Sheba Clarke

I started my career as a news reporter for almost 10 years before transitioning to public relations, where I've been for going on 13 years now. People call the public relations arm the dark side, but there's really more light here. I work in school PR, and my focus in industry is education. Currently, I run a one-person communications department at Grandview C4 School District, which means I'm wearing every hat - social media, marketing, branding, thought leadership, internal and external communication, and engagement. I also do consulting with educational institutions throughout the country, auditing and evaluating the way they do communications, which allows me to learn best practices, industry standards, and trends. My news background gave me my foundation for communicating. Working in that high-stress, high-deadline environment taught me how to work with different strong personalities, how to communicate to completely different audiences, and how to become an expert at something I'd never heard about and then communicate it to people in a way they connect with. I learned the power of storytelling and key messaging as a reporter, and when I got my APR, I learned ethics, strategic thinking, and how to build plans over time and execute them. One of my proudest achievements was leading a historical branding effort for Grandview C4 that created a brand identity beyond just a new mascot and logo. It brought confidence to our community, fought perception from the outside, and gave people something to be proud of and identify with. I'm starting to see how it has transformed our community and taken on its own legs.