I don’t think that leaving out the last name was detrimental to the quality of the article. Her first name alone was empowering enough and held enough metaphorical value for the writer to really help the reader understand how unique Dasani is in her circumstances. The last name would absolutely have to be included for a news article but for a feature with the amount of research that was done and the time it took, including a last name is not quite as important as her story and its relevance to a more national scale issue.

I disagree with the critique that the story ran too long. The writer dissected on one angle of the bigger issue of homelessness and tied it to the different aspects of Dasani’s life, so every part of the story held a different value to the authors angle and the extended perspective strengthens the article. The information is not repetitive and the main idea of the story continues to be the reoccurring theme of all the parts to the story.

Again, like the last name, I think disclosing the time involved and the months following her is information that makes the story go on a tangent. For a more concrete news article, all statistics around the situation are vital, but for a feature article, it’s not necessary when all the other information points to these conclusions.

Focusing on more politics and policies on how homeless people are treated would have broadened the angle that the writer was pursuing, and I thought it was wise that the writer chose not to include more information. Doing so allowed the writer to focus on their angle with more depth and because the angle was specific, the shift in focus in the articles from Dasani to the issue at hand where all empowering and smooth.

The constant shifts in focus were what kept the entire story so engaging. It kept giving readers something else to gather before they were shifted from Dasani to something related to her circumstance. Fort Greene being a gentrification gem to the Auburn family residence, change in community exemplified through different streets being paved differently on Myrtle, Bloomberg “homelessness more enjoyable” to rats in Dasani’s room. This is a style I see a lot with authors I read like Junot Diaz and Dave Eggers, with the constant shifts holding value in how the reader receives the information.

I think that the article had the potential to be a middle ground for understanding larger and more complex issues. The shift of focus gave the reader perspective on how the larger scale issues and decisions effected the smaller scale issue of Dasani’s life. However I don’t think the article was exaggerated and I think the very specific focus helps exemplify the issues going on.