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ufjschool / ob-s14

Orange & Blue issue for Spring 2014 -- Energy
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Edit "davis.md" #28

Closed jrthieke closed 2 years ago

ghost commented 10 years ago

Edited.

jrthieke commented 10 years ago

Hey Sarah, I liked your story a lot. I know Brittany already edited it, but I’m going over all the individual stories as well, and I had some thoughts:

  1. It seems like you wrote that Michael Sam, Missouri football player, committed suicide recently. He didn’t; he’s still very much alive. He came out as gay though, that’s why he’s been getting headlines. If you want an example of suicide, in 2012 Jovan Belcher of the Kansas City Chiefs in the NFL committed suicide at the Chief’s facility after killing his girlfriend; that example might work. But then again, if your focus is college athletes specifically, that wouldn’t work. I’ll get back to you when I can think of a better example.
  2. While the story as a whole is excellent, the lede does drag on a bit to me. The focus of the story seems to be the counseling and psychology of athletes. Your nut graph then is the 17th paragraph in the story; I think you should mention something about mental illness, psychological conditions or just athletic counseling a little earlier on and more specifically. Otherwise, readers might wonder if this is a profile, about eating disorders, about all disorders, about athletes etc. and not know for sure until they’re already 16 graphs into the story. It’s a little confusing.
  3. You have a nice collection of sources. I think the one you plan on getting will also help the story. You probably could afford to lose one of them once everything is said and done, but if don’t wish to you don’t have to.
  4. Does your lede source have a tie-in locally at all? I know she’s from Jacksonville, and then went to Penn, but is she back around now? Does she still live in this state at times? I have no problems with out-of-state sources, but if they have current connections locally, those should be mentioned.
  5. In conclusion, I think your story mostly has a nice flow and a good balance with regards to addressing a difficult topic. Double check all of your facts again, and see if any of your sentences feel too wordy. You have markers like “need specifics here” at various times edited into your story, so you seem to be on top of most of your edits.

Again, nice story, and just consider some of the changes I suggested. Hope your additional reporting goes well, and I think the story will come together nicely.

sarahidavis42 commented 10 years ago

Hi James, thanks so much for your comments! Seriously, amazingly helpful. Sorry about the fact error - I reread the interview I had with the person who told me that and realized I totally misread what she wrote to me - would have definitely checked up on it before publication though! Thanks again :)