Talk:Marian High School (Michigan)

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Bias in order of content and subject headings.

This page lists Controversies and Human Rights Issues as the second topic in content. I have reviewed the Wikipedia pages of four other Catholic high schools that have fired teachers for issues relating to gay relationships and having children outside of traditional Catholic relationships, and on none of those pages are the controversies listed as highly in this entry, nor do any of those entries refer to the controversies as human rights issues. This article is biased against the school by placing the controversy above standard school specific contents such as Academics. I propose that the Controversies section should be listed below Notable Alumnae.

Furthermore, the article is biased against the school because it makes the firing an LGBT issue instead of an issue regarding the Catholic Church's opposition to having children through non-traditional means such as IVF, artificial insemination, etc. The school has not commented on this issue in the public because employment law forbids organizations from commenting on why employees were fired, so there is no source available to determine exactly why she was fired. However, the school knew that the teacher was gay and was in a relationship for many years but did not fire her until she became pregnant.

Listing the heading as a human right issue makes is seem like the teacher was fired because she was gay, but a more reasonable conclusion is that she was likely fired for using IVF, artificial insemination or some other method of inducing a pregnancy. Those methods are forbidden by the Catholic Church and would result in the firing of a straight teacher, as well.

Examples: http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/story?id=1949131 http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/03/10/in-vitro-fertilization-catholic-diocese_n_6839746.html http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bridgette-dunlap/teacher-fired-for-ivf-pregnancy_b_3461461.html

Kakafilipo (talk) 18:53, 16 May 2016 (UTC)kakafilipo

I cross-posted a notice requesting comment here from the following places -

• Wikipedia:WikiProject LGBT studies
• Wikipedia:WikiProject Schools
• Wikipedia:WikiProject Catholicism
• Wikipedia:Neutral point of view/Noticeboard

Blue Rasberry (talk) 14:32, 27 May 2016 (UTC)

Not being familiar with the MOS standards regarding schools, I would have to say that IMO the sections on the "Academics" and "Notable Events" (or would "History" be better?) should probably come before the controversies section, which itself might best be included as a subsection of a History section. That other material looks like it could be much better fleshed out and less possibly look like advertising or quotes from the school's webpage. John Carter (talk) 14:43, 27 May 2016 (UTC)

First off, I'm self-identifying as gay here, just to note the potential COI. Ideally, we shouldn't have a controversies section at all as per WP:CSECTION (an essay, but representative of wide community consensus). We certainly shouldn't call it a human rights issue without specific sourcing using that phrase, as that phrase carries very serious connotations. Elevating orientation-based discrimination to the same level as war crimes is going way too far without extraordinary reliable sourcing, especially given that specific administrators are named in the article and that discrimination is attributed to the administration. This is a WP:BLP issue in addition to NPOV. My suggestion would be to merge Background and Controversies into a History section and leave it at that. As far as content goes, we need to source the apathy of administration or get rid of it. ~ Rob^Talk 16:00, 27 May 2016 (UTC)

Thanks, Rob. I think your summary here is very good and fair. And excellent point on sourcing the apathy of the administration. Kakafilipo (talk) 16:06, 27 May 2016 (UTC)Kakafilipo

It's also a case of WP:RECENT and WP:UNDUE. Did either of these events draw significant coverage that lasted over a long period of time, or were they simply events that drew some local/regional coverage and only around the time they occurred? If it's a case of the latter, then it's just a footnote in the school's history and shouldn't have anything beyond a sentence or two mentioning it. In looking at the sources, all of them are from the general Detroit area and came in December 2015, so that suggests it's not a major event worthy of its own section. If there are additional sources (beyond other local news simply picking up the story from Detroit), those should be added. The guard firing from 2006 was only mentioned in "Pridesource" (i.e. not a neutral news source) in 2015 when the second instance became news. At first glance, it seems that, at most, these events should be mentioned in passing, if at all. They don't appear to be significant events in the school's history, at least at this point. That could change if there was some kind of major development in the school that could be tied to this.

