From the coordinators

• The big news this month is the launch of the Academy content drive (see below if you want to help). But otherwise it has been a very busy month for both reviewing and contest department entries, surprisingly so considering the wind down of the academic year.
• If you'd like to do some wiki-gnoming over the holidays, please help with the huge backlog (currently 6 articles) at Category:Military history articles with incomplete B-Class checklists.  Roger Davies ^talk 11:31, 11 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Articles of note

New featured articles:

1. Battle of the Coral Sea
2. Battle of Vimy Ridge
3. Brazilian battleship Minas Geraes
4. Hastings Ismay, 1st Baron Ismay
5. Military history of Australia during World War II
6. Otto Becher
7. Moltke-class battlecruiser
8. Yamato-class battleship

New featured lists:

1. List of Medal of Honor recipients (Veracruz)
2. List of Philippine–American War Medal of Honor recipients
3. List of United States Military Academy alumni (athletic figures)
4. List of United States Military Academy alumni (engineers)

New featured pictures:

1. Governor Davey's [sic] Proclamation to the Aborigines
2. Test Baker, Operation Crossroads
3. Tuskegee airmen

New A-Class articles:

1. Army of the Tennessee
2. Battle of Bosworth Field
3. Battle of Corydon
4. Battle of the Coral Sea
5. Battle of Ticonderoga (1777)
6. Helgoland class battleship
7. Operation Sky Monitor
8. Rupert Downes
9. Sd.Kfz. 10
10. Werner Mölders

Project news

• The Cold War task force has been created. New members are welcome!
• Congratulations go to Patar knight and Cool3, who have both successfully passed RfA.
• Feel free to chime in on the longrunning discussion about the firearms article structure.
• The Contest department has completed its twenty-seventh month of competition, with 54 articles entered by 10 editors. Sturmvogel 66 placed first this month with 64 points, followed by Parsecboy on 49 points. They receive the Chevrons and the Writer's Barnstar respectively. Ed! commendably came third with 44 points, with honorable mentions going to AustralianRupert (38), Mynameinc (11) and The ed17 (10). Thanks also go to Gaia Octavia Agrippa, Bernstein2291, Piotrus and Wild Wolf, who also fielded entries.

The Academy content drive

• Introduced in February, The Academy is an online school for new members. This month, we're launching a drive to increase the breadth and depth of its content. If you can help, by writing four to six paragraph articles, please do so! Barnstars galore to be won!

Awards and honours

• Our top Peer and A-Class reviewers over the last quarter are: Joe N (38), The ed17 (38), YellowMonkey (24), Cla68 (22), Jim Sweeney (22), AustralianRupert (21), Nick-D (19), TomStar81 (19), Abraham, B.S. (15) and Ian Rose (12) who each receive the WikiChevrons. The following editors received the Content Review Medal of Merit for their help: Patar knight (9), Piotrus (7), Patton123 (6), Sturmvogel 66 (6), Bellhalla (5), Skinny87 (5), Ed! (4), Magicpiano (4), Maralia (4), Wandalstouring (4), Cool3 (3), Hawkeye7 (3), IceUnshattered (3), Jackyd101 (3), MBK004 (3), Simon Harley (3), and Vantine84 (3). Thanks also go to: EnigmaMcmxc, Kyriakos, Saberwyn, Brad101, Dhatfield, Kirill Lokshin, Kirk, Mm40, Admiral Norton, Askari Mark, Benea, Binksternet, Brianboulton, Btphelps, Cam, Cuprum17, Geoff Plourde, Guyinblack25, Hartfelt, HLGallon, Juliancolton, La Pianista, Nosedown, Ost316, Parsecboy, Redtigerxyz, Rosiestep, Ruhrfisch, Socrates2008, Sumanch, TechOutsider and Xatsmann.

Editorial: How to prepare an A-Class Review

Perhaps the most important—and, indeed, most respected—aspect of the Military History project is our rigorous A-Class Review (ACR) system, which puts articles through the most robust review outside of WP:FAC. Although reviewing might seem daunting to newcomers, this article will give you an outline of three popular reviewing methods so you can actually start contributing yourself.

1. General nit-pick - this is one of the easiest - and one of the most common - reviewing styles seen throughout Wikipedia. It is a similar approach to that you would see in proofreading and classroom marking. Basically, it is a general overview of the article, not getting too specific on aspects of the prose. The most common statements include This article could benefit from a light copyedit before going to FAC or You might want to check the endash and emdash placement in the article. It's a style that is incredibly easy to manage, and one that requires little-to-no experience in previous reviewing.
2. Specialization - it often is the case that those who have been reviewing articles for a long time will move away from the general review towards more specific areas of articles. As an example, Tony usually stays within the realm of prose and copyediting while reviewing Featured Article Candidates, Tom used to focus almost entirely on external links and disambiguations, while others specialize their focus exclusively on copyediting, reference formatting, dashes, punctuation and flow, image licensing, and a host of other areas. This is a review method that is not nearly as time-consuming as other methods, as it allows you to quickly scan an article, spot the things that you work on, and how they need to be fixed.
3. Sectional - My preferred style of reviewing, this is one of the most informative styles. Unfortunately, it is also one of the most time-consuming and exhaustive styles. Essentially, it involves going through the entire article, section by section, and pointing out every major (and often many of the minor) flaws present within each section. Everything from prose to reference formatting to content. It is a reviewing style that is exhausting, and often takes two or three goes through the article to get everything (sometimes even more), but it gives the article's main contributors two benefits. First, everything is well organized, mostly under section headers like this one, and it often makes finding individual sentences or refs much easier, as they are within that section. Secondly, it points out a lot of the problems from a lot of the areas.

Best of luck, and happy Reviewing! Cam ^(Chat)

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