My first job after college was as business editor and city reporter at The Newton Kansan. I covered city government in Newton, North Newton and Hesston, and the business beat for all of Harvey County. During those years, I completed the Leadership Newton course through the Newton Area Chamber of Commerce. I was responsible for assigning articles, writing and editing articles, layout and production of an annual business section and the annual graduation section. As part of the small staff of a 6-day daily paper, I had the opportunity to write, edit, paste-up and layout the paper. I wrote about not only civic and business issues, but I also had opportunities to work the sports beat. I enjoyed tremendously the community journalism experience.
I left the newspaper in 2000 to take a communications assistant position for the Kansas Credit Union Association, where I got my start in public relations and marketing. The position allowed me to strengthen my skills in design and photography as I learned and polished skills in Adobe Illustrator and Adobe Photoshop as part of my job. I redesigned the organization’s newsletter from an 8 1/2 x 11 publication to a smaller magazine format. I designed brochure shells and promotional pieces for educational opportunities and the annual meeting.