedded lists in WP:ALUMNI. I would argue that the normal rules on illustrative images apply to an embedded list of people. Certainly, a gallery will almost certainly be undue and contrary to WP:GALLERY, but individual images should be fine. I would also oppose WP:ALUMNI's idea of including non-notable people in stand-alone lists. Their guidelines for embedded lists are different, but not particularly useful at a practical level.

I would say that an embedded list without a stand-alone list should have very similar (if not identical) criteria to a stand-alone list. The difference will come for a residual section when there is a stand-alone list: in my opinion, this should, whether listing the most significant people or statistics or both, be a prose section rather than a list section. Robminchin (talk) 20:40, 5 February 2026 (UTC)

Embedded and standalone alumni lists should have identical criteria except when there is both a standalone list and a shorter list in the main article. Unless there are limits set by WP:UNI, the criteria are provided by MOS. I agree that only individuals who have an article or who meet requirements for notability in Wikipedia should be included in alumni lists. I think we all agree to setting that limit to alumni lists and would need to do so, as WP:NLIST says, "Because the group or set is notable, the individual entries in the list do not need to be independently notable, although editors may, at their discretion, choose to limit large lists by only including entries for independently notable items or those with Wikipedia articles."

Looking at MOS:USEPROSE, I am leaning toward prose, rather than an embedded list, when there is also a standalone alumni list. That would avoid the situation where names get added to the embedded list, but not to the standalone list. In terms of what to include, it is easy enough to differentiate the importance of individuals within the same category (i.e., senator vs. mayor for politicians), but who is to say that a politician is more "important" than a leading scientist, entertainer, or judge? If there is an independent source that specifies some of the "most notable" alumni, there is no problem. Otherwise, we could set a guideline, such as mentioning no more than two specific individuals from each category within the standalone list, when creating the summary prose for the main university article. The standalone list sections typically include (academia, arts/architecture, business, entertainment, law, literature/journalism, military, politics, science/technology, sports). If an alumni list has all of these sections, that would allow up to 20 specific names in the main article text: quite a long list for a summary. Or, we could limit this content to the generalized 3 generals, 2 Grammy winners, etc.—although finding an independent source may be a challenge. It also comes across as a bit promotional when listed like that.

I suspect WP:ALUMNI prohibiting photos with embedded lists is a WP decision; I mentioned it in response to the comment above about photo galleries. I have no feelings one way or the other, except that non-gallary photos should not exceed the length of the text or list, as this tends to run into the reference section, and will yield to the majority. Rublamb (talk) 23:51, 5 February 2026 (UTC)

I think that we're trying to address too many topics at once and I worry that it's hindering clear communication and consensus-building.

Inclusion criteria: I strongly disagree that embedded and standalone alumni lists should "have identical criteria except when there is both a standalone list and a shorter list in the main article." That is just unworkable and would result in many college and university articles having massive embedded lists that are completely unhelpful for readers who are very reasonably and correctly expecting those articles to provide high-level overviews of each institution. And WP:NLIST explicitly applies to only stand-alone lists so it's not appropriate to cite in this discussion. When there are more than a handful of notable alumni then we should apply some kind of reasonable selection criteria to keep the embedded list to a reasonable length. And when the embedded list grows too long then the entire, unabridged list should be moved to a separate list article and some kind of summary should remain in the main article.

Summaries of list articles: I think that this advice should require that college and university articles include a summary of their distinct list of alumni articles when those list articles exist. That aligns with appropriate guideline and the common practice that is helpful for readers. I think it would be good for us to encourage editors to write that summary in prose but the reality is that many of those summaries are just bulleted lists of a subset of the notable alumni in the list article.

Photo galleries: I also think that relatively brief photo galleries can be appropriate and helpful for readers. Like embedded lists, however, the absence of apparent selection criteria beyond "one or more editors just thinks this photo should be included" is a lasting challenge for many articles and editors. ElKevbo (talk) 01:05, 6 February 2026 (UTC)

@ElKevbo: Agreed, we have crossed over from the original topic of using “notable alumni” or “noted alumni”, to instructions for that section. If you have an opinion on the original topic, that would be appreciated.