I do agree that the three sections (Background, Controversies, and Notable events) should be merged into a History section instead and trimmed accordingly (many of the "notable events" aren't notable). These school articles are supposed to be general articles about the school, not every detail that happens at the school or everything associated with it. The history section should give the reader a decent idea of when the school was established and how it has developed, not the latest news. --JonRidinger (talk) 17:15, 27 May 2016 (UTC)

We need better sourcing for the first "controversy", but the second one is cited to the Detroit Free Press, which is a major regional periodical. There was also some national coverage. See USA Today and CNN, for example. ~ Rob^Talk 17:37, 27 May 2016 (UTC)

Ideally it should be merged into a "History" section. This article should follow WP:WPSCH/AG for the order of the sections. EyeTripleE (talk) 18:16, 27 May 2016 (UTC)

Here's a national news source, if it helps.

• Sullivan, Gail (September 8, 2014). "Gay teacher says Catholic school fired her for getting pregnant". The Washington Post.

/ edg ☺ ☭ 21:29, 27 May 2016 (UTC)

• Both incidents are described in too much detail, with unsourced editorializing (school was unresponsive to student protests, etc). The section could easily be trimmed to three sentences, with perhaps a "see also" to an article discussing LGTB firings. Example:

Marian High School has been involved in two notable LGBTQ controversies in recent years. In late 2006, a campus safety office after publishing a book in which she admitted to being a lesbian. In 2014, a lesbian science teacher was dismissed while pregnant from in vitro fertilization.

This information should be balanced with other historical information about the school. --Zfish118^⋉talk 18:33, 27 May 2016 (UTC)

• Revised:

In 2014, a lesbian science teacher was fired allegedly for becoming a pregnant using in vitro fertilization, which is not supported by the Roman Catholic Church. Students and alumnae organized protests near the Marian campus and wrote petitions online, but were not successful in gaining her reinstatement.

This version presents the essential material in a neutral manner, without going into excessive detail. --Zfish118^⋉talk 16:32, 28 May 2016 (UTC)

I think the whole "Controversies" section should be nuked. It starts out saying the high school was "involved in two notable controversies", but then fails to establish how these two specific incidents were "notable" or "controversial" in relation to a private Roman Catholic high school. I think it's fair to say that the official position of the Catholic hierarchy on LGBT rights is notable by itself, and additionally that Catholic teaching prohibits in vitro fertilization. So it seems to me that the "notable controversy" here is with the teachings and the official position of the Catholic Church concerning these issues, rather than these two specific individuals.-- Isaidnoway (talk) 18:43, 27 May 2016 (UTC)

I agree with the removal of the Controversies section, and I favor omitting names (though the fired teacher seems to have gone very public, so I wouldn't object to including that name). As the current last paragraph under History, this content appears much-improved from earlier versions. Since it is concise, reasonably well-sourced, and really the only notable content in this article, I'd say it is not give undue weight. (Without this paragraph, this would be a non-notable high school that would not merit it's own Wikipedia article, at least with the rest of this article's current content as evidence.) / edg ☺ ☭ 21:29, 27 May 2016 (UTC)

The 50 or so words now in place in the History section seem sufficient to me. I've seen other school with more extensive coverage, but those involved lawsuits. However, I note that one of the citations says "Webb’s story has made national headlines, including The Washington Post, New York Daily News and Buzzfeed." I don't think it's worth adding that to the text we now have, but a citation to a national news outlet would seem to be in order. This incident wasn't entirely under the national radar. I'll add the Washington Post. Bmclaughlin9 (talk) 18:07, 29 May 2016 (UTC)

References

BLP

Due to WP:Living, I have immediately removed the names of the individuals in the LGTB controversy's section. --Zfish118^⋉talk 18:36, 27 May 2016 (UTC)

I agree, the 2007 article cited only mentions the 2006 dismissal. It describes the dismissee's, then recently published, memoir and associated book tour. There is nothing there other than an allegation that "she was fired last year for going public about her sexuality" in her book. The 2006 dismissal was used as background after an eight year gap. I could not find if there was a lawsuit or a complaint filed and do not think it was significant coverage. Rob (here) and JonRidinger (here) summed up the BLP about the 2014 dismissal well. –BoBoMisiu (talk) 21:02, 27 May 2016 (UTC)

