Marissanne Lewis-Thompson
Marissanne Lewis-Thompson joined the KRCU team in November 2015 as a feature reporter. She was born and raised in Kansas City, Missouri where she grew up watching a lot documentaries on PBS, which inspired her to tell stories. In May 2015, she graduated from the University of Missouri with a Bachelor of Journalism degree in Convergence Journalism. Marissanne comes to KRCU from KBIA, where she worked as a reporter, producer and supervising editor while covering stories on arts and culture, education and diversity.
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Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library program is now statewide in Missouri. The program provides children with a free book in the mail each month until their fifth birthday. The goal is to nurture a love of reading and improve literacy. -
The United States Army has granted $1.2 million to a University of Missouri researcher to study combat wound infections. The research will focus on non-intravenous, topical and localized antibiotic treatments.
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Dred Scott, the enslaved man whose case made it to the U.S. Supreme Court, is getting a new memorial monument. The Dred Scott Heritage Foundation is dedicating the monument in his honor on Saturday at Calvary Cemetery in St. Louis.
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Installed at Mehlville Fire Protection District Station 2 in south St. Louis County, the box is a secured incubator that new mothers in crisis can leave their newborns in if they are not able to care for the child.
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A new St. Charles City-County library policy requires anyone under 18 to have a parent or guardian present to sign up for a library card. The move came in response to new rules from Missouri Secretary of State Jay Ashcroft threatening funding for libraries over "age-inappropriate" materials.
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According to findings from a Right Time survey, more than 50% of Missourians do not believe or know that emergency contraception is legal. The survey also found that roughly 72% of respondents across party lines want the state legislature to pass laws that make birth control more accessible and affordable.
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The federally protected birds are preying on newborn livestock. Missouri's black vulture bird population has grown from 14,000 in 2015 to roughly 21,000 in 2021, which is only worsening the problem.
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The Veterans Community Project, a Kansas City-based nonprofit, is building tiny homes and an outreach center in the JeffVanderLou neighborhood to help veterans who are experiencing homelessness.
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A one-room schoolhouse built in 1894 for African American children is moving to a St. Louis County park where it will be restored. African School #4 had been converted into a garage after the schoolhouse closed in the 1950s.
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Michael Brown Jr.'s father and stepmother are still hopeful the former Ferguson police officer who shot their son will be held accountable. Yet the family also is focused on healing.
