While plenty of professors have complained about the lack of accuracy or completeness of entries, and some have discouraged or tried to bar students from using it, the history department at Middlebury College is trying to take a stronger, collective stand. It voted this month to bar students from citing the Web site as a source in papers or other academic work. –Inside Higher Ed
No one disputes that Wikipedia has inaccuracies and outright errors. Students should definitely be taught how to use it as a resource. But blanket rules against citing it at all are simply reactionary and myopic. Educate students on how to negotiate the terrain, don’t try to keep them on only the same old paths you are comfortable with. Most of academia’s denizens make their hay questioning and challenging the published work of others… now students are being subtly taught to reinforce that very power structure… question Wikipedia but not every other source they find? Verify Wikipedia but you can’t cite it? What’s really being taught here? Hint: not much compared to what’s being ignored.
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I get it. These are the same people who all over the world try to block change of any kind. The goofy thing is wikipedia is NOT THAT DIFFERENT from a regular encylopedia in terms of accuracy. Just think what Middlebury College would think about students using podcasts or blogs as references. It’ll be funny (?) to see what their student handbook looks like in a few years when they outlaw every new technology that comes along (hint: it’s gonna get quite big and positively medieval).
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