With regards to your other comments, I don’t think anyone supports having a long alumni list as part of the main article. The missing piece here is that we had previously discussed setting a size limit that dictates when an embedded alumni list should become a standalone list. @Robminchin suggested a limit somewhere between 30 and 50 names. Since moving the embedded list to a standalone list is always an option, and most articles grow with time, it would be beneficial to have the same or similar guidelines for both types of alumni lists. Rublamb (talk) 01:25, 6 February 2026 (UTC)

@Rublamb, I agree with ElKevbo that it would be unworkable to have embedded lists and standalone lists have the same criteria. The situation is just more complicated than that. Ditto for the idea that we might be able to carve up notable alumni into professions and impose a quota on each profession — many schools, even without a formal focus, tend to excel in one or more particular area(s) and produce a disproportionate number of noted alums in those area(s). I know that Wikipedians can sometimes be uncomfortable having to make any sort of editorial call, but we do so all the time, and as I explained above, in this case it is impossible not to. Also, your comment here gives me the impression you still think that WP:NLIST locks us into having to use notability as the sole criterion for listing someone in a noted people section. I refuted that above — that's not what the guideline says, and it's equally unworkable. Sdkb ^talk 18:25, 6 February 2026 (UTC)

I don't have a problem making editorial calls; we do that all the time based on sources and our best effort to achieve neutrality. The key here is sources, the basis for all content in Wikipedia. However, you appear to be supporting an alumni list criterion that falls under the guideline "whatever I think is best". Many standalone list articles are put up for AfD on the basis of an arbitrary selection criterion. In my experience, the only solution is to find sources that discuss the group. And, yes, I do understand the difference between an embedded list and a standalone list.

This communication gap we seem to be having is that I consider alumni embedded lists as a waiting room for an eventual standalone list article. Thus, I don't care which 20 alumni are mentioned in an embedded list, provided they are notable according to Wikipedia. I don't have to spend time cherry-picking my personal favorites or the "most famous" because I am not showing bias in limiting the embedded list to a select few (which may also cause undue emphasis on something like Nobel Prize winners, for example). It sounds like you have spent a lot of time trying to create the "best" small list possible, when it would be much easier to go ahead and create the standalone list article that is needed for most major institutions.

Once a standalone list article is created, we do need text for the main article--and that is where your editorial call comes into play. But if you are going to limit the content of the only alumni list for an institution, you really need sources to back your selections or rely on an agreed-upon criteria--actual graduate, has an article, or the like—to avoid personal bias. Rublamb (talk) 19:39, 6 February 2026 (UTC)

On photo galleries, we've had many, many conversations about that at WT:HED. We really need to document the results of the major ones at this advice page so that this doesn't keep on getting brought up by editors who aren't aware of them, and so that we have a simple thing to point to if they do. (This is another area where common practice and best practice clearly diverge.) Sdkb ^talk 18:28, 6 February 2026 (UTC)

On summaries vs. lists of individual people, it really depends on how many people there are for a given institution, and whether we're talking about an institution lead section, an institution embedded list in a noted people section, or a standalone list. I find that, for elite U.S. liberal arts colleges (the institution type I've edited the most), it often makes most sense to have a summary in the lead section but to list out people in the embedded list in the body.

I'll also note that the sourcing is often lacking for creating summaries — I'd love to list the number of billionaire alums of a given school as an indication of its impact in the business world, but there is generally not reliable data on that (and compiling it runs into WP:SYNTH issues). Sdkb ^talk 18:36, 6 February 2026 (UTC)

Most "elite" mens or coed colleges have enough notable alumni for a standalone list articles. That is something I am willing to help with, in you can identify the colleges. Finally we agree--finding sources for summaries ia very, very challenging. It is also hard to create this content without looking like you work for the college's public relations division. I am inclined to avoid mentioning alumni names in a typical, fairly short lead, unless there is a major connection, such as the institional name or presidency. If we are working with a FA, it would be appropriate to summarize the notables section. Rublamb (talk) 21:15, 6 February 2026 (UTC)

Pulled some data. There are 148 articles in English Wikipedia that use the phrase "noted alumni" vs. 29,043 articles that use "notable alumni". Rublamb (talk) 00:31, 6 February 2026 (UTC)

WP:OTHER. Looks like we have some work to do to bring articles in line with best practice. Sdkb ^talk 18:12, 6 February 2026 (UTC)

I do not believe WP:OTHER applies here. This is a case where common usage has clearly selected "notable alumni" over "noted alumni". Although WP:UNI can agree to use "noted alumni" for its articles, that would not make this terminology the "best practice" for all articles in Wikipedia. I find nothing in MOS to support that using "noted alumni" is a best practice; rather, it seems to be your personal preference. MOS encourages consistency and consensus. I have never seen a clearer statement of consistency and consensus than 29,043 vs. 148. Rublamb (talk) 18:37, 6 February 2026 (UTC)

