Talk:American Central University

It is sad to see that some people on bent on spoiling the names of good schools. ACU is a new entity with good affiliates offering good services. A journalist whos views are only mired by his prejudices can not be used against ACU. History is replete with examples where some yellow journalists cooked up stories just to tarnish other's image. I would not give a damn to this journalist and shall continue pursuing my program with ACU.

I assume that you have no evidence for the accusations above, or you'd be willing to sign your name to them. Repetition does not make a claim more convincing. For the umpteenth time, if you have evidence in favor of ACU, or actual evidence against the articles in question, present it. Vicki Rosenzweig 02:37, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

"For not having even one qualified instructor in Wyoming, the agency prepared last fall [2004] to pull the school's license -- only to have the process bog down while state attorneys deliberate how to do that." This is wrong as you could find most professors from ACU are PhD or Doctoral graduates from reputable universities: http://www.acusa.net/faculty.php. What's your proof to support your point about no qualified professors from ACU. For the pull of school's license, how do you explain that as ACU got her license renewal in 2006: www.k12.wy.us/F/psl/degree.html, and however got DETC accepted her application for the accreditation though she's not yet been accredited? Try not to stick with subjective points. Should you try to be neutral, how could you just quote information from subjective journalist, but not from official homepage like Department of Education from Wyoming. You are now helping that subjective journalist to spread his subjective ideas and ruining the neutral image of Wikipedia. You may not like ACU, but she still has her value of existence as many students are still looking for easy pathway on achieving degrees. You are also affecting the pathway of those graduates as they had really taken efforts on getting the degrees from ACU. Try to keep your neutral mission, but not depending on handy and misleading source.

I have just consulted the web page of the Wyoming Department of Education, and it says that "American City University" is "in the process of seeking accreditation from DETC." Not American Central University. That a Wyoming school of a similar name is seeking accreditation says nothing about American Central University.

Also, it is not the purpose of Wikipedia to ease the way of students who are "looking for [an] easy pathway". The purpose of Wikipedia is to provide information: we may, I hope, sometimes be providing an education, rather than a degree. Vicki Rosenzweig 01:59, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

Saying the same thing fifteen times does not make it more convincing. As already explained, if supporters of ACU can give evidence that the information is inaccurate, Wikipedians will make changes. A simple assertion is not evidence. Vicki Rosenzweig 18:21, 2 June 2007 (UTC)

Buckrose we are awaiting your early action on removing false information about ACU. Thanks alot. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.51.9.188 (talk • contribs) Buckrose we are awaiting your early action on removing false information about ACU. Thanks alot. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.51.9.188 (talk • contribs) Buckrose we are awaiting your early action on removing false information about ACU. Thanks alot. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.51.9.188 (talk • contribs) Buckrose we are awaiting your early action on removing false information about ACU. Thanks alot. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.51.9.188 (talk • contribs) Buckrose we are awaiting your early action on removing false information about ACU. Thanks alot. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.51.9.188 (talk • contribs) Buckrose we are awaiting your early action on removing false information about ACU. Thanks alot. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.51.9.188 (talk • contribs) Buckrose we are awaiting your early action on removing false information about ACU. Thanks alot. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.51.9.188 (talk • contribs) Buckrose we are awaiting your early action on removing false information about ACU. Thanks alot. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.51.9.188 (talk • contribs) Buckrose we are awaiting your early action on removing false information about ACU. Thanks alot. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.51.9.188 (talk • contribs) Buckrose we are awaiting your early action on removing false information about ACU. Thanks alot. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.51.9.188 (talk • contribs) Buckrose we are awaiting your early action on removing false information about ACU. Thanks alot. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.51.9.188 (talk • contribs) Buckrose we are awaiting your early action on removing false information about ACU. Thanks alot. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.51.9.188 (talk • contribs) Buckrose we are awaiting your early action on removing false information about ACU. Thanks alot. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.51.9.188 (talk • contribs) Buckrose we are awaiting your early action on removing false information about ACU. Thanks alot. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.51.9.188 (talk • contribs) Buckrose we are awaiting your early action on removing false information about ACU. Thanks alot. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.51.9.188 (talk • contribs)

Buckrose we are awaiting your early action on removing false information about ACU. Thanks alot. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.51.9.188 (talk • contribs)

As far as I can tell, ACU's supporters (graduates, perhaps?) are just too dense to figure out how to provide citations to objective information, or EVEN TO SIGN THEIR COMMENTS ON THIS DISCUSSION PAGE. BuckRose 02:25, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Buckrose we are awaiting your early action on removing false information about ACU. Thanks alot. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 60.51.9.188 (talk • contribs).

