Latest / Ready Set Collaborate with Wanda Pearson / From Childhood Dreams to Broadcasting Excellence with Deborah Pearson: The Resilience, Mentorship, and Storytelling Impact in Journalism

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From Childhood Dreams to Broadcasting Excellence with Deborah Pearson: The Resilience, Mentorship, and Storytelling Impact in Journalism · Ready Set Collaborate with Wanda Pearson

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Welcome to Ready Set Collaborate podcast with Rhonda Pearson, where we will dive deep into the world of networking, collaboration and partnership, unlocking the secrets to a successful team working within innovation.
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: Whether you're an entrepreneur, a creative professional or just someone eager to understand the power of networking and collaboration, this podcast is your go-to resource.
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: Join us as we explore the stories, strategies and insights from experts, entrepreneurs and thought leaders who have experienced the magic of networking and collaboration to achieve successful results.
• 0:42
  Speaker 3: Tune in to Ready.
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: Set Collaborate podcast on a journey towards achieving your goals with host Wanda Pearson.
• 0:53
  Speaker 2: Welcome to the Ready Set Collaborate podcast with Wanda Pearson.
• 0:56
  Speaker 2: Now I am so excited to have my guest, Deborah Pearson, who is a director of Wolf FM in Dothan, Alabama.
• 1:05
  Speaker 2: Now this is something different for her and we're going to pull her out of her comfort zone and hit her into that podcasting, YouTube radio.
• 1:15
  Speaker 2: We'll say radio, but she's going to tell us a lot about herself as far as how she got into what she's done here.
• 1:19
  Speaker 2: But I am so excited to have you here, Debbie, with me, Not called Debbie, but her name is Deborah Pearson.
• 1:24
  Speaker 2: I've been known this is my sister-in-law so I'm just so excited for what she has done with her career and how evolved she has become, and you're going to understand that when I talk about her bio, Deborah, say hello to the audience.
• 1:39
  Speaker 3: Hello everyone, it's good to be here with you today, Wanda.
• 1:43
  Speaker 2: Yes, that's our radio voice.
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: Okay, let me talk about her bio.
• 1:53
  Speaker 2: Deborah Pearson is a distinguished journalism with a rich history as an afternoon reporter and anchor.
• 1:55
  Speaker 2: In 2023, she was appointed as news director at Wolf FM News.
• 2:00
  Speaker 2: She brings a wealth of experience and commitment to her new role.
• 2:03
  Speaker 2: A 1980 graduate of Ashford High School, deborah's passion for journalism blossomed at Alabama State University, where she honed her skills in broadcast journalism.
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: In 1985, she became in connection with Wolf FM as an intern.
• 2:20
  Speaker 2: After a brief hiatus from the radio business, she returned to Dothan in 1991, becoming a news director at the newly established WANFM and WAGF AM stations.
• 2:32
  Speaker 2: In 1992, she joined Wolf as the afternoon news anchor, a role she held for over three decades before stepping into her current leadership position in 2023.
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: Notably in 1995, debra broke her new ground as the first Black female talk show host at WDHN-TV18 with her show Newswatch Extra.
• 2:56
  Speaker 2: In April 2024, she won four Abbey Alabama Broadcasting Association Awards for her excellence in reporting Broadcasting Association Awards for her excellence in reporting.
• 3:03
  Speaker 2: Additionally, in May 2024, she was featured in a two-hour ABC 2020 primetime special on the 1999 murders of dope and teenagers, jb Beasley and Tracy Holland showcasing their extensive coverage of the case.
• 3:18
  Speaker 2: A mural titled Jubilee was an unveiled celebration as her first Juneteenth Grand March.
• 3:26
  Speaker 2: It was unveiled in historic community in May 2024.
• 3:28
  Speaker 2: And I also want to mention how she just was an awarded a TomCast award and that's prestigious, yes, yes.
• 3:35
  Speaker 2: And then I also want to say I was at that unveiling in Dalton for that award.
• 3:40
  Speaker 2: I was so proud of my sister to be able to make history in Dalton, alabama.
• 3:48
  Speaker 2: But I want to say thank you, jenny, for what you do and it just makes me just glean the joy of having you on my podcast.
• 3:55
  Speaker 2: I said I know you're a star, but can you come on my podcast with me?
• 4:00
  Speaker 3: You know me from whence I've come from Before all of this fame and glory, yeah.
• 4:07
  Speaker 2: So I am so excited to have you here, because it's just an honor, and actually to end our year December 24, with your podcast, to show people that you can do anything.
• 4:19
  Speaker 2: You set your mind to Amen.
• 4:20
  Speaker 2: I never thought I'd be doing podcasts, but I made one year in November of this year and I was celebrating my birthday November 15th.
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: I actually made one year on November 18th, so this is something we say God, I don't want to do this.
