Brown, Clayton, Griggs named 2026 Grady College Fellowship inductees

Grady College proudly announces the 2026 Fellowship inductees: Tracy Brown (ABJ ’88), Maureen Clayton (ABJ ’80, MA ’84) and Alan Griggs (ABJ ’72). Brown is inducted into the Grady Fellowship as the recipient of the John Holliman Lifetime Achievement Award.

Established in 2008, the Grady Fellowship honors friends of the college whose accomplishments, friendship and service to the industries they serve have made a positive impact on Grady College.

The Fellows will be inducted and recognized along with the 2026 Alumni Award recipients during the annual Grady Salutes luncheon on Friday, March 27.

Tracy Brown is the chief partnership officer of Chicago Public Media. She also oversees advertising and sponsorship at WBEZ public radio and the Chicago Sun-Times newspaper. Over the past several years, she has served as managing editor of WBEZ and chief content officer of WBEZ and The Chicago Sun-Times. Brown spent more than a decade as the news leader at The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, including as deputy manager editor and Page 1 editor, as well as editor of features, arts and education. She also served as an editor at the Dallas Morning News and worked at the St. Petersburg Times (now Tampa Bay Times) and South Carolina’s The State newspaper. She is a past chair of the Grady College Alumni Board and a longtime member of the National Association of Black Journalists.

Maureen Clayton is the president and founder of Insight Strategic Communications, a firm specializing in strategy, thought leadership and employment branding. She is also the founder of Nest Egg Communications, a financial education business. Insight Strategic Communications was recognized four consecutive years by the University of Georgia’s Bulldog 100, a ranking of the fastest growing UGA alumni-owned businesses. In 2017, Clayton was a recipient of the UGA Graduate School Alumni of Distinction Award. She has previously served on the UGA Alumni Board, the Entrepreneurship Program Board and the University Library Board of Visitors. She currently co-chairs the Grady College AdPR Executive Advisory Board.

Alan Griggs is a senior manager of communications with diverse experience including television news reporting and management; political, corporate and crisis communications; and teaching. He is currently associate professor in the School of Communication at Lipscomb University, and he has served in similar roles at Tennessee State University, the University of Tennessee and Western Kentucky University. Griggs spent nearly 20 years at WSMV-TV in Nashville, first as a reporter and working his way up to news director, a position he held for nine years. His television career also includes political assignment work for NBC News and work at WBZ-TV in Boston, where he was an investigative reporter and manager of its investigative unit. Griggs has received numerous awards throughout his career including three Peabody Awards, a duPont-Columbia citation for a documentary on the Ku Klux Klan and an Edward R. Murrow award for broadcast excellence, among others. He was the John Holliman Jr. Lifetime Achievement Award honoree by Grady College in 2014, prior to the time that honorees of this award were automatically inducted into the Fellowship.

Sponsorship information and reservations to Grady Salutes can be found on the Grady Salutes webpage.

Author: Sarah Freeman, freemans@uga.edu