Please let us know what type of facts you need. We really hope that the slandersous information are urgently removed as it is spoiling our reputation and business. Please be rational and objective. Many thanks. Sam —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 124.82.54.168 (talk • contribs).

ACU's supporters might want to provide some facts which can be verified by obective sources, and provide citations. And please, please, PLEASE SIGN YOUR COMMENTS. All you have to do is type four tildes. Pressing Enter a couple times to put in a blank space would also be nice. BuckRose 22:54, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

ACU's supporters only want facts to be published about it and not lies. How can you verify the truth of the article and its contents. Please do justice and remove the false and sedicious information about ACU as Wikipedia is a reputable organization giving facts and not lies. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.51.11.135 (talk • contribs)

ACU's supporters seem prone to unsigned comments complaining about the quality of reporting in the sources for the article, and unable to provide any substantive, quantitative, verifiable data. BuckRose 23:02, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

There is a term called Yellow Journalism which means that some of the people writing on the web or in newspaper talk bad about others and I hope Wikipedia is not on that mission. Wikipedia should not be just copying items from so called bogus reporter and displaying it on its website. You can provide short introduction of ACU and leave the dirt to the yellow journalists to deal with. Be fair and factual not yellow journalist — Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.51.13.250 (talk • contribs)

I'd like to find out what is really going on here actually. For one, this wikipedia page shouldn't even be up. Wikipedia is supposed to provide encyclopedia quality information. Two citations from the same journalist from a newspaper no one outside of Wyoming (and lets face it, most people are outside of Wyoming) has heard of don't give that quality information. I know for a fact that ACU does not claim to be accredited. They're listed as seeking recognition from DETC and they are licensed by the state of Wyoming. So that all checks out with the Casper newspaper. There was a recent claim that ACU is associated with a fake DETC clone (IDETC) that has since turned into one of those net black market owned search for anything sites. However, there's also another "American Central University" offering some sort of "life experience" degrees that is definitely a diploma mill (you just buy them). I know for a fact that around the world, companies that deal with ACU do offer facilities and class interaction to students. Some companies that deal with their programs are far from not being reputable - it would be a bad business decision to get in with an outright diploma mill doing illegal things. So its hard, from the evidence, to tell what's really going on. Let's go back to the point. Wikipedia is supposed to be an Encyclopedia. It isn't right to copy and paste from ACU's website what they want to say about themselves, but it isn't right to present multiple sources from one single journalist as fact either. Wikipedia has enough problems getting things like Mathematical theorems that already show up in dozens of textbooks typed correctly. It isn't a news site. It is a reference. I'd like to know what's true and what's not about ACU out of personal interest, but until then, I would suggest that you put minimal information in this article. Put that there have been reports, and reference the reports. Don't present them as facts. It is bad practice. Leave up the links to ACU's website. Put down what they are (a licensed yet unaccredited distance learning university based in Wyoming). 74.139.223.203. I forgot my password. Maybe I'll register again someday - this place is never that helpful anymore ;)

Licensed but not accredited is meaningless. And the organization (ACU) does exist, does claim to be a university, and is therefore a reasonable thing for Wikipedia to have an article about. Vicki Rosenzweig 01:35, 21 April 2007 (UTC)

ACU is operating in more than 20 countries and working with some of the best schools in the world. How can you assume otherwise and base your views on just an article by a yellow journalist. It is fair that you remove the lies and put truth on your website. Your website is not about tarnishing image of people and should not become a party supporting the competitors rather provide factual history of an institution. If you find it difficult then please remove the ACU information from your website. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 219.95.25.167 (talk • contribs)

The paragraph above was prepended to my last comment without signature, making it appear that I had written it. I did not. (I added the indentation and the paragraph break, to attempt to clarify this. Vicki Rosenzweig 01:07, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