• 4:36
  Speaker 2: No, I said yes, you will, and that's what he did to Boca, but yes, he said yes, you will, so we're just following his vision for us Absolutely so we did.
• 4:45
  Speaker 2: Yes, you will, so we're just following his vision for us, absolutely.
• 4:47
  Speaker 2: So, debra, tell us a little bit more about yourself and then we can dive into some questions here.
• 4:49
  Speaker 3: I'm in my hometown of Dothan, ashford, alabama.
• 4:52
  Speaker 3: The Wiregrass community is in southeast Alabama.
• 4:55
  Speaker 3: Young girl probably junior high school pretending to be a news anchor, reading the newspaper every day and pretending to be sitting at a news anchor desk and not realizing that was really.
• 5:12
  Speaker 3: I was setting, I guess, an example or setting priorities for myself, even at such a young age, not even realizing all of that.
• 5:19
  Speaker 3: But in high school I was a part of the jacket racket staff, which was our newspaper staff, and that's where I learned how to report and write.
• 5:27
  Speaker 3: And from there went a couple of junior colleges before I actually went off to Alabama State and to really learn how to hone my skills with a bunch of great professionals from Tuskegee, alabama at the time Steve Marshall, carol, steve Michael Crenshaw, they were from all over the place, but I really learned how to hone skills from there.
• 5:48
  Speaker 3: And then not graduating, and this was a part of something.
• 5:52
  Speaker 3: Sometimes I regret, but then no, I don't that I did not graduate at the time, waiting for a particular class that took maybe years to come about for two classes.
• 6:02
  Speaker 3: I decided to leave.
• 6:03
  Speaker 3: I had my dean of the department say look, debbie, we know that you can make it, we know that you have what it takes to be in this business and to make it so.
• 6:12
  Speaker 3: At that time we put cassette tapes together and I have one right here for you.
• 6:17
  Speaker 3: Some folks don't know what it is A cassette tape.
• 6:20
  Speaker 3: I put a cassette tape resume tape together and I sent it off to WNBC in New York and they called me and flew me to New York.
• 6:27
  Speaker 3: I didn't look like I sounded so that was my first setback at that point and they did not hire me and started coming up with the excuses that you didn't graduate.
• 6:39
  Speaker 3: And I said well, you knew all of that, it was in my resume.
• 6:42
  Speaker 3: I told you I was a senior broadcasting student, but anyway, that kind of took my.
• 6:46
  Speaker 3: That's where my hiatus started.
• 6:47
  Speaker 3: So in the meantime I met my husband at the time and got married and had a son and things didn't work out there.
• 6:55
  Speaker 3: So I turned around and decided to move back to Alabama with my two-year-old son, son starting all over again at 30 years old 29, 30 years old who would have thought that?
• 7:05
  Speaker 3: But I came back to Dothan and it was a newly formed radio station, as you mentioned started up and I walked in and asked who I was and they told me they didn't have a position available.
• 7:17
  Speaker 3: So I was like okay, what am I going to do now?
• 7:18
  Speaker 3: Before I could get home good, this is before cell phones I had received the call hey, come back.
• 7:23
  Speaker 3: We want you to be the new news director at WJJM.
• 7:26
  Speaker 3: So that was how that happened.
• 7:28
  Speaker 3: So I walked back in the door of radio again.
• 7:30
  Speaker 3: So I was ecstatic.
• 7:32
  Speaker 3: That lasted for about 10 months, and then here at Wolf FM actually, I interned here, as you mentioned in my bio.
• 7:39
  Speaker 3: I interned here in 1985 as a college student and they had an afternoon position open and I walked in, did the sound check, everything we need to do, boom hired and I have been here ever since.
• 7:51
  Speaker 3: So that is 32 years.
• 7:53
  Speaker 3: I just celebrated my 32nd anniversary here on December 1st.
• 7:57
  Speaker 3: So God is good.
• 7:58
  Speaker 3: He has blessed me in this field and has done.
• 8:01
  Speaker 3: I can't even fathom everything that he has done for me in this position.
• 8:07
  Speaker 3: So I am a believer Jeremiah 29, 11, for I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, and this is the plans he had for me right here.
• 8:18
  Speaker 2: Oh, you just took us through a journey.
• 8:19
  Speaker 2: That was my question take us through the journey?
• 8:20
  Speaker 2: So you took us through that journey and my favorite verse is Jeremiah 29, 11.
• 8:26
  Speaker 2: When I left IBM, that was the first verse that I had.
• 8:30
  Speaker 2: I put it actually on my book Last Week's at Five for Struggle to Triumph and I said God has a plan for us.
• 8:38
  Speaker 2: And I remember talking to you and what you was doing, how you got it to what you went back to Alabama and he would take care of us.
• 8:46
  Speaker 2: And that's why Jeremiah 29, 11 came into play.
• 8:50
  Speaker 2: So I am so glad you said that and I still say it God has a plan.
