I started my journalism career in 1990 at the Trumann Democrat (now the Poinsett County Democrat Tribune). I was 20 years old, a radio/TV student at Arkansas State, and full of curiosity and want. My job mostly entailed covering school board meetings, helping lay out the weekly issues, and delivering stacks of papers to local businesses on Tuesday afternoons. I loved every minute of it.

That job gave me more than a paycheck and a purpose. It taught me how much local journalism matters. Even then, I understood that reporting on school budgets and water bills was no small thing. Those stories are the ones that affect people's everyday lives.

The following year, I got my first job in TV news at WREG-TV in Memphis. I was young, green, and wide-eyed. I started as a video editor and quickly worked my way into producing. One of my proudest moments was convincing the weather team to include Trumann on the map. It........

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