I have always loved written language, from winning young author awards in elementary school, boasting my favorite book was the thesaurus, to excelling in advanced English, critical thinking, and communications classes in college. I am a goal oriented, self-starter, learn quickly, thrive in fast paced environments and am excited to jump right in to new opportunities.
Experience & Qualifications
June 2014- Current Winters Express Newspaper, Staff Writer
Reporting coverage of City Council, School Board, and Planning Commission Meetings
Pagination of the weekly publication, proof-reading, layout
In the process of redeveloping the newspaper’s webpage and develop a social media outreach strategy
February 2014- Current Dixon Daily News, Publisher/Editor
Developed and launched a local news website devoted to Dixon news. I built the site from entirely from a Wordpress CMS theme, adjusting CSS metadata in order to better suit the news. I have developed a communication strategy in order build a revenue base of advertisers, subscribers and more than 1,100 Facebook and Twitter followers. I use Hootsuite to manage user engagement on Facebook, Twitter, Google+, and Instagram, as well as to monitor user posts for potential story scoops. Currently averaging 1500 unique and engaged visitors to the site with an incredibly low bounce back, I have purposely controlled SEO output in order to avoid spam clicks for local business advertisers. My goal for this site is to be a community forum for the town, keeping ad prices low to support the sites minimal costs, while keeping an area overlooked by mainstream media covered.
August 2012 -- January 2014: Editor, Writer, Content Manager
I began working as a Freelance Reporter for the Dixon Patch in August 2012, promoting to Guest Editor before becoming a full-time Editor for two hyper-local news sites June 11, 2013. As a freelancer, I wrote a minimum of 1-2 articles per day. I have covered the good-bad-ugly of city government; student successes; trials and tribulations of police and fire; business highlights; small fetes; and amazing people doing extraordinary things; keeping my finger on the pulse of the Mill Valley and Dixon communities. I have expanded the Dixon site from 16,000 to 35,000 UVs per month, and maintained more than 35,000 UVs monthly on the Mill Valley site. I have been recognized for extraordinarily versatile and creative use of mobile posting, and optimization of SEOs, and have had great success with social user engagement. I currently supply content to 25-North Bay Area sites, and have had several articles picked up as national news. Within my time with Patch, I learned on the job during two CMS rollouts, incorporating knowledge of widget making tools such as Storify and Google Fusion to create visual presentation of polls, statistics, and data that might otherwise be overlooked by the short attention span of the online news audience. Since June 2013, I have published more than 4200 articles.
2005 — 2008 Editor, Independent Voice Newspaper
The Independent Voice is a local weekly print publication, with complete market saturation, delivered by mail to every address in Dixon. As the editor I was in charge of all layout and content for the newspaper each week, as well as ad sales, ad design and community outreach. I managed columnists, interns, staff, paste-ups, printing and delivery schedules. I was greatly involved in public event coverage, local news and happenings as well as coordinated donations for annual recognitions such as Mother of the Year, Christmas light tours, Father of the Year, Citizen of the Year, and Dixon Mayfair Floats. I also wrote weekly business highlights, a local family happenings column, city council meeting coverage, and other covered other journalistic duties.
2001 — 2007 Manager, Java California
As the coffee shop manager my duties included managing staff, ordering, new product ideas, store front designs, payroll, new hire interviews and training, advertisement and customer service. The coffee shop had a bouquet room attached and I was in charge of meeting with clients to plan their menus, coordinate efforts and staff events.
Education
- BA Communication Studies, Ashford University
- General Education Associate Degree, Yuba Community College
- Master of Arts Organizational Management specializing in Media Management, Currently Enrolled 2015 Graduation
Volunteer Work
2000-Current Toys for Tots, Food for Families Coordinator
I work annually with the Dixon Toys for Tots program to provide food for families in need during the three-week break from school. My family founded this charity in 1966, a 501-C3, and provides Christmas magic for over 800 children in the 95620 zip code each year. I have chaired the food program, coordinating food boxes to supply 21-days of nutrition for children who would normally receive free lunches at school. I order all of the food, coordinate volunteers, create list breakdowns for each family, and facilitate deliveries. I also work with the program to coordinate deliveries of baskets to lonely seniors on Christmas Eve. Dozens of volunteers come each year to deliver over 100 baskets to seniors who would otherwise be alone on the holiday. I order all of the gifts and food, manage funds and volunteers, contact each senior to confirm their information, and personalize each card to be delivered.
2010-Current Dixon American Legion, Auxiliary Member
As an auxiliary member I work with other members to plan fundraising events for Veteran support. I facilitated the creation of a new bar and coffee shop within the newly built American Legion Hall Post 208 in 2010.
2005-2008 Chamber of Commerce, Ambassador
As an ambassador I worked as a part of a team of community business leaders to promote growth and expansion of local business unity. We planned monthly mixers, annual events including and Epicurean Fete, Wine Strolls, State of the City, holiday dinner dances and fundraising events. We reviewed applications for student scholarships and hosted booths at events such as the Chillin’n’Grillin’, Lambtown, Dixon Mayfair, Independence Day celebrations, and Octoberfest.
References and Letters of Recommendation Available Upon Request
Excellent addition of your resume!
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