I’ve spent the last two hours pouring over Broken Trust, a two-year, Flash journalism project created by the staff at the Sarasota Herald-Tribune, where they gathered information about abusive teachers who were still working in the Florida school system. They delivered details on who they were, and what the stories of them and their victims were, as well as how the educational penalty system works, showing all the loopholes and misinformation circulating in judicial-educative circles. Needless to say, I’m a tempted to move out-of-state before having children, so I don’t have to put them into the Florida school system.
The writing was excellent, and the research was impeccable, leading to great parts of the Flash package. The Tribune actually made it’s own database and search function, so people could see where child abuse and molestation offenders were located. As they spent a great amount of time noting that the Department of Education didn’t actually track these offenders very well or notify neighborhoods and schools of their presence, this was a great, user-friendly feature.
The stories were well-written and informative, as well. However, I don’t think they took full advantage of Flash’s abilities. They simply worked like an un-illustrated book. They did have pictures, but they were set above the active text, which read through like a notebook, complete with flipping pages. I wanted the photos bigger and set within the active text. You couldn’t even seem them while reading the story, and the images were related to the story being told. I just didn’t want to have to scroll up and down to see them.
And I’m all for consistency, but it did seem to drag on and on with the same book-style design and action. The main stories of the four parts of the project were OK, but then they had separate parts that explained terminology, the organization of the Department of Education and profiles on offenders, decision-makers and children. They were mostly short, one to three pages each. I wish they had been presented as graphics or in a different kind of Flash design instead of the same-old text style used for the main features. It became monotonous after reading at least four different pieces for about 40 pages for all four separate sections. That made at least 160 page turns on the same background and with the same text.
The different tabs, which allowed the reader to report and seek out abusers, for instance, were much more interesting. It drew the reader into the story and the topic.
Overall, the reporting and research, along with the terrible and riveting topic, made this project excellent. The four parts, which appeared to be release on four consecutive days, told a very complete story. I wished for more graphics, photos and images, but because of the sensitive nature of the topic, it can be forgiven, I suppose.