• 8:53
  Speaker 2: He has a plan for all of us, no matter what you do, whatever you, you know what your passion is and that's what I always tell people.
• 8:59
  Speaker 2: I do coaching.
• 9:00
  Speaker 2: As far as telling people, what is your passion, what do you want to do?
• 9:02
  Speaker 2: Because, being a corporate for 36 years, I said, okay, this is it.
• 9:07
  Speaker 2: This is not really what I want to spend the rest of my life with and same with you, deb.
• 9:12
  Speaker 2: Congratulations on 30.
• 9:14
  Speaker 2: How many years?
• 9:15
  Speaker 3: 32 here.
• 9:16
  Speaker 3: That's here alone I've been in radio.
• 9:19
  Speaker 3: Probably 40 total, but right here alone one station, 32 years.
• 9:25
  Speaker 2: You brought Cameron there when he was a baby yes, with you, right?
• 9:28
  Speaker 2: Well, yes, he grew up in this radio station and I was so excited, dennis and I, to come there for your award, but also to be in the station and to see Deborah, how the people just love her and what she does there.
• 9:44
  Speaker 2: So it's like a family and that's what makes it even better, having a family together and working together.
• 9:50
  Speaker 2: And even the guy that does what does he do?
• 9:51
  Speaker 2: He does news and there's music and stuff.
• 9:53
  Speaker 2: He showed us how that equipment works.
• 9:56
  Speaker 3: Oh, yes, that's our D.
• 9:57
  Speaker 3: That was our afternoon announcer KW.
• 9:59
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I was like it was just exciting to me.
• 10:01
  Speaker 2: I was like I see it, I hear it, but I didn't see it.
• 10:04
  Speaker 2: You never see how it actually operates Exactly.
• 10:07
  Speaker 2: So no, that was actually awesome there.
• 10:10
  Speaker 2: So what inspired you to pursue a career you were telling us about that in broadcasting and journalism what actually pursued?
• 10:19
  Speaker 3: I know you said you used to play with the newscaster.
• 10:20
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I guess that was it early part.
• 10:21
  Speaker 3: I'm not realizing it until maybe this year.
• 10:23
  Speaker 3: I was inspired by that and I liked watching Barbara Walters at the time, in 1976, being the first woman anchor on television.
• 10:35
  Speaker 3: I was inspired by her.
• 10:37
  Speaker 3: So I guess all of that kind of came into play and that was it was just a passion.
• 10:41
  Speaker 3: So I guess all of that kind of came into play and that was it was just a passion.
• 10:44
  Speaker 3: I remember when I was in Florida going to school at Florida Atlantic University and didn't really want to be there at the time.
• 10:48
  Speaker 3: It's not a place that I enjoy going to school, but my mother's girlfriend asked me she says what is it that you really want to do?
• 10:55
  Speaker 3: And I said I want to be a news reporter.
• 10:57
  Speaker 3: So she told me to write it in my Bible, write it on a piece of paper, everything, all my goals.
• 11:02
  Speaker 3: And I did and I wrote it and I put it in my favorite scripture.
• 11:05
  Speaker 3: Scripture at the time was the 23rd Psalms.
• 11:07
  Speaker 3: That was the first thing my grandmother taught me as a little girl 23rd Psalms.
• 11:10
  Speaker 3: I knew it by heart.
• 11:11
  Speaker 3: Anything that you were going through, always read the 23rd Psalms out loud, say it, recite it, and so that was where I placed it.
• 11:25
  Speaker 3: And to go back and see all of that come to fruition is just absolutely amazing.
• 11:27
  Speaker 3: God, you really did this.
• 11:27
  Speaker 3: You really put me where you wanted me to be.
• 11:29
  Speaker 3: And I look at it.
• 11:29
  Speaker 3: I'm not on national or anything like it, but I feel like I'm a big fish in a little pond and I enjoy the position that I am in.
• 11:38
  Speaker 3: My pastor had mentioned that in a sermon.
• 11:39
  Speaker 3: He said I enjoy the position that I am in.
• 11:40
  Speaker 3: My pastor had mentioned that in a sermon.
• 11:41
  Speaker 3: He said God places just where he wants us to be, and this is where I make the most difference.
• 11:47
  Speaker 3: And you brought up not too long ago I think it was September 12th that I received this Comcast Award.
• 11:52
  Speaker 3: Now, that was out of this world, knowing that people from a national level are watching you and I had no idea that they were watching anything that I was doing.
• 12:02
  Speaker 3: And when I looked on my LinkedIn account and they gave me their business cards every last one of them's name they had been following me for months, checking out.
• 12:12
  Speaker 3: When they decided they wanted to select a reporter from Dothan, they said it was hands down, I was the one that everyone called their name.
• 12:19
  Speaker 3: So that shows that I have made an impact in this community.
• 12:23
  Speaker 3: And to be named a champion of change, oh my God, it's just, I'm still.
