Wlky: Attorney defends actions of fired school officer
http://www.wlky.com/national/spring-valley-school-officer-to-learn-fate/36089174
This article most notably violates the journalistic yardsticks of explanation and fairness. The whole story is about a teen who was, in a class with a room full of students recording videos, slammed down on the ground and thrown by an officer for disturbing the class. Be this as it may, the article is much more focused on the officer and people defending him. The bottom half mostly dedicated for blaming the student for this violent incident with out even giving her a chance to defend herself.
A whole, crucial side of this story is missing. Only authority figures were interviewed and they mainly backed the cop's actions. Neither the girl, her family, or anyone close to her is interviewed other than her attorney on her injuries. He only had one sentence. This one-sided tale, for the above reasons stated, obviously violates the Fairness yardstick.
But that's not all. It also violates Explanation, as this is not an isolated incident. The effect of having cops intervene in schools is a controversy sweeping our nation and it, along with the school to prison pipeline, desperately needs to be addressed. While the story does allude to this, it is very brief and not a very well developed thought.
To bring this article up to standards, more interviews from varying sides are needed, as this is the biggest issue. Also, the whole bit about cops in schools needs to be thoroughly explained for those readers not completely caught up on what's going on. After that, the article should be fairly decent.
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