Why do schools ban the use of Wikipedia as a reasearch source?

Question

I mean, MANY MANY people use Wikipedia as a research source or information database, and it's easily a reliable source, so why do schools ban the use of it?

Answer 1

The simple reason is because Anyone can add or edit something on Wikipedia, so the source may not always be correct.

Answer 2

Wikipedia is not a reliable soure consistently.

Answer 3

it is not reliable.

it is not written by experts.

your other question denigrates one of your own teachers. he is more of an expert on this than you, ask him.

Answer 4

Because it is not always a reliable source.  Since literally anyone can go and create information about something there is a high likelihood that "facts" posted on Wikipedia are in fact, not.

Answer 5

Because it isn't reliable, and can be changed by anyone, even if a lot of the stuff is accurate.

Answer 6

because on many of the wiki articles, anyone can go in and edit the information, which means that not everything on wikipedia is always accurate.

they do have people who moderate the website, but they can't catch all mistakes.

Answer 7

Wikipedia is banned because none of the information is verified by academic standards. If you visit the web site of a university or organization, their is a level of accountability.

Wikipedia is wonderful of off hand info, but awful for real research.

Answer 8

because regular people, like us, can change the information on there and teachers are afraid it MIGHT not be accurate. even though most of the time it is.

Answer 9

Mainly because Wikipedia is c**p and posts can be made by ANYONE without proving that it is correct information.  I saw a post the other day on Mariah Carey's new husband and someone had written some very nasty things about him and the fact that he married Ms. Carey.  The writer used very choice four letter words.  Now, I didn't go back to see if Wiki cleaned it up or deleted it, but that is ONE indicator that the site is nothing more than a bulletin board to let people ramble and vent.

Answer 10

No one checks the accuracy of Wikipedia.  People can write absolutely anything, true or not, on there.  It is in NO WAY reliable.  When there is factual information on there, it was taken from some other source, so we need to you get that original source for your research.