Template talk:Infobox university/Archive 22

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Archive 22

Add Visitor as a field

Can someone please add visitor as an option since many institutions in India have visitor instead of chairman. ShauryaChopra03 (talk) 04:12, 17 July 2022 (UTC)

This is sometimes place in the free_label, ei.g. in the infobox at University College London. Many older British universities have a Visitor, which is a person with an oversight role of a charity's operations in English law (and, I believe, also in other parts of the Commonwealth) – quite different from the role of the chair. Robminchin (talk) 06:09, 17 July 2022 (UTC)

Since we limit ourselves to two head figures in the infobox, the Visitor (and the chairman for that matter), which is usually less important to list than the Chancellor and Vice-Chancellor, is very seldom listed. Having it as an option for the very small minority of pages where it is relevant does not seem like a smart move. --Muhandes (talk) 17:29, 18 July 2022 (UTC)

Where does the documentation say that "we limit ourselves to two head figures in the infobox?"

ShauryaChopra03, you can use the "head" and "head_label" parameters to add critical leaders to the infobox of specific institutions; this may meet your needs. ElKevbo (talk) 22:04, 18 July 2022 (UTC)

I don't have specific knowledge about this role, but I firmly agree we should strictly limit the person(s) we list in the infobox to the head of the institution, or if there are two people in equally important roles, then at most two. If this is just a figurehead that we'd never mention in lead prose, it shouldn't be in the lead infobox either. {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 01:57, 19 July 2022 (UTC)

In the UK, it's a person with an oversight role rather than someone in the leadership of the university. In an eleemosynary corporation they are normally appointed by the founder to ensure the terms of the bequest are followed, and they also have a role in judging disputes between members of the corporation (although student complaints were removed from their jurisdiction in 2004, when the Office of the Independent Adjudicator was set up). It's not a figurehead role – see, for example, the coverage of an enquiry launched by UCL's Visitor in 2018:London university probed over management misconduct claims Financial Times. Robminchin (talk) 04:34, 19 July 2022 (UTC)

Reading the word and parameter "Visitor", it can also mean visiting professor etc. So this introduces semantic creep/cruft from the start. So at least, name the proposed parameter |UK_visitor=. -DePiep (talk) 05:13, 19 July 2022 (UTC)

What visiting professor has ever been referred to with the title "Visitor"? Graham (talk) 05:48, 4 February 2023 (UTC)

I'd like to revisit this. Quite a few UK universities use the head_label for the visitor – as suggested arrive and as is, in fact, done with the example in the documentation. However, with an increasing number being led by a "Vice-Chancellor and President", this has led to editors putting the chief executive under the free label. We could be solve the problem that the template clearly does not do what editors want it to do by adding a visitor label. This may not matter much to Americans, but it will be useful in the UK, Australia, India, etc. Robminchin (talk) 00:46, 23 January 2023 (UTC)

Template-protected edit request on 4 February 2023

This edit request to Template:Infobox university has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request.

Description:

Add a new label and data for visitor as item 23; renumber the following items (to 47, as there is no item 48); add visitor to the check form unknown parameters.

Implementation (tested in the sandbox and testcases pages):

Change1:
	label23 = Chancellor	data23 =	label24 = President	data24 =	label25 = Vice-president	data25 =	label26 = Superintendent	data26 =	label27 = Vice-Chancellor	data27 =	label28 = Provost	data28 =	label29 = Rector	data29 =	label30 = Principal	data30 =	label31 = Dean	data31 =	label32 = Director	data32 =	label33 = {{{head_label}}}	data33 =	label34 = Academic staff	data34 =	label35 = Administrative staff	data35 =	label36 = Total staff	data36 =	label37 = Students	data37 =	label38 = Undergraduates	data38 =	label39 = Postgraduates	data39 =	label40 = Doctoral students	data40 =	label41 = Other students	data41 =	label42 = Location	class42 = adr	data42 =	label43 = Campus	data43 =	label44 = Language	data44 =	label45 =	data45 =	label46 =	data46 =	label47 = Colors	data47 = To:	label23 = Visitor	data23 =	label24 = Chancellor	data24 =	label25 = President	data25 =	label26 = Vice-president	data26 =	label27 = Superintendent	data27 =	label28 = Vice-Chancellor	data28 =	label29 = Provost	data29 =	label30 = Rector	data30 =	label31 = Principal	data31 =	label32 = Dean	data32 =	label33 = Director	data33 =	label34 = {{{head_label}}}	data34 =	label35 = Academic staff	data35 =	label36 = Administrative staff	data36 =	label37 = Total staff	data37 =	label38 = Students	data38 =	label39 = Undergraduates	data39 =	label40 = Postgraduates	data40 =	label41 = Doctoral students	data41 =	label42 = Other students	data42 =	label43 = Location	class43 = adr	data43 =	label44 = Campus	data44 =	label45 = Language	data45 =	label46 =	data46 =	label47 =	data47 =	label48 = Colors	data48 =

