Many locals might recall watching Heidi Diane Kirk from the time she was an infant accompanying her parents, Megan and Sam Kirk, to work at Eureka Market up to her teen years working at the natural foods store. The Eureka Springs High School 2017 graduate is now a television news reporter for WRDE Coast TV News in Milton, Del., an NBC affiliate.
“Every single day I wake up and am thrilled to be doing what I love,” Heidi said. She earned her degree from the University of Arkansas in journalism in 2021 before going on to get a master’s degree in Journalism and Public Affairs from American University in Washington D.C. this year.
“I was so lucky to find employment in a place where my work is valued, and I am treated the way I should be. I am starting out in a very small town, but my colleagues value the work I’m doing and I value their experience. It is a good idea to learn in a smaller place and work your way up. My news director has been doing it his whole career, and he loves it. I love learning from him and my other colleagues. That is what makes it a wonderful experience.”
Heidi enjoyed theatrical performing in high school and college, and recalls that she was walking on the UofA campus when she walked by “this gorgeous TV station,” housed in the Sue Walk Burnett Center for Journalism and Student Media. That television news station replicates anything you see in professional television newsrooms.
Heidi recalls her grandmother pointing at a television news program and telling Heidi, “You’d be awful good at that.”
“At the time it didn’t resonate with me,” Heidi said. “But when I was trying to pick a major in college, I felt drawn to it. I got involved in our campus news station and rose up in the ranks there. I started as a volunteer, got to work in the control room, and then they let you be on the air. It just clicked. I eventually enjoyed being able to shine a light on other people’s stories. It is all about people and all about connections.”
Television news can be a high-stress environment, especially when doing live interviews.
“There are days that are intimidating,” she said. “You might have just arrived on the scene and, in 45 seconds, you are on live television. When that little red button comes on the camera, you’ve got to go, no matter what. But you get this kind of adrenaline. Once you start talking, it flows out of you. It can be challenging. But, at the end of the day, you are just talking. I’m naturally comfortable in front of a camera. I’d been trained to do this in college. It is no different.”
Finding starting jobs in highly competitive broadcast journalism is no easy task. Heidi said she started a nationwide search about halfway through her master’s program, and everything lined up for the job she has now.
In graduate school, she did an internship for CNN in Washington, D.C., working on The Lead with Jake Tapper, on the production side. But she missed reporting.
“I kept yearning to be out in the field,” she said. “I applied all over the country and started having in-depth discussions with several stations. I wanted to stay on the East Coast because my long-term goal is to end up in D.C. I really caught on with management at WRDE. And being from landlocked Arkansas, it is special to live by the ocean.”
She was also looking for opportunities to cover interesting stories. President Joe Biden has a home nearby in Rehoboth Beach, a town known as “the nation’s summer capital.” And the nearby beach towns of Lewes, Rehoboth and Dewey provide opportunities for coverage of tourism and economic activity.
“It was like home in those ways,” she said. “It really just clicked for me.”
Working at her parent’s store was good preparation for her news career.
“Eureka brings in such a unique plethora of people,” she said. “I met people from all walks of life. I think that really sparked my curiosity. I’m curious by nature. I was exposed to such a wide variety of people. You work hard. Sometimes you are slammed by customers. At the end of the day, working at the store taught me how to interact with people, an invaluable skill, especially in journalism.”
Being within a two-hour drive of Washington, D.C., there are a lot of trickledown news opportunities. Anytime there is a story that has national pull, she jumps at the opportunity to cover it. One recent example was she was the first reporter to interview the mother of a man who rammed into a barricade at the White House, fired shots into the air, then killed himself.
While interviewing a grieving mother can be really tough, Heidi feels like the interview was therapeutic for the mother and the neighbors she interviewed who were trying to get insight into the tragedy. Another time she interviewed a woman who had lost her son to a fentanyl xylazine overdose.
“The mother wanted to help prevent that from happening to others, so she spoke about her experience,” Heidi said. “In TV, we are the pipeline for people getting their story out.”
As for her future aspirations, she is currently focused on her first year as a broadcast reporter. At some point she does want to end up living in the city she loves, Washington, D.C., and work in journalism in some capacity.
Heidi feels very fortunate that she is living in a wonderful area of Sussex County where she can go to the beach, drive an hour to hike a state park, and within a few hours’ drive can be New York, Baltimore and D.C.
“That is something that really made me fall in love with this area,” Heidi said. “I’ve done a lot of traveling. I’m also a runner. I love putting on a podcast to listen to other journalists and go for a run.”
Heidi can be followed at facebook.com/heidikirkWRDE, her Twitter account is @heididkirk, and her broadcasts can be seen at wrde.com.