I note that while defenders of this school have periodically pasted in material from the school's website, nobody has supplied basic, factual data that I'd expect people reporting on a legitimate university would provide, such as the size of the student body. (To do so, they might need to do further research, since that's not on said website.) That would be actually informative, unlike unsourced assertions that the newspaper articles are false. Vicki Rosenzweig 02:40, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Putting false information on Wikipedia is neither legal nor ethical.I do hope you will be able to provide true picture of the university and not views of some newspaper reporters who due to instigating of competing parties which to villigy an entity. Again, note that this unsigned comment was left by an unregistered user from 218.208.212.99 on 26 February 2007. Type four tildes to sign a posting, press Enter twice to put a blank space between your comment and the next. BuckRose 23:34, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

The AP stories in the Casper Star Tribune look fine to me. If you can cite some non-interested sources that counter the information in these stories, or that provide hard evidence that a lawsuit has been filed, then do so. Even if you don't like that info and you think it should be replaced, that's no reason to copy chunks of text from ACU's website; this is neither neutral nor verified, and it violates ACU's copyright. BuckRose 23:28, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

Please note that the information provided by AP is falsee and deragatory. A law suit may be in the offing against the paper. Your article should be based on facts and not tarnishing the reputation of an entity. You have also misquoted another website which has got nothing to do with ACU. That is a bogus entity confusing people with ACU. Thank you for your time and understanding. NOTE: This unsigned comment was left by 219.95.238.101 at 01:54, 23 February 2007. It isn't that hard to sign comments, folks; four tildes will do it. BuckRose 23:21, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

Let's put the most recent comments at the top. I have asked that this page be protected. It's been subjected to repeated whitewashing, replacing the entire body of the article with text that is largely merely copied from the website of this entity. This violates several Wikipedia policies -- Wikipedia:Neutral point of view, Wikipedia:Verifiability, and Wikipedia:Copyright violations. The current version of the page (reverted yet again from whitewashing) does include information which could be seen as detrimental to ACU. This is well-documented with references to news items from the Associated Press and the Casper Star Tribune. I see no reason to remove this information and replace it with promotional material copied from ACU, unless one is trying to cover up the true history and reputation of ACU. BuckRose 18:30, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

ACU is a good school which offers quality education in many countries. Yes you are right that it is not recognised but we should not be bad mouthing such type of schools. John ( NOTE: Note: This unsigned comment was left by 219.95.237.11 on 18 February 2007. For whatever reason, he also changed the URLs mentioned below by Ybunkwok, making both of them refer to acusa.net, rather than one to this domain and the other to acuniversity.org BuckRose 18:30, 18 February 2007 (UTC)).

They took out the accreditation info, so I put a tiny blurb about lack of accrediation back in. I think you will need to request the page be protected.

With MBA schools, if you want to get a job after graduation, it's important that the school be appropriately accredited. Any school that doesn't blatently list their accrediation info is one to be concerned about. RoaringMice 16:50, 15 February 2007 (UTC)

This article has been repeatedly whitewashed by anonymous users. Please, if you have issues with the current article, discuss that here on the talk page. If you continue to whitewash, I'll request that the page be protected. BuckRose 01:07, 15 February 2007 (UTC)

Folks, if you've looked at a version of this article that 1) doesn't mention that ACU is not accredited by any organization recognized by the US Department of Education, and 2) doesn't even include a link to ACU's own website, you're probably looking at a whitewashed version. BuckRose 23:13, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

I found two websites for "American Central University," as follows:

http://www.acusa.net/

http://www.acusa.net/default.asp

Do they refer to the same school or two different schools? Are they recognized or formally accredited? Ybunkwok Jan 17, 2007

Before vandalism that question was asking about acusa.net versus acuniversity.org. acusa.net is registered in Vietnam, hosted in Malaysia, and lists its Laramie, WY address on the front page; it is the subject of this article. acuniversity.org, however, is registered in Bowie, Maryland, hosted in Tampa, Florida and does not list any contact details other than an email address. It is not an incorporated entity in either MD or FL. acuniversity.org's html contain remnants where it refers to itself as American Coastline University, and if you were foolish enough to submit your details, they actually go to Al Qasim University in Pakistan (aqu.edu.pk) - which is listed here Saint Regis University#Connected institutions. So the second one isn't even an unaccredited university; its a fake unaccredited university. --Bazzargh (talk) 13:08, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

