End of Year Interview with Kassidy Arena

This holiday season, Nebraska Public Media is reflecting on stories and topics our newsroom has covered over the past year. Our team is made up of ten reporters, each one with their own beat. A beat is a an area of focus that a reporter caters their stories to. For example, typical beats include education, health, government and agriculture.

Senior reporter Kassidy Arena joined Nebraska Public Media in 2023. She will spend time covering Latino, Spanish-speaking and immigrant communities in Nebraska. To her, telling these stories is personal. Arena sat down with Dale Johnson to explain why.

Dale Johnson: At a time when newsrooms around the country are shrinking. It's exciting to be part of a growing newsroom. I started here at Nebraska Public Media about 11 months ago, 10 months ago. Kassidy, your calendar's even shorter than mine. When did you start?

Kassidy Arena: I think this is officially my fourth week working here.

Johnson: One calendar month. In other words, where did you grow up? I'm a Nebraska kid, where did you grow up?

Arena: I am also a Nebraska kid, kind of split though between California and Nebraska. I moved to Nebraska when I was about four. So I basically grew up in Nebraska, grew up in Omaha, West Omaha. it was kind of around that time when West Omaha wasn't as developed as it is now. So, it was very cool to-- when I left the state and I left for approximately seven years and I came back and it's way bigger now. I live in Gretna now. And seeing that Gretna now has another high school. I was like what happened to my little small town Nebraska?

Johnson: What drew you back to Nebraska?

Arena: So I went to Missouri and then Iowa and then back to Missouri, where I then attended a conference where I met our news director here Jay Omar at the conference. And he approached me: he was like, 'Hey, you're from Nebraska, right? And I was like, 'Yes, I'm from Nebraska! Are you?' And you know, we immediately bonded. Because that's kind of the Nebraska way and he was like, 'You know, I've been following your work, would you ever consider coming back here?' And at first I was like, 'You know, I'm not sure.' And I kind of, you know, very politely brushed him off, and then continued to go back to Missouri. And I'm sitting in Missouri, you know, experiencing Missouri and the more and more I thought about it, I was like, it would be so nice to go back home and to be in a place that I can call my own, where I don't feel like an outsider all the time. And just know where I'm going. The grid system is a plus, but just in a community and in a place where I feel like I belong. And this is where I'm meant to be.

Johnson: I love this job because no two days are the same. In the small amount of time that you've been here, have you landed on an interest that draws out your passion?

Arena: Mostly. So for those who may not know, I'm Cuban, so something that I'm really passionate about covering are Hispanic and Latino communities and immigrant communities, making sure that they get the opportunities to share their stories, which are often I always say, yes, they're overlooked, but they're also often misrepresented when media maybe focuses on one aspect of those communities when they may put importance on a different aspect.

Johnson: Talk about your piece Healing Ribbons.

Arena: Yeah, so that has been really exciting. I've been meeting a lot of really great people for that. Healing Ribbons is a nonprofit that focuses on healing from historical traumas through sewing traditional regalia. And it's an intergenerational and intertribal group of women that come together to work on that emotional healing. They put on their first-ever fashion show. And following that story is just going to be a deeper dive into what Native and Indigenous women are doing to kind of empower themselves to heal from that historical and generational trauma.

Johnson: So no doubt 2024 will bring out more of Healing Ribbons?

Arena: Absolutely. And more just, especially Native women voices and people of color, and especially women of color, who we haven't always been the ones to shine in the media. And I think it's right about time that we do.

Johnson: Well, when you flip over another calendar page to an entire new year. What are your interests? What would you like to accomplish early in the new year?

Arena: Definitely a big thing that I've been focusing on, and I've been trying to communicate with the rest of the news team, I would love to get more Spanish on the air. The kind of Spanish that we actually let breathe and really be on the air as it is as opposed to, you know, cutting it or translating over them. I want to introduce Nebraskans more to our Spanish language that's here in Nebraska in our really large and vibrant Hispanic communities, that's not just, you know, maybe some people think just South Omaha, but it's actually throughout the entire state.

Johnson: That'll be exciting for you. So will getting married?

Arena: Yes, I'm getting married in May in Waterloo. Congratulations.

Johnson: Congratulations! Well, who's the lucky fella?

Arena: He is from Dallas, Texas. And that was actually a really fun thing to try to convince him to move to Nebraska. Being from Dallas, he maybe thought that Nebraska was more small town and more agriculture-based, which we are, but we also have a complete other side of us where we are... There's so much more to Nebraska than just agriculture, which we do great, but we also do a lot of other things.

Johnson: Kassidy will be teaching us all things in 2024 and congrats on the May wedding, Kassidy.

Arena: Thank you!

Johnson: Kassidy Arena joining me here thanks everybody. I'm Dale Johnson for Nebraska Public Media.