Summarize Timeline Fact Check

This section currently reads:

If an institution's faculties, constituent academic colleges, or academic departments are especially notable or significant, they may have their own dedicated article (e.g. Jesus College, Oxford, Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania). In general, these organizations are not notable (see WP:ORG) and should not be split off from the main institution article in the absence of significant coverage by reliable, independent sources. If some faculties or academic colleges have significance and others do not, it may be the case that the institution's academic programs as a whole are notable. In this case, it may be acceptable to create a separate academic article (see Michigan State University academics or Colleges of the University of Oxford).

Half of the examples here are about residential colleges, not academic colleges. We should probably re-word this to make the text and the title (something like "Institutional subdivisions") to reflect this, or split it into two parts.

It would also be useful to add a separate section about notable buildings, referencing WP:NBUILDING. This can apply to halls of residence (e.g., Cushing Hall and other university buildings (e.g., Brunel University lecture centre), particularly historic ones or controversial ones (even ones, like Munger Hall, that never got built). Robminchin (talk) 23:33, 13 February 2026 (UTC)

Notable buildings, or buildings in general, should be included in the campus section. Campus buildings with their own article should also be included in the template for the university. If there is a lot of content on a specific building, the appropriate place is a separate article, as allowed by WP:NBUILDING, or as part of a stand-alone article on the institution's history or campus. As someone who works on architectural articles, I would rarely find it acceptable to include more than a couple of sentences on a specific building in a university's article. For example, look at the University of Virginia which includes a UNESCO World Heritage Site; the solution here was to create Grounds of the University of Virginia, rather than to include a overlong section in the main article. Rublamb (talk) 01:24, 14 February 2026 (UTC)

Sorry, I wasn't clear – this is from the part of the advice page about stand-alone articles. I was suggesting that we include advice that buildings could be split off if they are notable, which I think is what you are also saying. Robminchin (talk) 04:08, 14 February 2026 (UTC)

Yes, that is what I am saying. However, I would use caution in the examples provided. I don't think Cushing Hall and Munger Hall are what we want to encourage, as we already get too much detail on dorms. Instead of saying residence halls, I would specify buildings or campuses on the National Register of Historic Places or National Heritage List for England. Does that make sense? Rublamb (talk) 15:48, 11 April 2026 (UTC)

Summarize Timeline Top Qs Fact Check

Note in advance: This is a very long post with multiple questions that may be best put to the side or redirected elsewhere. I wanted to lay it out for people to weigh in on holistically, both for clarification of guidelines here and a Wikipedia:Consistent approach for these schools overall. Feel free to only respond to a single element.

Hi there. I've not participated in this wikiproject before, but after a few move requests at Geneseo, Upstate, and Cobleskill, I've noticed that there's some inconsistencies in the naming conventions for the different schools in the State University of New York system and wondered if people had any notions about the article titles in the SUNY system

• Never use abbreviations or acronyms in titles unless the institution you are naming is almost exclusively known only by including such terms and is widely used in that form. [...]
• For universities that are part of a larger system, in general, the university name is followed by a comma and the name of the city in which the institution is located [...]

There are about 60 or so schools in the SUNY system. There are a few groups, with exceptions/complexities in each group

• A) Community colleges in the SUNY system, that go primarily by SUNY County-name (e.g. SUNY Sullivan, SUNY Niagara, SUNY Adirondack (not a county), SUNY Broome) [almost all shifted to new names in the past 10-15 years ref1 ref2 ]
• B) Community colleges in the SUNY system, that go primarily by County-name Community college (Monroe Community College, Suffolk County Community College, Onondaga Community College)
• C) Four-year, primarily bacherlor-granting comprehensive colleges that generally brand themselves as Town-name, State University of New York, often referred to by State University of New York at Town-name, and rendered in shorthand (and second reference) as SUNY Town-name (New Paltz, Oswego, Oneonta)
• D) Four-year, primarily bachelor-granting, technical colleges that vary a bit, but often have branding that primarily names it as SUNY Town-name, though also referred to by the longform name at times. (Morrisville, Canton, Delhi)
• E) Primarily post-graduate and/or specialized schools with no apparent standard (Upstate and Downstate (which each have multiple different common names), College of Optometry, ESF)
• F) University centers - flagships/prospective flagships that have intentionally developed branding to diverge from SUNY (University at Buffalo*, University at Albany, Binghamton University, Stony Brook University), but still maintain official and branding name connections to State University of New York identity (and which are still sometimes referred to by full long-form name and/or SUNY shorthand in reliable sources).