WP:BLP removal

Based on the vandalism that this article has been seeing lately, I've removed the name of the director of the school from the article as per WP:BLP type concerns. I don't think having his name in the article adds anything, and certainly removing it doesn't hurt anything. CosmicPenguin (Talk) 02:02, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

To anonymous editor

Good sir/madam, Welcome to Wikipedia. I thank you for your attempted improvements to Wikipedia. Please notice that your edits have been reverted because they do not follow Wikipedia policy. I respectfully suggest that you get better familar with Wikipedia policies, guidelines, and suggested practices. Perhaps a nice friendly place to start is WP:WELCOME. I think that you'll find that there are many friendly editors here on Wikipedia that will be happy to answer any specific questions that you might have. Regards, TallMagic (talk) 02:48, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

Dear Sir/madam, The information listed on wikipedia are seditous and not correct. Our request to you will be to provide correct information about our university. Alternatively you may altogether remove our organisation from you list. Thank you Ann —Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.82.52.77 (talk) 04:39, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Hi Ann, I would like to welcome you to Wikipedia and suggest you may be interested in reading the WP:Welcome article. Thank you so much for your interest in Wikipedia and the accuracy of this article. It is very much appreciated. I also appreciate that you have chosen to share your valued opinion on this talk page. Regarding your above assertions, I believe that everything stated in the article has been properly sourced and is verifiable. I really would appreciate it though if you could point out specific statements that are not properly sourced. Or perhaps you may have some alternative sources that seem to contradict the sources referenced in the article? Such considerations are very important and are taken very seriously. I would also like to suggest that you review the Wikipedia conflict of interest policy. Regards, TallMagic (talk) 14:27, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Hi Tallmagic,

Thank you for your reply and I would like to explain the following:

American Central University is owned by SS. Shah and Raymond Chan. Dr. Adalat Khan is only the member of academic council. American Central University has also got nothing to do with the Hawaii University. The following are some of the external sources which you may view too. I will suggest and request you to correct the false information alleging and spreading seditious information the rest would be fine. Thank you. Ann

REFERENCES:

1. www.acusa.net
2. http://collegenetsearch.com/school/American_Central_University/10590
3. http://www.learn4good.com/distance_learn/usa_online_learning_bachelor_master_degrees.htm
4. http://allaboutonlineeducation.blogspot.com/2008/01/american-central-university-innovative_17.html
5. http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/49279

—Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.54.66.2 (talk) 02:29, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Ann, thank you for your continued interest and suggestions. Here's my comments on each of your above links.

1. This link is already in the article as the primary link in the External Links section.
2. The information in this link is the street address for ACU. Are you suggesting that we add that information to the article?
3. This appears to be an advertisement. At least some of this information could be found on the ACU website. It could potentially be useable as self published material. A source for self published material would better be the ACU website than an advertisement. It is unclear to me what material in the learn4good site should be used. An important point here is that any material used needs to presented in a neutral manner.
4. When I tried to read the posting by Dr. Khan, I got an error. Perhaps it might work latter but whatever it says it can't really be used as a source. Wikipedia does not normally allow blog posts to be used as a source because it can't be proven that the author actually was Dr. Khan or someone just pretending to be Dr. Khan. Although sometime such material can be a good lead to some reliable sources or even provide material that can be backed up by a reliable source after a search.
5. This is a nice article written by Dr. Khan.