Change2:

"_VALUE_"|ignoreblank=y

To:

"_VALUE_"|ignoreblank=y

Robminchin (talk) 16:22, 4 February 2023 (UTC)

Continuing from above, I'd like to see some additional discussion to ensure that we wouldn't be violating WP:DUE by allowing this. Infoboxes, as part of the lead, need to meet the bar for lead-level weight, and the fact that editors often want to add more parameters than they ought to (making the infoboxes far too long) is a problem, not a justification for making it easier. The way I tend to think about it is, would we ever consider putting this piece of info in the lead prose? If not, it doesn't belong in the infobox either. For university leaders, I can really only envision the top most important person at the institution being mentioned, or at most two people if there are two such co-leaders.

As I mentioned above, I don't know much about the UK higher education system, so I genuinely don't know if the visitor meets that standard. But that's the standard we should be evaluating against. Best, {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 17:41, 4 February 2023 (UTC)

I reopened the discussion above a few weeks ago and didn't receive any further comments, which is why I proceeded to making a formal request. As I mentioned above, quite a few infoboxes are currently using one of the free parameters to include this, but as UK universities are increasingly moving to titles like Vice-Chancellor and President for their chief executive, this means that free parameters from elsewhere in the infobox are being used and things ended up listed in odd places. Indeed, the documentation for this infobox actually includes Visitor in the example, using the free_head parameter. So in many ways this is tidying up and properly including a parameter that is often already there.

As an example of the position of the visitor, the statutes of Durham University state that "The University shall be governed by a Visitor, Chancellor, Vice-Chancellor, Convocation, Council, Senate, and Boards of Studies."[1]. Similarly, the charter of Cardiff University listed the visitor before the Chancellor in the section on how the university of governed,[2], and the same at University College London [3]. Visitors are not involved in the day to day management, but can wield quite a lot of power. At UCL (as I've been working on that recently), there was a visitorial enquiry into how the university was being run in 2018–19 (which ended up mostly backing the management) [4][5]. Visitors also exist in other Commonwealth countries; while their powers and status may vary depending on local laws, the general principle is that they represent the founder and have the power to compel the institution to follow their interpretation of the founder's wishes (as expressed in the charter and statutes). Robminchin (talk) 18:55, 4 February 2023 (UTC)

I have collapsed your code above. Please consider moving it to Template:Infobox_university/sandbox — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 22:44, 4 February 2023 (UTC)

I tested it in the sandbox first, and it's presumably still there, but included it here because the instructions for requesting an edit are explicit that "providing the new sentences or code in your request, if possible, will expedite the process". Robminchin (talk) 23:49, 4 February 2023 (UTC)

Okay, thanks for trying to follow the instructions and sorry if it seems bureaucratic sometimes. There is more advice in Wikipedia:Edit requests#Requests for templates but I might try and improve the wording in the first paragraph — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 10:04, 5 February 2023 (UTC)

How frequently are visitorial powers exercised? At the average UK university, would it be as often as once every decade or two? Graham (talk) 04:46, 5 February 2023 (UTC)

I don't think this is something I've ever seen stats on. Having been doing a lot of work on UCL recently, there was a visitorial inquiry there in 2018-19, but I don't know how common these are generally, and how many happen without it being publicised. We also don't know how often visitors provide advice less formally than through full inquiries. Unfortunately, 'visitor' is a problem when it comes to doing searches! When it comes to the law regarding visitors, there's more information, e.g. [6][7][8]. More widely, I found that the University of the West Indies replaced the Queen as visitor in 2019 with a local judge because of the backlog of unheard cases [9]. Robminchin (talk) 06:45, 5 February 2023 (UTC)

To put it in US terms, the visitor is the judicial branch of government for a chartered or statutory body. Robminchin (talk) 19:17, 4 February 2023 (UTC)

