Kelly Vaughn

Arizona native Kelly Vaughn has always loved writing. She went to college at Arizona State University where she planned to major in English. After realizing she “didn’t want to write academic papers for the rest of her life,” Vaughn switched her major to journalism in her junior year. Her first internship was at a local magazine and she developed a good rapport with her editor. After college, Vaughn went on to work in PR and fundraising. One day, her old editor called her and offered her a job as a junior-level editor at the magazine.

From there, Vaughn went on to work for a custom publishing company for barely a year when the same editor (who now worked for a different magazine) called her again and told her he had a job for her. She's been at Arizona Highways ever since and specializes in environmental writing, personality profiles, experiential travel writing and personal essays.

Q: What do you find rewarding about being a journalist?

Kelly Vaughn writes in her reporter's notebook. Photo courtesy of Kelly Vaughn.

“It’s given me an opportunity to explore places that I otherwise might not have,” Vaughn said. “I’ve spent a lot of time over the course of my 14+ years at Arizona Highways working with Indigenous people on the Navajo Nation, Hopi Nation and Havasupai tribal land.”

Her travels have been regarding experiences where she was able to learn more about cross-cultural reporting which is not something she considered doing early in her career. Vaughn has had the chance to spend time in remarkable places and see iconic Arizona landscape scenes.

“Whether I’ve gone backpacking, rock climbing, hiking or kayaking (for a story), I’ve been able to blend what I love about the outdoors with an actual career,” Vaughn said.

Q: What is a topic you report on that gets negative feedback frequently?

“People always tend to have negative reactions about some environment topics,” Vaughn said. “Especially if they feel like their way of life will be disrupted by proposed changes.”

Her biggest example of this was in regard to a story she reported on in 2016. Vaughn spent six months working on a story about Oak Flat, a section of land east of Phoenix that is sacred to the San Carlos Apache people. The young women of the tribe have their coming-of-age ceremonies there and they host their acorn gathering there as well. In an 11th-hour defense spending bill, the land was transferred to a foreign mining company.

Kelly Vaughn climbs at Oak Flat. Photo courtesy of Kelly Vaughn.

Vaughn reached out to environmental groups, rock climbers, members of the San Carlos Apache tribe and politicians. A well-known senator at the time didn't choose to give Vaughn a comment and she was referred back to press releases and previous statements by his office multiple times.

“When the story came out, the senator and his office got mad at me and wanted the magazine to be pulled from newsstands since it didn’t necessarily paint him in a positive light. He had every opportunity to go on record and didn’t so we didn’t pull the publication, but that was probably the biggest example I have of negative feedback from a powerful person,” Vaughn said.

Q: How does negative feedback affect you?

“I think for the most part I can brush it off a little bit because I work for a publication whose purpose is to promote tourism and encourage people to travel,” Vaughn said. “We are not a magazine that’s out for the ‘gotcha’ or the scandal.”

She says she is lucky because that means her publication is less likely to be exposed to constant negative feedback. Vaughn went on to say most of the feedback Arizona Highways receives is positive.

“We have kind of a rule to steer away from political commentary for that reason. I think I probably have it easier than a lot of journalists who are writing for daily papers, political websites or breaking news where there is so much scrutiny on every single word they publish,” Vaughn said.

Q: Is there anything you do to cope in times you do receive negative feedback?

“I’ve always been a little bit of an athlete, so I tend to work out my frustration in the boxing ring or on a rowing machine,” Vaughn says.

For her, being active is a way she can try to burn off some of the anxiety she may be feeling from work. That may be the only physical way she copes with negative emotions that stem from work, but she has a saying she likes to follow.

“If it’s not going to matter in five years, you shouldn’t spend more than five minutes thinking about it,” Vaughn said. “At the end of the day, it is important for us as journalists, and also consumers of journalism, to recognize that we are still human and we are capable of making human mistakes.”

Q: When you went to Cronkite, did any of your professors talk to you about mental health?

“I don’t remember that specifically. Bear in mind it's been 20 years since I was in college and I went to Cronkite before it was Cronkite,” Vaughn said. “But, I can almost imagine my news reporting professor, Bruce Itule, having some kind of conversation with us.”

Q: Do you think that’s something that the curriculum would benefit from now?

Vaughn believes that it would be beneficial to implement some type of mental health training or resource into the curriculum. She says maybe it is a condition of people paying more attention to mental health and well-being now, but that it is so important.

“I think as a journalist it can be easy to say, ‘what I’m doing isn’t rocket science or brain surgery,’ but it’s still really important,” Vaughn said. “I think that we take on a lot as journalists because at the end of the day, as unbiased as you are, you can’t help but take on a lot of people's emotions.”

She believes taking on those adding emotions can have a really negative effect on a reporter's mental health sometimes. When you are constantly reporting on difficult subjects it can be hard to have work-life balance. It can be difficult to compartmentalize all the different emotions you may be feeling.

“I think that talking about mental health would be a huge benefit to the program. Even if it’s just a two-hour seminar or a workshop. As a journalist, I think that’d be invaluable,” Vaughn said.

Q: Have you experienced any hardships in your professional journalism career from being a woman?

“Every day. Every single day,” Vaughn said. “It is hard for me to admit that because I have a really good team, but the management is all middle-aged white dudes who on some level have a set way of thinking.”

Portrait of Kelly Vaughn. Photo courtesy of Kelly Vaughn.

Most of the time, the men are focused on the past, Vaughn said. Instead of looking for ways to grow our readership in the future with younger audiences, we tend to rerun old content which I think may even be tiresome for our current readers. She feels as though it's a constant battle to try to get people to listen and think about shifting the magazine’s focus to attract a new demographic. Vaughn believes attracting a younger audience is the only way the magazine will survive.

Early in her career Vaughn also experienced hardships due to her gender. While working at Phoenix Magazine, the publisher at the time told Vaughn “(she) would never go anywhere because (she) was just a little girl. The former publisher of Arizona Highways also thought Vaughn wasn’t cut out for the job. He told her she “would never be an editor because (she) was too aggressive.” When Vaughn asked if he meant aggressive or assertive he responded, “It doesn’t matter. You’re too much of whatever it is.”

Those experiences stuck with her. “They are kind of damaging, and I feel like I have to claw a little bit every day to go above and beyond. Maybe if those things hadn’t been said to me or I felt like I did have a larger voice at the table I wouldn’t feel that way. But, I do feel on some level an old boys club certainly still exists in this industry,” Vaughn said.