I saw nothing in the above links that mentioned Shah or Chan. The article source for the disputed information, Casper Star Tribune, supports the assertion that Dr. Khan is the owner. It also supports the affiliation of ACU and the American University of Hawaii. Please note that if the Casper Star Tribune is wrong then ACU needs to have them publish a correction or perhaps have another reliable source publish the correct information. All information in Wikipedia must be verifiable. The Casper Star Tribune is a reliable source and their article is verifiable. So all the information in the article I believe is verifiable. Specifically the items that are disputed are verified in that article. I'm sorry Ann but unsupported assertions by you (or me or anyone) cannot be used to support information in Wikipedia. I do appreciate your help and hope that you correct any misunderstandings, mistakes, or items that I missed. For example, perhaps the ACU website mentions Shah and Chan? That should be information that self published would probably apply. May I suggest you review the five pillars that describes these policies in greater detail. Thanks again, TallMagic (talk) 04:07, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

You are basing your whole article on lies and seditious article rather professionally looking at the neutral views. The article I provided to you are ignored but the opposite is being acceptable to you. Isnt it make you a proponent of a false and selfish seditious propaganda against one person who has got nothing to do with it. Please strict to the main objective of wiki which is not allege and disrepute others but be impartial. Thanks —Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.54.70.93 (talk) 09:30, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Ann, please assume good faith. You're accussing me and fellow editors on this article of false motivations. We all want the Wikipedia article to be accurate, verifiable, and reflect a neutral point of view. While we all hope for the truth, more important is that whatever is stated in Wikipedia is verifiable. For example the first sentence of the verifiable policy states, "The threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia is verifiability, not truth—that is, whether readers are able to check that material added to Wikipedia has already been published by a reliable source, not whether we think it is true." Ann, your statements here while appreciated are not verifiable. The article in the Casper Star Tribune is verifiable and the Casper Star Tribune is a reliable source. Please point out where the article you provided me even conflicts with the Wikipedia article content. I believe our discussion will be more productive if we discuss specifics about the article content or Wikipedia policy and try to avoid discussing general characterizations especially characterizations regarding our fellow editors. Thank you, TallMagic (talk) 14:33, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

I am not trying to acuse you but we as a general public also expect wikipedia to see alternative views from people who are affected by your articles. It is sad to see that some people are bent on spoiling the names of good schools. ACU is a new entity with good affiliates offering good services. A journalist whos views are only mired by his prejudices can not be used against ACU. History is replete with examples where some yellow journalists cooked up stories just to tarnish other's image. I would not give a damn to this journalist and shall continue pursuing my program with ACU. I do hope that you will correct the facts and do justice to the reputation of Wikipedia and ACU. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.54.65.14 (talk) 01:54, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Unfortunately you have provided us with nothing reliable that provides a view contrary to the one presented in the article. This article does not exist to serve as a directory entry or as free advertisement for the school, it exists to document a notable entity in history; in this case an entity notable for negative behavior. If you can give us some reliable sources that confirm other facts about the university, then please do. We would be happy to write that somebody other then Dr. Khan is the owner of the university if any documentation emerges that proves that to be the case. Note that anything written by Mr. Shah or Mr. Chan is not acceptable as a reliable source, because they are direct parties. This back and forth has gone on for more then a year now. Many dozens of times an anonymous editor has changed the article to remove sourced facts about the school. Luckily, there are a number of Wikipedia editors that have this article on their watchlists, and they have been quick to correct the changes. I do not know if you are this anonymous editor, or if they are other agents of the University, but please understand that we won't eventually give up and let you remove sourced information from the article. If you wish the article to be improved, then I urge you to stop replacing the content and collaborate with us. User:TallMagic has posted a laundry list of appropriate guidelines and links that can help you understand what is needed here. Thank you. CosmicPenguin (Talk) 03:01, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Hi Ann, CosmicPenguin is correct in what he says. You have disputed a number of items in the article. Yet you haven't provided any reliable source that supports your assertions. Wikipedia must be based on verifiable information taken from reliable sources. This article does that. Ann, you really haven't provided anything that can be used according to Wikipedia policy and guidelines. You haven't even provided a non-reliable source to back up your disputed facts except for the words of an anonymous person on this talk page, which like anyone's words here is not a reliable source. The reliable sources indicate that the facts in the article are correct. Based on the available information, your plea for justice appears to be more a plea for us to ignore the facts as well as Wikipedia policy. We need to try to keep our focus on the supported facts, that means wp:verifiable facts found in wp:reliable_sources. Regards, TallMagic (talk) 05:08, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Hi Tallmagic, Whatever we provide you instantly reject and rely on biased views which is not fair. Instead may I request you to either accept the facts or altogether remove our organization from wikipedia so as to avoid misunderstanding for everyone. Thank you