Her work has been supported by a student award of excellence from the Alexia Foundation for World Peace, a University of Missouri “Truth with a Camera” scholarship and honored by Pictures of the Year International, NPPA Best of Photojournalism, Society for News Design and the New England Press Association. Her photo career began at the age of 30 after working for a park in Kentucky, apprenticing as an actress at Actors Theater and serving as a Peace Corps water and sanitation volunteer in the Ivory Coast. She earned her B.A. At Indiana University and her M.A. In Journalism at the University of Missouri. She has worked for the Concord Monitor since 2004.