@Zfish118 and BoBoMisiu: I heavily disagree with you that the name of the teacher from 2014 should be removed. See the sources I cited above; this teacher's name was widely reported in national coverage and she herself spoke out about the firing, so sections like WP:AVOIDVICTIM and WP:BLPNAME don't seem to apply. I would believe differently if the teacher had acted to conceal her name (or even done nothing), but she actively sought media attention and it was achieved. I don't see how a mention of the name is a BLP violation in that situation. Could you cite a specific sentence or section of the BLP policy that supports this removal? ~ Rob^Talk 21:20, 27 May 2016 (UTC)

BLP or not, I wouldn't mention the specific person anyway, similar to not mentioning specific non-notable coaches, teachers, and/or administrators (like mentioning the coach of a state championship athletic team). Again, in the greater scope of the article, this is not a major event in the school's history, so a great deal of detail isn't needed. --JonRidinger (talk) 21:42, 27 May 2016 (UTC)

How do we decide how "major" the event was? I would point to reliable sources to do so, and the reliable sources show this as the most major event in school history. Even ignoring the fact that we must go by reliable sources, it's exceptional for a high school to reach national headlines. I think this is pretty major by any definition of the word. ~ Rob^Talk 22:44, 27 May 2016 (UTC)

WP:NOTNEWS probably applies here, to some degree, somehow, although I honestly don't know how it would be best applied here. If the school is notable, and I think it clearly is, then there is also the matter of whatever official or unofficial style guidelines we might have for schools in general, as well as, I suppose, WP:WEIGHT. Most of the content about this event seems to be related to that event alone. If there were any sort of encyclopedic overview article out there about the school as a school, it might be a good indicator of how to structure the article, but I don't know of any, or even where one might find them. Of course, if anyone does know anything about MOS for schools or reference sources on schools, I think we would all love to see them. John Carter (talk) 22:59, 27 May 2016 (UTC)

Comment: High schools are considered inherently notable in the manual of style, so there is no need to justify the existence of the Wikipedia article due to a controversy. As for including the names, being fired, whatever the reason, is adverse information, and should only be included when vital to understanding the controversy. --Zfish118^⋉talk 16:16, 28 May 2016 (UTC)

Doesn't this change when the subject themselves publicizes it, however? As a side note, I don't think this adequately represents current policy. A name is never necessary to describe any controversy, since we could just say "Person X" and it would mean the same thing, but we regularly match names to controversies when they're well-reported in reliable sources because that's part of being an encyclopedia. For instance, names are named in Catholic Church sexual abuse cases. There is clearly something more complicated than "This is potentially adverse, so leave it out." WP:NPOV and WP:BLP don't demand that we purge negative information, but then again I don't even think this is negative given that the subject herself spoke out here. ~ Rob^Talk 16:52, 28 May 2016 (UTC)

It is a matter of proportion. WP:Bio specifically warns about including too much detail about living persons of marginal notability. A women being fired for otherwise legal behavior that violated her contract is very different than major felonies committed by persons holding a position of public trust. --Zfish118^⋉talk 01:13, 29 May 2016 (UTC)

Move

Another technical issue is this article should also be moved to Marian High School (Michigan) since there aren't any other Marian High Schools in Michigan, though that will need an administrator to do so. The disambiguation part of the title should be minimized and the only time a city name should be included is if there's more than one in the same state. --JonRidinger (talk) 20:15, 27 May 2016 (UTC)

Requested move 27 May 2016

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: moved per unanimous consensus. (non-admin closure) GeoffreyT2000 (talk) 02:10, 4 June 2016 (UTC)

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Marian High School (Bloomfield Township, Michigan) → Marian High School (Michigan) – WP:PRECISE. No existing articles for any other Marian High Schools in Michigan, so no need to have Bloomfield Township in the disambiguator. ~ Rob^Talk 22:49, 27 May 2016 (UTC)

• Support, no need for unnecessary disambiguation. SSTflyer 15:28, 28 May 2016 (UTC)
• Support, no need for unnecessary disambiguation. Deus vult (aliquid)! Crusadestudent (talk) 21:28, 28 May 2016 (UTC)
• Support –BoBoMisiu (talk) 23:45, 28 May 2016 (UTC)

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The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.