• 12:27
  Speaker 3: And then all the nonprofits that actually benefited from that, because with six nonprofit organizations that I work with that I deal with, they all received computers, and the Hawk Houston Youth Enrichment Center received 12 computers and a $5,000 check.
• 12:45
  Speaker 3: That just warmed my heart so much because it's that the giving that I've given to them has been given back.
• 12:52
  Speaker 3: And so I was just so absolutely grateful and just.
• 12:55
  Speaker 3: And to be named the first champion of change ever through Comcast was just amazing.
• 13:00
  Speaker 3: Little girl from southeast Alabama, dothan, alabama, to receive that award, that was just amazing.
• 13:06
  Speaker 2: That's awesome, and I look at you because we've been knowing each other, especially when you meet my brother-in-law, pearsons.
• 13:12
  Speaker 2: So remember, pearsons, yes, amy, okay, no, and I mean I just smile that my father used to always dote on you as well as far as what you were doing and he was following you.
• 13:24
  Speaker 2: But no, that is something that you, I'm sure you are proud of.
• 13:29
  Speaker 2: I know I'm proud of you as far as how far you've come, because the same thing, when I was 10 years old, I said I want to be a social worker, not knowing that's what I was going to do.
• 13:38
  Speaker 2: I'm mentoring and I never realized that.
• 13:41
  Speaker 2: But God already has his plans for you.
• 13:43
  Speaker 2: He already knows.
• 13:44
  Speaker 2: We don't know the day we were born, he already planned it.
• 13:46
  Speaker 2: He already planned it.
• 13:48
  Speaker 2: We don't know.
• 13:49
  Speaker 2: And I say just coming from where we were.
• 13:51
  Speaker 2: As far as even me, little girl, I thought I would never be here.
• 13:54
  Speaker 2: I was told I'd never be anything.
• 13:55
  Speaker 2: And look at me now we got our own podcast.
• 13:58
  Speaker 2: You got our own podcast.
• 13:59
  Speaker 2: You got your own.
• 14:00
  Speaker 2: Director of Wolf FM.
• 14:02
  Speaker 3: When I do have a podcast online on Spotify, it's a crime series podcast.
• 14:06
  Speaker 3: So if I like that, you can check it out.
• 14:09
  Speaker 3: Yes, what's the name of it?
• 14:10
  Speaker 3: Sincere Voices of Victims?
• 14:13
  Speaker 3: It was named after a young boy that I mentored.
• 14:14
  Speaker 3: He was a high school student that I mentored.
• 14:17
  Speaker 3: His name was Sincere Tyson and he was gunned down in his apartment.
• 14:21
  Speaker 3: I think it'd be three years soon and he was just like my extra son, my bonus son, and that just tore me apart and I had.
• 14:29
  Speaker 3: My coworker said you need to have a podcast.
• 14:31
  Speaker 3: I'm like I don't want to do that.
• 14:33
  Speaker 3: He says you have all the sound, you have all these interviews that you've done.
• 14:37
  Speaker 3: And one day he came up with the name Sincere Boy and I just teared up and I said oh, I know that's in.
• 14:43
  Speaker 3: And I did call his mother and ask.
• 14:44
  Speaker 3: I said you always said that you wanted Sincere's name to live on and this way it will live on by me naming this podcast after him.
• 14:53
  Speaker 3: So the very first podcast is called it's Sincere Voices of Victims and the first story is about his, his story and his mother, and so there are four on there.
• 15:03
  Speaker 3: They're about 30, 40 minutes long.
• 15:05
  Speaker 3: We do take our time and produce them.
• 15:07
  Speaker 3: So that's why they don't come out so quickly, because we do take our time with them, but they're very interesting stories.
• 15:13
  Speaker 3: I'm a part of the Wiregrass Angel House, which is a victim's crime organization that helps families to get over the trauma of being murdered family members and things of that nature.
• 15:25
  Speaker 3: So I joined their board a couple probably about two years ago, and so we do things for them and so that's how I get the stories and there's so many out there, because crime happens every day, unfortunately.
• 15:37
  Speaker 3: But this is a platform for them to tell their stories, to just get it out for them, and it's a healing.
• 15:44
  Speaker 3: It's healing for them.
• 15:46
  Speaker 2: That's awesome, I tell you I, and I'm going to follow that to the planet as well.
• 15:52
  Speaker 2: I know you did learn about the teenagers as well.
• 15:55
  Speaker 3: Yes, jodi Beasley and Tracy Hollett.
• 15:58
  Speaker 3: That was on 2020.
• 15:58
  Speaker 3: And that was an experience to be on a national, for them to call me out of the blue, it was amazing also.
• 16:07
  Speaker 2: I saw that.
• 16:08
  Speaker 2: I saw that.
• 16:08
  Speaker 2: I said, well, look.
• 16:09
  Speaker 2: Then it says Deborah Pearson.