Basically, though I know that this is not a policy-defining group, I think the naming in the system is a bit of out of wack. I wonder if people here have notions either based on the existing style guidelines here, or on addenda or corollaries that would fit the SUNY questions specifically. Essentially:

• Does a school rebranding itself using an acronym (like SUNY Brockport, which features only that name in its current wordmark/branding after having the full, spelled-out version (and being recognized that way by sources)) for the system go by the name that shortens the longform system? Or is the system-name preserved despite the school preferring the shortform version? [equivalent non-SUNY example: UC Irvine with official branding]
• If a school does use branding that uses the longform, but is mentioned in secondary sources by both longform and shortform with, let's say, a 3/4 shortform mentions and 1/4 longform mentions[some from Type C and some from Type D], what's the read? Would a COMMON name in that instance override the guidelines here? Does the branding work as a tie-breaker? [UMass Amherst seems a prime example, also UNC-Chapel Hill and UT San Antonio, but all use the longform on WP]
• The SUNY system seems to be unique among larger state systems in the US for incorporating its community colleges [I definitely could be wrong, only looked at a couple instances] in the broader system. For the Type A schools above, should the system be spelled out? Or, since the branding is only and has apparently only ever been SUNY, not the longform, should that matter? Should the Type B schools also include the SUNY name? Longform or shortform? Should community colleges have separate naming conventions? [NB: Not all of the current names are correct/updated (SUNY Erie seems to be commonly referred to as Erie Community College; Westchester Community College now prefers SUNY Westchester Community College)]
• For the Type E schools, which do not generally include the placename in their names, is the system name generally still desired? Generally still spelled out even if end-name is long, as in State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry?
• This section "Colleges and universities should always be named using the common (not necessarily official) name of the institution. This can often be determined by looking at the current branding of a university via their website, published documents, and advertisements." seems to complicate the two subsections above and also general naming conventions. Usually reliance on official branding is frowned upon, especially with things in flux. As a corollary, Purchase College has been trying to brand itself as that for 30 years, though its current name (and secondary adoption of that name) is Purchase College, State University of New York. But it leaves a lot of room for interpretation. Some sources use Purchase College, some SUNY Purchase, some State University of New York College at Purchase, some [longform SUNY] Purchase College. [An alternative to the Purchase College move is Maritime College, which has the same branding look as Purchase, but uses the longform on WP]

Anyway, please let me know what you think, even if it's on only one element of the post. I would bring this to Wikiproject: SUNY as well, but it seems unfortunately inactive. Dizzycheekchewer (talk) 08:27, 11 April 2026 (UTC)

I have noticed, and it does bother me. Same with CCNY. I found a handy source where we can see the branded names of all SUNY institutions at the same time. (Click through to see the preferred name when the branding is a single word). I know that we don't always go by branded name, but this is a helpful guide to whether or not SUNY should be spelled out in the article's title or even used in the article's title. Note that some of the inconsistencies, such as with the naming conventions for the SUNY community colleges, come from the institution's common name, rather than the editor. My general thoughts are:

• If "SUNY" is a prefix to the institution's name, it should be included in the Wikipedia article's title. "SUNY" would be preferred over "State University of New York" as both the shorter name and the common name for these institutions.
• "SUNY" should not be used in the article's title for the main universities such as Binghamton University, Alfred State College, Buffalo State, University at Buffalo, etc., which only use "State University of New York" as a little letter suffix. This follows guidelines for the common name and shortest name.
• The full name of the institution (State University of New York...) would be stated in the first sentence of the lead.

