Talk:NWEA

Requested move 1 June 2020

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 after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: No consensus. Cwmhiraeth (talk) 12:50, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

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Northwest Evaluation Association → NWEA – Northwest Evaluation Association formally changed its name to NWEA and "no longer refers to [itself] as Northwest Evaluation Association" [1]. While it is appropriate to note the historical, geographic origin of its name in the article, the accurate name of the company is "NWEA." No other name is used in any part of its identification or official business. BigRodent (talk) 18:31, 1 June 2020 (UTC)—Relisting. Mdaniels5757 (talk) 17:57, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

• Please read WP:OFFICIALNAME. O.N.R. ^(talk) 21:44, 1 June 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose - Unless almost-universally known by the initials (such that sources don't even need to explain them, as in NASA), organizations should be titled using their expanded names. Recent news sources still use the long name to introduce them[2][3][4]. -- Netoholic @ 21:53, 1 June 2020 (UTC)

• Support (as proposer) - The NASA comparison is incorrect because NASA is still an acronym. NWEA is no longer an acronym; while many news organizations incorrectly refer to them by their previous name, they are no longer the "Northwest Evaluation Association" - that is not their "expanded name." It is not their name at all. As a not-for-profit, their 990 tax form is publicly available and shows that their legal corporate name is NWEA.[5] Many news sources correctly use NWEA and not the old name.[6][7] -- BigRodent @ 11:01, 3 June 2020 (UTC) "(as proposer)" added Mdaniels5757 (talk) 17:57, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

  As the proposer, your "support" is inferred. Also I don't think you read WP:OFFICIALNAME when it was mentioned above. Wikipedia follows the sources. The sources still use the old name frequently. -- Netoholic @ 02:06, 4 June 2020 (UTC)

  Two new articles (June 2020) in the WSJ[8] and New York Times[9] both use the organization's current legal name "NWEA" with no reference to the former name. -- BigRodent @ 12:05, 5 June 2020 (UTC)

  Be careful of WP:CHERRYPICKING. Its clear the usage is mixed, and that's enough to show that the new name is not widely-used. Our guideline is to "Avoid ambiguous abbreviations" and that "should be avoided unless the subject is known primarily by its abbreviation". It doesn't quite seem to be at that level yet. -- Netoholic @ 18:44, 6 June 2020 (UTC)

  With regards to WP:CHERRYPICKING. My contention is that finding a few news sources who did not use the new name is cherrypicking, whereas I cited two recent sources from leading news organizations. WP:OFFICIALNAME is very clear that we should look for the common name rather than the official name, and the use of "NWEA" across every single source cited here makes that far more common than the occasionally cited former name. You may be able to find sources using that former name, but I have been unable to find a single recent secondary source that does NOT use "NWEA." The sources cited by both you and me show that NWEA is known "primarily by its abbreviation" as you said is the standard - every source uses that abbreviation either as the primary or only identifier of the organization. -- BigRodent @ 10:31, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

  Acronyms aren't treated literally for COMMONNAME... effectively NWEA and Northwest Evaluation Association are both the COMMONNAME. For acronyms, we follow WP:ACRONYMTITLE which has a general standard of "if readers somewhat familiar with the subject are likely to only recognise the name by its acronym". In other words, the use of the acronym has to be so ubiquitous that the expanded name is almost never needed for understanding. I just don't think this is the case now, due to the recentness of the the name change, and the fact that so many sources still use the longer name. If you want to see an extreme example, we just this year moved "Home Shopping Network" to HSN twenty years after its official name change. This one probably wont take as long, but its not there yet. -- Netoholic @ 22:03, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

• Support but only if the acronym is a WP:PRIMARYTOPIC. is NWEA acronym a primary topic for this article? I think they are many companies named as NWEA as well. 180.244.147.63 (talk) 00:01, 10 June 2020 (UTC)
• Support per concise, common name... Red Slash 20:34, 17 June 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose. This is a particularly sorry sub-stub. It's arguably deletable, there is a borderline claim to notability but unnsupported by secondary sources. In fact the only references given are primary; Despite Largoplazo writing at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Northwest Evaluation Association I find a great deal of coverage via Google News attributing substantial significance to the Northwest Evaluation Association and probably thereby saving it from deletion, the result being no consensus, these sources still aren't there more than a year later. There's been a lot of activity, it's been in and out of draft space, even the AfD was made, reverted and remade. But no real improvement to the article. So I say, forget the name for the moment, give it a month to see whether all this interest can actually bring it up to scratch, and if not renominate for deletion. Andrewa (talk) 21:51, 21 June 2020 (UTC) '

If pertinent sources exist, it's irrelevant to meeting WP:N whether they've been cited. Here are a few that might support WP:N: Largoplazo (talk) 23:00, 21 June 2020 (UTC)

References

Thank you! Andrewa (talk) 07:17, 22 June 2020 (UTC)

But you still oppose the name change? You didn't give a reason why, given the existence of the article, its name shouldn't be changed to NWEA. Largoplazo (talk) 10:20, 22 June 2020 (UTC)

Yes, still oppose the current proposal. It seems that the article can be brought up to scratch, and it should be. And then we should consider its name. That was my reason and still applies. Andrewa (talk) 16:49, 22 June 2020 (UTC)

Well, that makes no sense, since the state of the article is one thing and what it should be named is another. But whatever. Just so you understand, you've still given no actual reason, and !votes are assessed not based on majority rule but on their merits. Largoplazo (talk) 16:58, 22 June 2020 (UTC)

And just to be sure that you understand, my reasoning will be assessed by the closer, not by you or I, and as the creator and regular user of several shortcuts such as wp:discardable that point to the relevant section I'm well aware of that. The closer may well discard my argument... it's an unusual one but this is IMO an unusual case, I have never seen so much interest in the name of such a poor article and so little interest in improving it before, and think that it would improve Wikipedia to focus instead on bringing it up to scratch by whatever name. That is up to them. And thank you for the opportunity to clarify the argument. And hopefully, whether or not the move does take place, either you or I or both will then look at improving the article. It's been a year since you saved the article from deletion at the no-consensus AfD, during which time you have done nothing, but it's a collaboration and hopefully now someone will. So again either way hopefully this RM will have benefits (despite the nominator providing no valid case). Andrewa (talk) 19:16, 23 June 2020 (UTC)

I'm not claiming to be the one to evaluate your reasoning. I'm merely pointing out that you have literally presented no reasoning regarding the name of the article. An exposition on your other concerns with the article and lamentations over the failure to improve the article in the past doesn't amount to reasoning in favor of keeping its current name. An exhortation to forget about the name till later isn't an argument for keeping its present name. It isn't that I'm evaluating these to be bad reasons for opposing the change, it's that I'm observing that they don't relate to the question at hand at all. I'm pointing this out as a courtesy only because (a) you appear to be under the impression that you did provide some reasoning that an admin will have an opportunity to evaluate regarding the question at hand, (b) you didn't, and (c) it seemed only fair to bring your omission to your attention so you can rectify it if you care to. If you don't care to, that's up to you. Largoplazo (talk) 20:03, 23 June 2020 (UTC)

Noted. Andrewa (talk) 21:50, 23 June 2020 (UTC)

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The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.