Quoting Wikipedia as a Source

As a university student, one of the things you look for when writing a paper is supporting sources for your work. You scan and skim through many articles, essays, books and other sources before you can find write one for you.

In the Digital Age, searching has become a tedious job. With a click of a button and a scroll of the mouse we can now skim and brush through so many more sources than ever before. The information age brought with it the opportunity to explore databases and sources that were never before available to us at a very small (almost nil) cost.

I came across this article in Yahoo (by AP News Agency) that tells of how in Middlebury College students are not allowed to quote Wikipedia as a source.

This should not come as a surprise to people, students and teachers alike, since Wikipedia Founder Jimmy Wales was quoted saying that for Academic papers you should not base your material only on Wikipedia in an event in UPenn.

It is understandable, since Wikipedia relies on user input to generate its knowledge (though there are problems with plagiarism from time to time). There is no scientific research to coroborate the information in the Wikipedia, and also no sure way to verify its authenticity.

The only logical conclusion is that Wikipedia is a good starting source for a project, pointing you in the direction of the quotable sources that'll be academic enough for your university/college paper.