Following these guidelines and looking at the branded names, it looks like "State University of New York" would only be used in the article about the system: State University of New York and/or a couple of institutions such as SUNY Plattsburgh (which we could move to SUNY Plattsburg for consistency). Also, there are a few that will require a judgment call, especially where the branding is too vague to use in Wikipedia, such as ESF and FIT, currently State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry and Fashion Institute of Technology. ESF should be shortened to "SUNY College of...", and FIT is fine as is. I am willing to work on moving articles if a consensus is reached. Rublamb (talk) 15:28, 11 April 2026 (UTC)

Thank you for sharing your thinking and working to help with this question. To clarify my concern, it's both the inconsistency within SUNY names and inconsistency between SUNY as system and other equivalent systems. So, for example, the UC system and UNC and UMASS and UT systems all frequently go by the shorthand in branding and in media references, but on Wikipedia, the title standard is to spell them out. That's codified in the guidelines here. It seems that generally preferring the SUNY shorthand in titles would be inconsistent with that standard for colleges, even if all 20-30 or so colleges that go by SUNY Blank (frequently enough to merit noting) use that standard. This post here is meant to test whether people think the guideline should be changed (that University of California, Irivine should shift to UC Irvine or University of Massachusetts, Amherst should be UMass Amherst, etc.) or whether the SUNY schools would be an exception. I have my preference, but either option is better than current system.

So basically, my notion would be that when a college calls itself SUNY Brockport (or is referred to by that name), it's really still State University of New York (at) Brockport, as that's what the name stands for. So the name here would be State University of New York at Brockport, because a) it avoids the acronym b) it properly sets Brockport in the system using the non-ambiguous standard and c) it remains Consistent with the names of other system-subordinate colleges in the aforementioned systems.

If people agree with that, then there are still the question marks around exceptions. I completely agree with you that the very long SUNY ESF could be an exception to the longform usage, as it's a very long title without shortening. Ditto for colleges that are pretty firmly branded/referred to without the SUNY name. Buffalo State and Alfred State for example seem completely fine without the system name, even though they are part of it. Also agree re the four university centers, though I still see some referred to frequently by the full name and even the new names sometimes refer to the old name (some ngrams for Buffalo, Binghamton, Albany, Stony Brook)

That link to the SUNY site I find to be interesting but perplexing. Multiple schools have 2-3 different names on the same page (i.e. Upstate is Upstate Medical University, but the first sentence calls it SUNY Upstate. Erie is SUNY Erie in the branding, but only referred to on the page as Erie Community College. Plattsburgh's logo is State University of New York Plattsburgh (unlike others that are BLANK, State University of New York), but then on the page it's SUNY Plattsburgh. I found this guidance, which may be useless as it comes from the official organization, but could give us at least an idea. Dizzycheekchewer (talk) 17:20, 11 April 2026 (UTC)

I have worked on conformity for several systems. It is never 100% perfect, but we can get pretty close. With UNC, the long version is what most of those institutions use on their website's landing page. I am refering to the title on the landing page, not the text. California went through a rebranding and is using UC Berkeley or UC Davis, etc. in their logos. We usually are conservative with this type of name change, recognizing that many will be temporary rebrands that do not actually become the common name. At some point, the names of those articles will be discussed again. The key is that we are not looking at consistency between spelled-out or abbreviated institutional names in article titles, but consistency in naming articles by the institution's common name and consistency within that grouping. Thus, the University of North Carolina Wilmington, SUNY Geneseo, and University at Buffalo would be equivalents. We also shy away from UCLA, UNC, UConn, UPenn, preferring actual words.

My suggestion for SUNY is to follow the SUNY sources and the website landing pages. At the same time, we seek consistency between the various articles (those with SUNY as a prefix or suffix as detailed above). If you click on the logo in the list I shared, you will find the same names found on your list and the landing pages (or at least my random testing suggests this). The exception would probably be the University at Buffalo, which was an update since the date of your document (see here). In this list, SUNY is again reinforcing the common name of its institutions. The consistency in all three sources is that none of the accepted short forms use "State University of New York" spelled out. This is a clear case where the common name and the institutional preferred name are in synch, and also nicely fit into our desires to not have an article title that is 8 or 9 words long.

With issues like Erie, there is usually a WP:UNI editor associated with the system who can confirm which is the long-term name vs. a recent rebrand. Sometimes the name change reflects an academic change--maybe it is moving from a community college to a more collegiate institution. If we don't have an insider's perspective, I look for PR and the institutional branding guide to see if there is an answer. If it is unclear, we go for conformity with the other similar institutions in the group. There are plenty of instances where a move disucssion is started for an outlier article. Rublamb (talk) 18:25, 11 April 2026 (UTC)

@ElKevbo, have you noticed this issue? Rublamb (talk) 18:26, 11 April 2026 (UTC)

I have noticed this. I do my best to ignore it because it's really, really annoying when university and college systems can't manage something as simple as consistently branding their member institutions (and the SUNY institutions that (a) don't use SUNY in their title and (b) use "at" instead of "of" in their title are especially irritating!). WP:COMMONNAME is still the guiding policy here which means that we sometimes end up situations where our article titles are inconsistent simply because that reflects real-world usage. But figuring out the common name isn't always straight forward and reasonable editors can disagree when determining the common name.