• 16:11
  Speaker 2: You said Debbie, I know that's what it said.
• 16:13
  Speaker 2: It's hard for me to say Deborah.
• 16:16
  Speaker 2: I'm like I'm going to say Deborah Pearson, debra Pearson, y'all.
• 16:19
  Speaker 2: Yeah, she's on LinkedIn all the time.
• 16:21
  Speaker 2: So you really definitely need to follow her on LinkedIn because she and see all the awards that she's getting.
• 16:26
  Speaker 2: I am so proud of you again.
• 16:28
  Speaker 2: So let's wind it down.
• 16:30
  Speaker 2: What does a typical day as a director at Wolf FM look like?
• 16:34
  Speaker 2: The last?
• 16:35
  Speaker 3: two years it looks pretty different because I was afternoon for 30 years, so now morning.
• 16:40
  Speaker 3: So I am up at 4.30 every morning, here by 5.30, and to the gather, get into that mode of gathering and what am I going to talk about?
• 16:49
  Speaker 3: And that's mainly the morning.
• 16:51
  Speaker 3: The morning show is very fast, a very fast pace.
• 16:53
  Speaker 3: If you listen to any morning show on the radio, you have your two DJs we have two here in the morning that they talk and everything and then they come in with my cut ends for the news and it's usually from the day before, because that's really what mornings are.
• 17:06
  Speaker 3: And then the afternoon I may go out and cover maybe commission meetings or whatever that's going on in the community and have that ready for the next morning.
• 17:14
  Speaker 3: So that's usually a typical day.
• 17:16
  Speaker 3: I usually do a lot of interviews.
• 17:18
  Speaker 3: Because this is a community-based station, I try to do a lot of community-related stories of things that are happening in this community.
• 17:26
  Speaker 3: I think you hear enough bad news.
• 17:28
  Speaker 3: There's a lot of bad news.
• 17:29
  Speaker 3: That goes on every day.
• 17:30
  Speaker 3: And so when I took this position two years ago, I said what do I want to do differently compared to what I've done in the past when we had a two-person team for 30 years.
• 17:39
  Speaker 3: John would take care of most of the hard news and I would do more of the community-based news, and that's what I really love to do, and I do a lot of interviews.
• 17:48
  Speaker 3: People come in the station and we talk and put stories together.
• 17:51
  Speaker 3: We put the community information together.
• 17:53
  Speaker 3: So that's what I really enjoy doing.
• 17:56
  Speaker 3: And just to hear people say I really enjoy listening to your news because it's not the typical hardcore news, it's more what's happening.
• 18:03
  Speaker 3: I don't have to go fumbling and looking for it on social media because you announce it while I'm in my car or if I'm in Dollar General or Walmart, wherever they have us on.
• 18:13
  Speaker 3: But by us being a powerhouse station, a lot of local stores have our radio station on, so I'm known pretty much everywhere I go.
• 18:21
  Speaker 3: I don't even have to say my name.
• 18:23
  Speaker 3: They hear my voice.
• 18:24
  Speaker 3: Oh, we know who you are.
• 18:27
  Speaker 2: That's awesome.
• 18:28
  Speaker 2: And then just being recognized just by your name and your voice is so inspiring.
• 18:32
  Speaker 2: So let me ask you another question In the age of digital and social media, how do you see the role of radio evolving?
• 18:39
  Speaker 2: I know we were talking about that before.
• 18:42
  Speaker 3: It's going to be different.
• 18:43
  Speaker 3: I think right now we'll say that radio and TV.
• 18:46
  Speaker 3: There's some things that are going on with the large corporations.
• 18:49
  Speaker 3: They're cutting back a lot of the.
• 18:50
  Speaker 3: We just had a big cut back here gray communications.
• 18:54
  Speaker 3: They cut about 11, 12 jobs, Young people who just got hired on, and they're combining stations.
• 19:00
  Speaker 3: So that doesn't look good for them.
• 19:03
  Speaker 3: Radio the blessing with us, we're not owned by a corporation.
• 19:06
  Speaker 3: We are a family-owned station, so they have the liberty to do whatever it is they want us to do.
• 19:11
  Speaker 3: Social media we don't do social media too much.
• 19:15
  Speaker 3: We can't really like to have our own control, because when you start putting things on social media, it's easier for you to get sued, in a sense that a lawyer, especially with a case, you said this on the air or you said that and we want.
• 19:28
  Speaker 3: We used to go to court a lot back in the day so we started saying, oh no, we're not doing this anymore, so we stay away from the social media and just let everything be heard live or recorded, and so I really don't know.
• 19:41
  Speaker 3: But I think there probably going to be some, maybe some digital platforms, some sort of way, where they'll combine radio with something.
• 19:49
  Speaker 3: A lot of things I'm seeing too, like Don Lemon, that they're not with the corporations anymore, but they're doing their own podcast, just like you're doing.
