Amongst all of the charts, one city ranked in the top eight every time. Jonesboro’s difference increased in each specified crime rate.
In the murder rate difference chart they ranked number three with a 21.8 increase. And in the total murders category they ranked number two with an increase of 16 murders.
If this is the direction that Jonesboro is headed towards than what can we expect in the coming years? A continued increase like this would not be good considering many families live and raise their children here.
Jonesboro is known not only for being a populated city where many Arkansan families live. It is also home to many students attending Arkansas State University.
Cities with college campuses tend to have a stereotype of higher crime than cities without colleges. So this begs the question, are the college students the ones to blame?
Let’s take a look at what we are analyzing though. Our categories include, total murders, murder rate, total robbery, and total property crime. Of all of these crimes, only one of them is really considered a “college crime”, and its property crime. Neither murder nor robbery, are very stereotypically associated with college campuses.
So while many residents might point to the college kids, they can’t be blamed too quickly. More research would need to be done and compared with the crime data from the campus police department at Arkansas State University.
If the data from the campus police department was pretty close to the data in these charts for Jonesboro, then it could be more easily pegged to the college students. But say the campus police department only recorded an increase in one murder from 2010-2014 (and that pattern was seen in all four categories of crime) then it probably couldn’t be directly pegged to them.
One also has to ask if the Jonesboro Police Department includes ASU’s police department in its reports. If it does not, then this data does not represent any crime from Arkansas State. Thus, this crime increase could be blamed solely on the city, and not the university.
One would have to dig deeper into the data records of the university’s police department and how the Jonesboro Police Department gathers its data in order to form a solid conclusion.
The charts and data are correct. They could have used a little more polishing with diverging colors and numeric labeling.
The story pitch is good – I admire you pinpointed one city out of all of this. The writing needs a little work. Some suggestions:
Rewrite the lede: “Amongst all of the charts, one city ranked in the top eight every time. Jonesboro’s difference increased in each specified crime rate.”
–Try this – more direct: “The City of Jonesboro consistently appears in the top eight of Arkansas cities and counties in the rates of murder, robbery and property crime.”
–Avoid the pompous “amongst” — it’s the British usage and should stay on the other side of the Atlantic.
Murder: To make the point about a rise in murders, pick the murder rate or the total murders, but don’t hit us with both.
Attribution: Even in a story pitch, you want to attribute generalizations such as this: ” Of all of these crimes, only one of them is really considered a “college crime”
This aside, I think this was a smart way to frame the pitch by focusing on Jonesboro, the campus and getting into the data trends on campus versus the city. Thoughtful idea.
Grade: B+