Ignoring WP:COMMONNAME to instead impose our own preferred nomenclature is not acceptable. ElKevbo (talk) 22:47, 14 April 2026 (UTC)

Agreed. And we get into strange territory when trying to determine the popular name when there is an institutional name change. Rublamb (talk) 22:56, 14 April 2026 (UTC)

I'm definitely more convinced from this explanation that it might be best to operate with most as SUNY Blank, with the aforementioned exceptions and necessary non-conformity. One thing that I'm a little stuck on is the role of PR/official language. It doesn't seem like it's top-down, so it's naturally inconsistent and confusing. I wonder about natural disambiguation between the different types of schools (e.g, Binghamton University, SUNY Oswego, but SUNY Cobleskill Ag & Tech and SUNY Erie Community College), but that might become a little kooky/unsustainable.

I also am not completely convinced (but ofc don't need to be if others feel the same) about the longform-shortform logic. The equivalent document to the one I cited for the UC system would have the same logic where University of California Berkeley is not an acceptable shortform, since it's not a shortform. NGrams also indicate that the UC initialism has been in usage for decades, generally more in usage than the longform (Berkeley, Davis, Irvine compared to Geneseo, Plattsburgh, Fredonia). While the SUNY examples have converged with shortform and longform usage (per these stats, they're basically equivalent as of 2022), the UC schools have had the shortform be more Common since the 1980-90s.

Last part is a question, if "We also shy away from UCLA, UNC, UConn, UPenn, preferring actual words." why would that not include SUNY? My original confusions results from that shyness, laid out in the guidelines. As demonstrated from the Ngrams if nothing else, (most of) the SUNY schools are not, per the guideline here "almost exclusively known only by including" the SUNY. They are frequently referred to by the full name, as with the UCs/UTs/UNCs/ etc. Sorry for the weird notation, Idk how to make the quote text green. Dizzycheekchewer (talk) 19:47, 11 April 2026 (UTC)

Why? See WP:ACROTITLE. Because UCLA is the entire name of the school abbreviated, whereas University at Buffalo SUNY is abbreviating the secondary name, not the primary name. When you abbreviate the full name of a school, as with UCLA, there is no context with that abbreviation. Also, University of California, Los Angeles is just 4 words, whereas University at Buffalo State University of New York is eight words (which is a really long title in Wikipedia). But that is just my opinion. Let's wait and see if others think SUNY should be abbreviated or spelled out. Rublamb (talk) 21:40, 11 April 2026 (UTC)

No, definitely UCLA wouldn't be fully abbreviated in title, but UNC Chapel Hill or UMass Amherst (not an acronym, but similar idea) would be in the same bucket as the SUNY schools. They are very commonly—arguably primarily if you count things we count for SUNY like headline references or total volume in secondary sources—referred to the short name with official use of the short name. Ditto with something like UT Austin or UC Berkeley (and other UC/UT schools). That's the sum of the conflict here. If SUNY Fredonia et al is preferable to State University of New York at Fredonia then that would reasonably mean that the other state systems should be abbreviated with similar room for exceptions based on usage differences. Or that a different rule would be made here for SUNY, if it's deemed an exception from the guidelines as they are.

Agree about waiting for more people. I know it's almost certainly just miscommunication on my part, but I think the question has gotten a little muddled. There is absolutely room for non-conformity (ie Buffalo State University stays like that, University at Albany stays like that), but the rule itself (rather than exceptions to the rule) seems to sway under the weight of this question. If we rename 30 odd schools with an acronym, then it opens up the aforementioned instances (UNC Chapel Hill and UMass Amherst, not UCLA or UPenn) where an acronym+placename is also the most standard version. Either way, Apologies for the length and back-and-forth and thanks for providing your insight. It's definitely been helpful in thinking about this. Dizzycheekchewer (talk) 05:01, 12 April 2026 (UTC)

Again, comparing SUNY with the UNC system is a false equivalent. The standard is not how we treat other article names, but what the common name is for each institution. But if it helps you to compare, Chapel Hill does not use an abbreviation in its logos and branding. As you can see here, every single version of Chapel Hill's logo fully spells out "University of North Carolina". (They only use UNC for departmental units. The difference is that SUNY itself accepts the abbreviation and uses SUNY in it logos and on the landing page of some of its units. For example, Erie Community College is now SUNY Erie. Same with SUNY Sullivan, SUNY Niagara, and SUNY Ulster. Spelling out SUNY in these cases would not be correct, as that has never been used as the name of these institutions.

