Rebecca Smith
Health ReporterRebecca Smith is an award-winning reporter and producer for the KBIA Health & Wealth Desk. Born and raised outside of Rolla, Missouri, she has a passion for diving into often overlooked issues that affect the rural populations of her state – especially stories that broaden people’s perception of “rural” life. She created a conversations-based journalism project, Missouri Health Talks, in 2016 that empowers people throughout the state to share their stories of access to healthcare – in their own words.
She has degrees in both Journalism and Chemistry from Truman State University in Kirksville, Missouri, and often says health reporting is the perfect marriage of individual’s stories and reporting on science.
You can reach her at smithbecky@missouri.edu or 573-882-4824.
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After several months of discussion and anticipation from community members, the Columbia City Council declared Columbia a “safe haven” city for LGBTQ+ people this week .
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The annual Great Backyard Bird Count is happening now and will continue all weekend – through Monday, February 19th. This is a global event where people are asked to go outside in their community, look and listen for birds, and submit their data to the eBird database.
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Paige Spears has been incarcerated in the Missouri Department of Corrections for nearly 35 years. At the age of 26, he was given a life sentence plus 30 years for an armed robbery he committed in 1988 – where no one was physically injured. He’s now 62. We met up with his family in January-Wabash Park in north county St. Louis recently and spoke about Paige and how his absence for more than 30 years of incarceration has impacted them.
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According to the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, more than 150 students dropped out of Columbia Public Schools in the 2022-2023 school year. So, one local group is opening a new center in town that will support kids in traditional and some not so traditional ways.
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A roundup of regional headlines from the KBIA Newsroom.
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A three-year grant awarded to the University of Missouri by the USDA will help train health and social workers on adverse childhood experiences, or ACEs.
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Many in northern Missouri remain without power as Macon Electric crews worked through the night, and warming centers have been set up across the region for anyone needing shelter.
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