McGill Fellows named for 2026

Thirteen students have been named 2026 McGill Fellows by the Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication. This year’s class includes 10 undergraduate students and three graduate students.

Each student was selected by a faculty committee for their strengths in academics, practical experience and leadership. 

The 2026 McGill Fellows are:

• Jamal Affo, advertising, Atlanta, Georgia
• Ashtin Barker (AB ’25), graduate student, Lilburn, Georgia
• Courtney Craft, political science and journalism, Dunwoody, Georgia
• Demi Gilstrap, journalism major and communication studies minor, Grayson, Georgia
• Mollie Beth Johnson, journalism, Box Springs, Georgia 
• Emily Laycock, journalism major and international affairs minor, Dacula, Georgia
• Allison Mawn (AB ’25), graduate student, Marietta, Georgia
• Ziggy Moon, journalism, Conyers, Georgia
• Felix Scheyer (AB ’25), graduate student, Augusta, Georgia
• Helen Slawson, journalism major, law, ethics and philosophy, Atlanta, Georgia
• Laney Spevacek, journalism and theatre, ASL minor, Lilburn Georgia
• Mia Tanner, journalism and English minor, Cumming, Georgia
• Nathan Valles, journalism major and sports management minor, Woodstock, Georgia

The McGill Fellows were responsible for researching nominees and selecting the recipient of the 2026 McGill Medal for Journalistic Courage. Tamir Kalifa, this year’s recipient, was announced last week. Kalifa is a Berlin-based visual journalist, writer and musician with 15 years of global experience. 

The McGill Fellows and Andrea Bruce, Knight Chair in Visual Journalism and director of the McGill program, will participate in the McGill Fellows Symposium and present the McGill Medal on April 24, at 11 a.m. in Studio 100 in Grady College. The event brings together students, faculty and leading journalists to consider what journalistic courage means and how it is exemplified by reporters and editors.

For this year’s McGill Symposium, Kalifa will deliver a lecture, accept the medal and the fellows will be recognized. Felix Scheyer (AB ’25), a master’s student and the McGill Fellow who nominated Kalifa, will moderate a Q&A with Kalifa and a presentation of his work following his lecture.

This is the seventeenth McGill Fellows class since the honor was introduced in 2007. 

The McGill program for journalistic courage grew out of the McGill Lecture which, for more than 40 years, has brought significant figures in journalism to the University of Georgia to help honor Ralph McGill’s courage as an editor. 

McGill, while editor and publisher of The Atlanta Constitution, was regarded as the “conscience of the south,” using the newspaper’s editorial pages to challenge segregation in the 1950s and 1960s. McGill was awarded a Pulitzer Prize in 1958 for “long, courageous and effective leadership.” 

The McGill program is funded in part by the McGill Lecture Endowment. 

Author: Sam Tupper, Samuel.tupper@uga.edu