2023 Alumni Awards

Honorary Alumnus Award Fred Klein is senior managing partner at Childress Klein, one of the largest full‑service commercial real estate firms in the Southeast. He has been responsible for new business activities and investor relationships, as well as leveraging his 45+ years of experience developing commercial real estate across the southeast region to help the firm […]

Distinguished Faculty Award Dr. Tracy Rock is a professor of reading and elementary education in the Cato College of Education. Her teaching and research interests include inquiry models of teacher professional development, social studies education and service learning. Tracy is a faculty fellow for the Center for Teaching and supervises the college teaching seminar teaching internship […]

Outstanding Young Alumnus Award Andrew Baker is a digital marketing leader for Autobell Car Wash. In addition, he and his wife, Emily, founded Prohibition Candle Company in 2022. This small business of creating handcrafted soy candles, inspired by craft cocktails, has been a great opportunity to leverage Andrew’s skills to grow a hobby into a business.  Andrew […]

Distinguished Alumna Award Jane Wu founded Panorama Holdings, a real estate development and investment firm in 2014. Since Panorama’s inception, she has overseen and guided $600 million real estate transactions across multifamily, office, retail, mixed-use and hotels. Prior to establishing Panorama, Jane was an investment banker at Bank of America and Wells Fargo.  Jane is a […]

Distinguished Alumnus Award Dontá Wilson is chief retail and small business banking officer and a member of the executive leadership team for Truist Financial Corporation, where he is responsible for leading world-class, distinctive client banking experiences powered by innovative technology and personal service. He leads 22,000 teammates in the retail, small business and premier segments […]

Distinguished Alumna Award Kathy Merritt serves as senior vice president for radio, journalism, and CSG services at the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, where she is responsible for leading efforts to distribute more than $300 million annually in community service grants to qualified public radio and television stations and for advancing  public media’s journalism efforts, locally, regionally […]