In looking through List of State University of New York units, I think the issue is not how we treat the SUNY system as a whole in Wikipedia, but whether any of the institutional names have changed since its article was created. For example, State University of New York Upstate Medical University is already under a move discussion to its current name Upstate Medical University. Most of the institutions that begin with "SUNY" are well on their way toward dropping that prefix, as has already been done with the University at Buffalo, etc. As far as I can tell, the only articles that use "SUNY" are consistent with institutional usage/common name. The variations in article names that seem to be inconsistencies are actually a direct reflection of the institutional name. Rublamb (talk) 12:39, 12 April 2026 (UTC)

I fear we've completely lost each other here. I've made a note at the general wikiproject page to request for input, but a couple things

• The SUNYs you cite (Sullivan, Niagara, etc.) are exceptions that only have ever gone by that name (and their old name of SCCC, NCC, etc.). The proper disposition for them is not likely the disposition for schools that are often "State University of New York at Fredonia" or Oswego or wherever.
• Ditto for the university centers. They made a push to drop "SUNY," though they are still officially State University of New York. But on WP the new name seems taken up. Upstate is a different story. If you Google it, it brands itself as SUNY Upstate and is known by that name in secondary sources.
• Maybe each system is different, but it seems the UC schools often go by UC blank. Some are only branded that way. Look at UC Irvine's website versus Geneseo's for example. Look at the graphs above for (Berkeley, Davis, Irvine compared to Geneseo, Plattsburgh, Fredonia). Ditto for UMass schools or UNC schools or UT schools, all of which are branded that way in shortform and referred to that way by secondary sources by similar rates as the SUNYs.

We can drop the community college question for now. And let's say we drop the post-grad institutions (and the four university centers which are fine). Focus instead on the comprehensive colleges (New Paltz, Oswego, Geneseo, et al) and the tech colleges (Morrisville, Delhi, Canton, et al.) They have been branded and referred to by their longform name. If we override that fact, and insert an acronym, we would resonably do the same for other schools where that's the case. Dizzycheekchewer (talk) 15:34, 12 April 2026 (UTC)

I find that we are treating UC and SUNY the same, ignoring initialisms in logos and opting for the full name. That is why so many articles have "State University of New York" spelled out, exactly like "University of California" is spelled out. SUNY is only being used in article titles when that is the new institutional name, as far as I can tell.

There is a difference between an institution's branding (UC Davis) and an institution changing its name (University at Buffalo). Yes, the full name may remain on a charter somewhere, but that is not the common name. Sometimes it is difficult to tell if it is an actual name change or rebranding--which is why we have move discussions. The reason I support changing the article name for Upstate is that their rebranding has changed their name, as part of a pattern of name changes that SUNY has been slowly making over recent years. Upstate's name change is demonstrated by the logo on their landing page and their branding guide. The old name lingers because it takes a long time and involves many people and many departments to fully update a university website (been there, done that).

In general, article titles change when the institutional names change, using redirects for the former name. Whether or not Upstate's article is moved will be determined by consensus. Institutional name changes are an instance that makes secondary sources and Google data temporarily unreliable, because they are out of date. (U.S. News & World Report is consistent in not updating institutional names and in using its own formatting guidelines for names). Press releases from the institution about name changes are helpful for purposes of discussion, but are not independent as sources.

Geneseo is a good example of SUNY distancing itself from using the prefix "SUNY". The same is true for Plattsburgh and Fredonia. It is now rebranding those locations as the main name, changing the prefix to a suffix. This is an example of rebranding that does not yet warrant an article name change. If they start calling it Plattsubrgh University, changing the article's name will come up for discussion, or someone will just move it.

I appreciate your bringing up this topic. I had always wondered about the variations with SUNY, but now see it results from institutional names, rather than erratic editing. I was also able to update names in the main article, which had been overlooked. My questions about consistency have been answered and I believe most of the article names are correct. Are there specific articles that you believe have the incorrect name or concerns about? Rublamb (talk) 17:51, 12 April 2026 (UTC)