<p>We students should definitely hold a sit-in or protest because we are not allowed to use Wikipedia to research. I mean professors even make a career out of editing that stuff. It's the information motherload and the only teacher that ever lets me use it for projects is the computer apps teacher. I think students are smart enough to know if something is legit info. </p>
<p>And by the way, do many college professors allow it?</p>
<p>Well, I think wikipedia is good for background at least. Maybe not specific details on really arcane stuff, but yeah. My English teacher ALWAYS wikipedias-even cultural references about books we read, to the point that it's creepy.</p>
<p>Nobody bans it for researching purposes (that I know of). They just don't approve citing it.</p>
<p>Which is fine, because its generally inappropriate to cite encyclopedia's anyway.</p>
<p>Wikipedia's blocked under our school's firewall.</p>
<p>"This site falls into one of the categories the School District has chosen to block.
Category: Education"</p>
<p>I love Wikipedia, and my hick school hasn't caght on to the whole 'Wikipedia=death' bandwagon. Yay for me.</p>
<p>OMG Can't stop laughing at fizix's comment.</p>
<p>We have an orientation every year on the "right research websites to use". We get an automatic F for citing Wikipedia.</p>
<p>i love wikipedia.ha.</p>
<p>Ya, wiki is blocked at our school too... ='(</p>
<p>We're not allowed to cite wikipedia as a source. My teachers object to it a.) because it can be inaccurate and b.) because it is too accessible, and just reading the wikipedia page doesn't constitute real research.</p>
<p>my history teacher allows one wiki citing per paper, under the logic that we should be able to use it because the public's conception of history changes, and the information on wikipedia represents those changes.</p>
<p>Wikipedia is my home. <3 We've never really done any intense research projects yet, so I can't really say for all my teachers, but for the most part it's allowed. It's not blocked. Only my AHAP teacher prevented us from using it for our mid-term paper.</p>
<p>Honestly, I think it's more accurate than not. When there's a screw-up, it's usually corrected pretty quickly.</p>
<p>There you go. Wikipedia is, on average, nearly as accurate as the Encyclopedia Britannica. And this is a study published in Nature, one of the premier journals of science and technology. I don't know how much more "official" you can get than that.</p>
<p>Anyways, wiki articles are required to cite sources, so if you use wikipedia to do research, you can just reference to the citations given in wiki. Teachers seem to believe that most of the material on wikipedia is unverified information, which is simply not true.</p>
<p>my school blocks it under "category: personal website." Makes no sense. My school is really they typical bad public high school. I've actually graded/seen reports citing just "google.com," if anything wikipedia would be a step up.</p>
<p>For those of you hardcore Wikipedia fans, I can tell you a way to get past the filters without the use of a proxy. :D PM me if you want to know how.</p>
<p>
[quote]
There you go. Wikipedia is, on average, nearly as accurate as the Encyclopedia Britannica. And this is a study published in Nature, one of the premier journals of science and technology. I don't know how much more "official" you can get than that.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I remember reading the article. The Nature article only referenced the number of errors made per article, not the quality or comprehensiveness of the article per se. Perhaps it could be the case that the Wikipedia article omitted important passages that the Britannica article did not make.</p>
<p>Now, one thing with Wikipedia, of course, is that it's dynamic and that its style has changed through the years. It isn't the same encyclopedia it was back in 2003. In 2003, many people could create an article based on non-specialist knowledge that they have acquired. Nowadays, all of the articles on the most important things have already been made, and the excitement over the potential of being able to write so many articles (and people seeing that those pages were indeed made by you in the history section) is now over.</p>
<p>By the way, a blank page automatically gets 0 errors. :p</p>
<p>Here's the list:
<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:External_peer_review/Nature_December_2005%5B/url%5D">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:External_peer_review/Nature_December_2005</a></p>
<p>Nonetheless, I trust the study itself, since it addresses the core complaint against Wikipedia - that it would have many inaccuracies. Wikipedia is only a means of an information-gathering source, and an information-gathering source's validity should not be affected by style. A repeat study should be done years from now, when there is less to add to the Wikipedia.</p>
<p>==</p>
<p>And school-bans of Wikipedia may not be related to its alleged factual inaccuracies. They may be related to the fact that Wikipedia contains fully graphic images of nude bodies (and sexual organs). It even contains an "list of human sexual positions."</p>
<p>I must have to admit, I never knew how people had sex until I ran into the respective Wikipedia article.</p>
<p>Example: <a href="http://facebook.com/group.php?gid=2227761146%5B/url%5D">http://facebook.com/group.php?gid=2227761146</a> =P</p>