Barbara Shelly
ContributorBarbara Shelly is a veteran journalist based in Kansas City, Missouri. She has been an opinion columnist, metro columnist, editor and reporter for The Kansas City Star and is currently a contributing editor and writer for news outlets in Kansas City.
Barbara specializes in writing about Kansas and Missouri state governments, schools and colleges and health care.
Her interests include bikes, biographies, piano, people, family, friends, cats and kids. Her favorite pursuits are travel and hanging out on her front porch in Kansas City’s Waldo neighborhood.
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Kansas City Public Schools has goals to increase its numbers of Black and Latino teachers. A parents’ group says that’s race-based hiring and it’s discriminatory. -
KCUR is the latest of several NPR affiliates to unionize. Employees at St. Louis Public Radio voted to form a union in June 2023 and are still working to finalize a contract with the University of Missouri. -
Impact KCK in the Kansas City, Kansas school district is a national model for how communities can address student homelessness by bringing different organizations and resources together to connect families to stable housing, jobs and other services. -
School districts are required by law to help homeless children stay in school. Most Kansas City-area districts take that role seriously, but the Blue Springs School District may be undercounting its unhoused kids — and failing to provide them critical services. -
Research shows that students who are worried about having a safe place to stay ihave lower grade point averages than their peers and higher rates of anxiety and depression. But housing options are rare at urban community colleges — and not offered at other systems in the Kansas City area. -
Mayors and local officials founded Climate Action KC, and are taking measurable steps to reduce emissions and create healthier communities throughout the Kansas City metro. -
The district’s financial picture has improved, partly with the help of federal COVID aid, and the board last year approved a substantial pay bump for teachers. -
Kansas City, Kansas, Police try something new to get unlicensed cars off the road: Teach driver's edBecause the Kansas City region mostly lacks reliable public transportation, people routinely drive without valid licenses. But that can mean court dates, escalating fines and bewildering encounters with law enforcement and legal bureaucracies -
Eviction numbers in many big cities are staggering, and school districts struggle to serve kids constantly on the move. The coronavirus crisis is making that job harder. -
Cancer survivors and their loved ones who attend meetings of the Prostate Network in Kansas City have talked for years about a radiation treatment called…