The argument about de facto usage is not persuasive to me, per my comment above (there's a lot of de facto usage of infoboxes that's wrong), but the arguments about the importance are persuasive to a degree. It seems kinda akin to a board of trustees in the U.S., which I would consider marginal depending on exactly how empowered it is. Deferring to your expertise, I'll probably drop any objection to this so long as we put a {{please see}} at WT:HED/WT:UK/WT:Infoboxes to get more input. Depending on what that input is like, it might also help to note in the documentation that use of the parameter is optional and conditional on the Visitor having an empowered role at that particular institution. {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 00:09, 5 February 2023 (UTC)

We need fewer parameters in this infobox, not more. I've argued for the removal of the "chair" parameter in the past and I maintain that it does not belong - the same logic seems to apply for this new parameter. ElKevbo (talk) 01:18, 5 February 2023 (UTC)

We quite possibly need fewer parameters, but lots of parameters is what we get for having a single worldwide infobox. Refusing to add parameters that would be useful in India (as mentioned in the original request above), Britain and other countries on the basis that we already have too many already simply maintains the historic US-centric nature of the template: having an international template means we have to add international parameters to cope with different governance arrangements around the world. And when we have sources saying the visitor is one of the leading figures in the governance of a university, we should be following the sources rather than inserting our opinions. Robminchin (talk) 02:05, 5 February 2023 (UTC)

I think trying to have a single infobox for all colleges and universities in all countries is a mistake. ElKevbo (talk) 02:25, 5 February 2023 (UTC)

I was wondering this as well, but couldn't find a way of saying it that didn't sound like saying 'if you don't agree with me, I'm going to pov-fork'! Possibly we should be discussing this option in a separate thread. It might also give us the option of having something like 'executive_label' in a new infobox rather than being stuck with the legacy of having all the different executive titles as alternative parameters. Robminchin (talk) 02:37, 5 February 2023 (UTC)

I'd be quite hesitant to fork, per WP:INFOCOL. I'm not opposed to more parameters because of the risk of overlong template documentation; rather it's that I don't want to enable usage that goes against WP:DUE. Cheers, {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 04:56, 5 February 2023 (UTC)

It would not be a fork to use a wrapper template for Indian universities. This could pass the visitor and exclude some other positions which are not relevant in India. — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 20:33, 5 February 2023 (UTC)

I'd be quite happy to put on a note about only using it if its actually a position with some power. We could improve the documentation on the various head labels in this respect more generally: provost, for example, is simply documented as 'Provost of the institution' and dean as 'Dean of the institution', with nothing to say that they should only be used if they are the executive rather than a deputy or someone else in the governance structure. Robminchin (talk) 02:15, 5 February 2023 (UTC)

Adding documentation to other head labels along those lines sounds good to me. {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 04:56, 5 February 2023 (UTC)

Where are we with this request? Is code in sandbox ready to go? — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 08:45, 13 February 2023 (UTC)

Code in the sandbox is ready to go. I was coming up with some documentation for the head labels, which I haven't done yet. If I've understood correctly, the documentation is generally editable though so this doesn't need to be part of the protected edit request. Robminchin (talk) 15:06, 13 February 2023 (UTC)

Done — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 19:08, 13 February 2023 (UTC)

Template-protected edit request on 19 May 2023

This edit request to Template:Infobox university has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request.

Change "Nickname" to say Athletic nickname otherwise it's ambigious. 90.255.15.152 (talk) 15:27, 19 May 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for the suggestion, IP. There has been some previous discussion about this, but it's complicated, as "athletic" is only used to refer to sports generally (as opposed to the Sport of athletics) in North America, and "Sports nickname" sounds a bit weird. Happy to discuss further, and to implement the change if consensus forms to do so. {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 16:03, 19 May 2023 (UTC)

How about "Sports team nickname" 90.255.15.152 (talk) 18:30, 19 May 2023 (UTC)

I have a sense that, for many institutions, the nickname is used widely beyond just sports. {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 19:38, 19 May 2023 (UTC)

Links to Wikidata

The links to wikidata does not seem to work. All the information for various information is trancluded. In you try to use the template Infobox university for any article, it loads only the title and none of the information which is indicated in Wikidata. Nornally, if you just indicate the template for any article you should automatically load most of the information in Wikidata, without having to separately load the informaion. This happens for the infoboxes for settlements or persons, but not for universities. Why? Afil (talk) 05:07, 28 May 2023 (UTC)

@Afil, we'd like for this template to fetch Wikidata values for its parameters, but that needs to be set up, and it hasn't happened yet. See some recent efforts at this thread. Cheers, {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 05:19, 28 May 2023 (UTC)

Template talk:Infobox university/Archive 22

Add Visitor as a field

Template-protected edit request on 4 February 2023

Template-protected edit request on 19 May 2023

Links to Wikidata

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