• 19:57
  Speaker 3: They're doing that now, and so I think we're going to see a lot more of that, I believe.
• 20:01
  Speaker 2: Yeah, no, that's great.
• 20:02
  Speaker 2: That's great information that you're telling us here.
• 20:05
  Speaker 2: So how does Wook FM engage its audience to remain relevant and impactful?
• 20:10
  Speaker 2: And I think you mentioned that already Community, we're all about community.
• 20:15
  Speaker 3: We're the station you can bring your dog to work.
• 20:17
  Speaker 3: We're just so family oriented and a lot of people, actually a majority of the people here are family members.
• 20:26
  Speaker 3: You have daughters of KW People here are family members.
• 20:28
  Speaker 3: You have daughters of KW His daughter is on the air now.
• 20:30
  Speaker 3: You have sales teams that are husband and wives.
• 20:33
  Speaker 3: You have the owners mother, daughter, husband, wife, that kind of thing.
• 20:38
  Speaker 3: So a lot of that has worked here.
• 20:40
  Speaker 3: My son even started here in high school.
• 20:42
  Speaker 3: He was our mascot wolf, so that's like the groundbreaking when you come in here you've got to put that wolf costume on and get out there in the community.
• 20:51
  Speaker 3: So we all about community and I think everybody knows us by that and we give away money.
• 20:56
  Speaker 3: We're a big station that gives away money.
• 20:58
  Speaker 3: We just gave away a 2024 Mustang for our 60th birthday anniversary.
• 21:03
  Speaker 3: We do a lot of things in the community and people love us.
• 21:06
  Speaker 2: We're just a station that people love to listen to a lot of things in the community and people love us.
• 21:10
  Speaker 2: We're just a station that people love to listen to.
• 21:11
  Speaker 2: That's great, because actually you wanted to add what I was going to ask you about community involvement.
• 21:15
  Speaker 3: So you've already oh yeah, definitely, we are definitely community involved.
• 21:17
  Speaker 3: I am definitely community involved.
• 21:19
  Speaker 3: Next week we'll be doing something with Wiregrass Angel House.
• 21:23
  Speaker 3: We're going to do our second annual Fly Me to the North Pole.
• 21:31
  Speaker 3: So these kids who are victims or who have been traumatized by some life trauma experience, we're taking them out to the airport, we're putting them on a plane, we're going to fly them around for 15 minutes and bring them to a winter wonderland and provide them with gifts, and some of the computers that I won through Comcast will be given to some of these kids, and so we're just so excited to put smiles on those kids' faces and that just warms my heart and anything that I can do in this community to see a child smile.
• 21:57
  Speaker 3: Anybody who goes through trauma, I'm always out there.
• 21:59
  Speaker 3: If you see me, I'm boots on the ground.
• 22:01
  Speaker 3: Anybody who knows me, I am boots on the ground.
• 22:05
  Speaker 2: And that's awesome what you do Because, like I said, that's how you be blessed by blessing other people.
• 22:09
  Speaker 2: So that is great.
• 22:10
  Speaker 2: I love the community involvement and engagement that you all have.
• 22:14
  Speaker 2: So what advice would you give to aspiring journalists looking to make an impact in their communities?
• 22:21
  Speaker 3: Things that have gone away by the wayside is shadowing.
• 22:24
  Speaker 3: You do not see a lot of young people wanting to shadow.
• 22:32
  Speaker 3: They want to do their own thing.
• 22:32
  Speaker 3: You have got to, uh, start from ground up before you get.
• 22:35
  Speaker 3: You cannot start way up here and in the very beginning and asking for a fifteen thousand dollar salary.
• 22:42
  Speaker 3: I started with peanut, but look where god has brought me.
• 22:44
  Speaker 3: He has always protected me, he's always guided me and he's always provided for me.
• 22:48
  Speaker 3: But please, mentor you.
• 22:51
  Speaker 3: Get somebody who's been in the business, whatever it is that you want to do, find somebody in that community to follow them, to shadow them and let them mentor you, because that's the best lesson you can learn from anywhere.
• 23:04
  Speaker 3: I think even working at WVAS back in the day of college, those professionals who had been in radio for so long.
• 23:11
  Speaker 3: I lived in the radio station and that's how I was able to learn so much.
• 23:16
  Speaker 3: I was their sunup sign to after class.
• 23:18
  Speaker 3: I was always in the radio station.
• 23:19
  Speaker 3: You could never find me anywhere else but there, and that's why I like to bring on college students here to go out with me and see how I do things and learn that way.
• 23:28
  Speaker 3: That's the best experience you can ever get is learning firsthand.
• 23:34
  Speaker 2: That's awesome and that's true.
• 23:35
  Speaker 2: We used to have at IBM.
• 23:36
  Speaker 2: We used to have interns, people that came there, and the good thing about it is that when you do that, you end up maybe getting hired Exactly At the station or at the jobs corporate.
