Welcome to Wikipedia!
Welcome! My name is GorillaWarfare, and I'm one of the Online Ambassadors assisting students who are contributing to WikiProject United States Public Policy. We're excited to work with you, and we hope you'll stick around. If you haven't already, take a few minutes and check out the handy links below to start sharing your knowledge with the world. Your class is part of a pilot project for bridging the gap between Wikipedia and the academic world; as you learn how to edit Wikipedia, we'll be learning how to better help newcomers. So it will be a fun learning experience all around! You'll find links below for leaving feedback or getting help. If you need anything further, feel free to contact me at my user talk page. And don't forget: have fun! — GorillaWarfare talk 23:22, 25 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Editing cheatsheet Forgot how that code worked?	Summary of policies and guidelines A quick reference for Wikipedia's "rules"
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Hello. In case you didn't know, when you add content to talk pages and Wikipedia pages that have open discussion, you must sign your posts by typing four tildes ( ~~~~ ) at the end of your comment. You may also click on the signature button located above the edit window. This will automatically insert a signature with your username or IP address and the time you posted the comment. This information is useful because other editors will be able to tell who said what, and when. Thank you. --SineBot (talk) 22:52, 28 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Hello, Claire. Did you want me to act as your mentor or did you want Alpha Quadrant to do it? Here is a good example of an article about a law for you to look at: Alaska Mental Health Enabling Act. One very important tip: Make sure to add full citations to WP:Reliable sources to support all the statements that you make (see WP:CITE, giving author, title, date, publisher/city, page number or url). Please scan through the links in the Welcome message at the top of this page, as they will give you the background you need to get started. Happy editing! -- Ssilvers (talk) 23:01, 28 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

OK, good luck with the article! -- Ssilvers (talk) 03:14, 5 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Clairestum I am a bit confused, would you like Ssilvers to mentor you, or would you like me to? Thanks, --Alpha Quadrant ^talk 03:22, 5 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Hello, Clairestum. You have new messages at Alpha Quadrant's talk page.
Message added 04:16, 5 October 2010 (UTC). You can remove this notice at any time by removing the ((Talkback)) or ((Tb)) template.[reply]

Actually, it appears that Claire has teamed up with User:Sonia, but, of course I am happy to answer any questions or assist in any other way! -- Ssilvers (talk) 18:35, 5 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Sonia appears to be on wikibreak atm. If you need help please ask me or another mentor. Your articles look fine...just one minor formatting comment: when adding hyperlinks, do [url description] as opposed to [url]description.Smallman12q (talk) 02:30, 17 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, Claire. Note that in addition to the above article, there is an existing article on Compulsory education. All the best! -- Ssilvers (talk) 18:42, 5 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the heads up - the compulsory education article is a very broad overview of the concept while the compulsory public education article is referring to a specific social movement in the US. Is it possible to change the title of an article to further clarify the distinction? Clairestum (talk) 23:53, 5 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, you can "move" an article like this. A more global-centric and clearer title for Compulsory public education would probably be something like Compulsory public education movement in the United States. What do you think? sonia♫ 22:28, 6 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

On 24 October 2010, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article Food Quality Protection Act, which you created or substantially expanded. You are welcome to check how many hits the article got while on the front page (here's how, quick check ) and add it to DYKSTATS if it got over 5,000. If you know of another interesting fact from a recently created article, then please suggest it on the Did you know? talk page.

The DYK project (nominate) 06:03, 24 October 2010 (UTC)

CONGRATULATIONS!!! Annie Lin (Campus Team Coordinator, Wikimedia Foundation) (talk) 15:44, 26 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I'll proceed with the rename if you give me the go ahead. Just let me know the exact name you decide on (or, if you prefer, your mentor can do it). The guideline recommends the shortest title that conveys the topic, as that makes it easier for a reader to find. Note also that the guideline says: "Use lower case, except for proper names". Let us know what you decide. See WP:NAME#Deciding an article title. -- Ssilvers (talk) 19:35, 30 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I saw your article review request on Sonia's talk page and would be glad to review your article. I am one of the online ambassadors and will also be glad to help mentor you in Sonia's absence. I will be looking through the articles ASAP (I have to go offline soon). If you have any questions, feel free to leave a message on my talk page. Cheers, Bejinhan talks 14:32, 16 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Hello! Your submission of California Voting Rights Act at the Did You Know nominations page has been reviewed, and there still are some issues that may need to be clarified. Please review the comment(s) underneath your nomination's entry and respond there as soon as possible. Thank you for contributing to Did You Know! 28bytes (talk) 01:05, 17 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Hi! I've read both the Food Quality Protection Act and California Voting Rights Act articles and below is my review for both.

Food Quality Protection Act

• Great job in the grammar copyediting and rewording for clarification! Such copyediting is sorely needed in many articles.
• Your edition of a NPOV paragraph was good. We want a balance in articles and both views should be expressed.
• Lastly, I saw that you expanded and created a number of sections. While that is good, you'll need reliable sources to back-up whatever you added. Content without reliable sources can be removed. Also, section headers should not be capitalized per our manual of style. For example, ====Public Health Pesticides==== should be ====Public health pesticides====. This goes for every section header, except the article name and abbreviations.

California Voting Rights Act

• Wow, great expansion! You added references and all.... good job! Your edit summary said "Add article". I presume you worked on it in a sandbox prior to added it to the main article? Sandbox is great for starters, but if you feel confident, I'll encourage you to straightaway edit the article if you wish. Either ways are fine but if you choose to edit the article right away, be sure that you have the time to complete whatever you want to do.
• There is a list of senators and representatives who voted on the bill. While that might be helpful for references purposes, it's not really necessary and if possible, should be removed. Mention a senator or representative only if he has done significant work and is connected with the act.
• I've tweaked the size of the california seal pic. you added so that it wouldn't be so prominent. I did it by adding |150px. I also moved the VOTE pic to the left just to make it look better and reduced it to 150px. I did it by adding |left|150px.
• Other than that, great job! I'm so proud to see you editing. You're certainly making great progress. Kudos on your hard work! Bejinhan talks 02:59, 17 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

On 18 November 2010, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article California Voting Rights Act, which you created or substantially expanded. The fact was ... that the California Voting Rights Act makes it easier for minority groups in California to prove that their votes are being diluted in "at-large" elections? You are welcome to check how many hits the article got while on the front page (here's how, quick check) and add it to DYKSTATS if it got over 5,000. If you know of another interesting fact from a recently created article, then please suggest it on the Did you know? talk page.

The DYK project (nominate) 12:02, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

Hi Claire, did you know that more than 1,300 people read you article on November 18th? Congratulations! --Fschulenburg (Public Policy) (talk) 04:07, 4 December 2010 (UTC) [reply]