ZooChat Composite Top 25 Rankings?

I'd consider participating but it depends on a few factors:

1. I haven't visited too many zoos and aquariums (Definitely less than 20)
2. If it would be a very time-intensive and tedious process, I might not want to participate since I will be very busy over the next week or so.
 
Getting it done over the next 2-3 weeks would be good.

As far how tedious it is, well that's for you to decide. Enough effort should be put in to feel like your list is fair.
 
I think I probably should not participate, but I will be absolutely following along with what you guys decide
 
Sure it sounds like a fun idea. I think in the results you could put perhaps how many votes it got and follow that with how many (or what percentage) of those voters have personally visited the facility. As a hypothetical example, let's say number one...
1) San Diego Zoo - 46 votes (68% based on personal visits)

The more contentious issue I think is how you come up with the initial list to vote on.
 
Arizona Docent said:
Sure it sounds like a fun idea. I think in the results you could put perhaps how many votes it got and follow that with how many (or what percentage) of those voters have personally visited the facility. As a hypothetical example, let's say number one...
1) San Diego Zoo - 46 votes (68% based on personal visits)

The more contentious issue I think is how you come up with the initial list to vote on.
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Yeah, that's a good idea.

What do you mean by that last part? I'm not proposing any votes. I'm proposing people doing their own rankings (like in college sports) and then using those to create a composite ranking.
 
In that case (anyone can submit their rankings), then it will only be meaningful IMO if a very large number of people participate. Based on past ZooChat polls, I doubt this will be the case. I am NOT trying to discourage you; in fact I am all for this idea. Just saying I hope more people participate this time than they have in the past.
 
It could still be enjoyable without a lot of participants but certainly the more people that participate the more meaningful it will be.
 
Coincidentally I’ve have in my spare time been working on ranking America’s Greatest Zoo. Greatest being used in the Alexandrian way as opposed to just “best” or “favorite”. I’m using serval different factors to score each Zoo. Some are subjective...for example how I rate them....obviously I have not visited all of them...so I factor others ratings in as well. I provide points based on data gleaned from published “best” books and online lists. Is the zoo AZA accredited? For how long? Any Exhibit awards? Attendance numbers? Social media presence? I’ve applied a “poker” based scoring system on collection details. Africa’s Big Five? Local species? Plausible ecosystem represented? ABC’s present? Iconic pairings? Tiger-Asian Deer, Cheetah-Gazelle, Lion-Zebra, Jaguar-Tapir...etc. Number of photo pages on zoo chat? Number of paragraphs in Wikipedia. How many of my personal friends have checked in or liked the zoo on Facebook.
Does the Zoos website list all species? Does the website have a downloadable map? Being a map-phile...I score the quality of the map. Does the zoo have a bird show? A merry go round?

I working on the assumption that scoring system is comparable to gleaning sports statistics to determine and rank baseball’s greatest Short-Stops.

Some factors are subjective, very much in tune with my views, and some objective, basically beyond my ability to influence.

It’s time consuming and my absolute obsession for list-making has not help speed the process. A pattern is developing and it contains no real surprises this early...but I’ll post the top 30 (25 plush runners up) to get the ball rolling.
 
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Accreditation might be a good factor in making a list, but not necessarily AZA (North American) accreditation only because this is supposed to be an international list.
 
Ah! For an international list we could refer to regional organizations?

Then opening post made reference to this being a ranking of North American Zoos.

So everything from Canada to Panama, along with the Caribbean...Cuba to Trinidad?
 
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My mistake - I didn't realize it said North American and I didn't notice this is posted in the United States threads. Please disregard former comment. (Just a note if you do proceed with an actual vote thread, please specify top 25 USA Zoos in the thread title).
 
Can we come to a consensus and start voting. I propose that everyone nominates any zoos they want and the top 30 go to a final vote for everyone.
 
I said I hadn't visited that many zoos (which is true), but either way, I think Brookfield and Minnesota should be put somewhere on the list.
 
There's no voting in that sense. This would be like how they do college sports rankings. Different people would compose their own top 25 rankings. Then those lists would collectively be used to form a composite ranking.
 
mweb08 said:
There's no voting in that sense. This would be like how they do college sports rankings. Different people would compose their own top 25 rankings. Then those lists would collectively be used to form a composite ranking.
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What if a voter doesnt know enough to compile 25 zoos?
 
Well they don't have to do it. ;) Or they can do some research.

It's also not the end of the world if someone creates a list without having been to each zoo or spending hours researching.
 
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