• 23:47
  Speaker 2: So that is so relevant what you're saying here.
• 23:49
  Speaker 2: So now we were talking about the future.
• 23:51
  Speaker 2: So what about the future of Wolf FM?
• 23:53
  Speaker 2: What are the goals, your goals, for Wolf FM in the next five years?
• 23:58
  Speaker 2: Retirement Retirement.
• 24:05
  Speaker 3: I'll be 67 in the next five years, so I hope to be able to retire.
• 24:10
  Speaker 3: Last time you and I talked right around Thanksgiving I think it was you had asked me why don't you write a book, and I was like no, I don't want to do that, I don't want to do that.
• 24:19
  Speaker 3: Shortly after I think you were probably about the third person that said that to me- that is speaking to you, yes.
• 24:26
  Speaker 3: And so I went to lunch with the general manager for one of the TV stations here, and that was her question as well.
• 24:33
  Speaker 3: I'm like no.
• 24:34
  Speaker 3: I says OK, you're probably the fifth person who said that.
• 24:37
  Speaker 3: And she says Deborah, you've got to do it, You've got to do it, You've got so much to tell.
• 24:41
  Speaker 3: And so that day I went home and I started writing.
• 24:44
  Speaker 3: So I am in the early stages of writing, writing.
• 24:50
  Speaker 3: So I am in the early stages of writing.
• 24:51
  Speaker 3: And I think I've changed the title three or four times since then.
• 24:53
  Speaker 3: And she says you want to change some more.
• 24:54
  Speaker 3: But she says I'm here to guide you and I know you will be there to do the same thing.
• 24:58
  Speaker 3: But it is a work in progress.
• 25:00
  Speaker 3: So I am working on it.
• 25:01
  Speaker 3: I'm setting a, I guess, a temporary date to be released on my birthday oh man, that's in June and if not, then this time next year.
• 25:10
  Speaker 3: So I'm pushing myself.
• 25:12
  Speaker 2: No, that's great Because I'm going to tell you.
• 25:14
  Speaker 2: When I started writing, I said I would never write a book and one of my clients called me.
• 25:20
  Speaker 2: She said Wanda, god told me to call you.
• 25:22
  Speaker 2: I said oh, what do you say?
• 25:26
  Speaker 2: You know part of the book collaboration.
• 25:31
  Speaker 2: Collaboration, which is the book, is actually audacity to shine.
• 25:33
  Speaker 2: I just told my girlfriend.
• 25:33
  Speaker 2: I said I'm not gonna write a book.
• 25:34
  Speaker 2: So when she said that, I said okay, god, I guess she's speaking to me here and the same thing that's happened with you that, deborah, I said it's time for you to write a book, really get your story out.
• 25:45
  Speaker 2: And actually my editor she told me she's, she was reading my story and it took a while because what I did?
• 25:51
  Speaker 2: I buried a lot of stuff deep inside that helped me to bring it out.
• 25:55
  Speaker 2: And her daughter told me Mommy, you need to go see a counselor, because they read the portion of the collaboration book and I was like, why do I need it?
• 26:03
  Speaker 2: I don't need to see no counselor, I don't need to see no therapist.
• 26:06
  Speaker 2: What are you talking about?
• 26:07
  Speaker 2: So that actually helped me to move forward.
• 26:11
  Speaker 2: And then I was part of another collaboration book, a lady from California, impact of One Voice Now never say never.
• 26:20
  Speaker 2: And actually that was the name of my title in that book Never say never because God has a plan for you.
• 26:24
  Speaker 2: And then that's when I wrote my own book.
• 26:28
  Speaker 2: So, deborah, I am so excited to hear you writing a book now, and I want to be the first one that you autographed to send it to.
• 26:36
  Speaker 3: Well, my pastor, I'm not sure.
• 26:38
  Speaker 3: His second book is coming out and it's, I guess.
• 26:41
  Speaker 3: He's talking about our old school, which was Ashford Grimsley Colored High School, and he's talking about old past teachers and people who influenced us along the way.
• 26:51
  Speaker 3: And then he says I want to include you in my book, and I was like what?
• 26:54
  Speaker 3: So I will be a part of his next book that's coming out, so that'll be the first time.
• 27:01
  Speaker 3: It's just pretty much what you've read about me as far as my bio, but then I do need to as far as my bio, but then I do need to dig a little deeper.
• 27:10
  Speaker 3: There's a lot there out of me too that I need to allow to come out.
• 27:14
  Speaker 2: Yes, it starts with that collaboration and that's why I said I'm glad I started with that collaboration, because that actually helped me to start the process.
• 27:21
  Speaker 2: And my girlfriend said why don't you just get a journal?
• 27:23
  Speaker 2: Just start.
• 27:24
  Speaker 2: I would sit down and stay up, watch the TV on my phone and my notes.
• 27:27
  Speaker 2: Exactly Something comes to me and I just start writing things down.
• 27:30
  Speaker 2: Then I brought it all together.
• 27:32
  Speaker 2: I'm doing the same thing.
• 27:34
  Speaker 2: I'm journaling, basically.
• 27:35
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I used to write poetry.
• 27:37
  Speaker 2: Whenever I got depressed, I just started writing things.
• 27:39
  Speaker 2: So you can do it.
• 27:40
  Speaker 2: So we're winding down here, girl.
• 27:42
  Speaker 2: I've been having you on for hours here, so what is the most valuable lesson you've learned in your career so far?
• 27:49
  Speaker 2: Who?
• 27:50
  Speaker 3: most valuable lesson?
• 27:52
  Speaker 3: I don't know, that's a hard one one that's what you're gonna put in your book what's valuable is.
• 28:04
  Speaker 2: I have learned so many lessons along the way and what comes to your mind, something to just say.
• 28:13
  Speaker 3: There's nothing that just sticks out right now.
• 28:16
  Speaker 2: That's okay.
• 28:16
  Speaker 2: That's okay, Actually.
• 28:18
  Speaker 2: My last question I want to ask you is how do you maintain creativity and passion in such a dynamic and demanding field?
• 28:26
  Speaker 3: One thing about reporting the passion comes from what.
• 28:30
  Speaker 3: And if you have a passion about telling your story, it was one thing.
• 28:33
  Speaker 3: When I first started here with my news director at the time, john Daniel, when I would go out and report, I was so nervous because this was a, this was a different type of beast compared to what I had learned in college and so this was the big league.
• 28:46
  Speaker 3: And I'm like, how am I going to do this?
• 28:48
  Speaker 3: And I'll never forget it was a story, it was a 1992, I believe it was a standoff in Enterprise, alabama and I was.
• 28:59
  Speaker 3: It turned out tragic and I was just so nervous I was shaking to see two people murdered right in front of my face and and he said you got to tell me what happened.
• 29:07
  Speaker 3: You got to tell me what happened.
• 29:08
  Speaker 3: And he said use your eyes, tell me with your eyes.
• 29:13
  Speaker 3: And that probably is the most valuable lesson I've learned from this and that is how I've learned how to report is using my eyes and visually telling my audience, because they can't see what we're doing.
• 29:28
  Speaker 3: I've got to pass that along to listeners.
• 29:30
  Speaker 3: So I'm their eyes and their ears and so that has taken me so far and I have a very keen ear when it comes to listening to different things and different sounds and I keep a recorder on all the time and I pick up those sounds and I put those.
• 29:46
  Speaker 3: It's just like putting a puzzle together sound with your voice and with the story, and it all comes together and it turns out being an Abby or an AP award-winning story.
• 29:57
  Speaker 2: So there you go.
• 29:58
  Speaker 2: I remember years ago when you started doing this here and just listen to your voice on the radio and the passion Is that Debra talking there.
• 30:08
  Speaker 3: You said that to Debbie.
• 30:12
  Speaker 2: Well, I am so excited that I've had you on the Ready Set Collaborate podcast, deborah Pearson, and I really welcome you to come back, because we definitely know I'll have you back next year because we're going to see how that book is going.
• 30:25
  Speaker 2: We're going to talk about your book, so how about that?
• 30:27
  Speaker 2: But thank you for being on the Ready Set Collaborate podcast.
• 30:31
  Speaker 2: Audience, make sure you follow Ready Set Collaborate on all podcast platforms, and I want to make sure that you listen to some of my guests that have already been on here.
• 30:40
  Speaker 2: It's very valuable information and you will learn a lot.
• 30:45
  Speaker 2: So I'm looking for sponsors.
• 30:46
  Speaker 2: If you'd like to be a sponsor of one of our shows, please let me know.
• 30:49
  Speaker 2: Thanks again, deb and I call her Deb too for being on my podcast.
• 30:54
  Speaker 2: What a great interview that I just had with you.
• 31:01
  Speaker 2: So you just really brought this information out to us.
• 31:03
  Speaker 2: But thank you so much for being on my podcast.
• 31:04
  Speaker 2: It's a pleasure.
• 31:04
  Speaker 2: Thank you, audience, listen to the next Ready Set Collaborate podcast and we're going to bring it all back in to talk about 2025.
• 31:14
  Speaker 2: Thank you.
• 31:15
  Speaker 2: Thank you, def.
• 31:15
  Speaker 2: Thank you, wanda.
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: Thank you for tuning into this episode of Ready Set.
• 31:20
  Speaker 1: Collaborate For more information about the host.
• 31:23
  Speaker 1: Head to WDPearsonAssociatescom and that's P-E-A-R-S-O-N.
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: Want to connect?
• 31:33
  Speaker 1: Send an email to Wanda at WDPearsonAssociatescom and, as always, stay tuned for the next episode of Ready Set.
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: Collaborate.