Melony Jones Shemberger, a professor of journalism and mass communications and a member of the Board of Regents at Murray State University, has been chosen as the winner of the Talisman Award for Outstanding Contributions in Communications for 2024-25.
The award will be presented to Shemberger at the WKU Student Publications Centennial Celebration on April 25-26, marking a century of excellence for WKU’s flagship student-run publications, the Talisman and the College Heights Herald.
Shemberger is a Hopkinsville native. She earned bachelor of science degrees in mass communications and history/government in 1993 from WKU, where she served on the staffs of the College Heights Herald and the Talisman. After graduating, she began her professional media career in radio news for WHOP-AM in Hopkinsville before moving into advertising at The Leaf-Chronicle newspaper in Clarksville, Tennessee. She later became assistant news director at WHOP and then worked at The Kentucky New Era, covering education, courts and business news. She also was an education reporter for The Todd County Standard in Elkton.
Beginning in 2005, Shemberger worked in the public relations and marketing office at Austin Peay State University, where she also was an adjunct instructor.
In addition to a bachelor’s degree from WKU, Shemberger has a master’s degree in mass communications from Murray State University (2004), a master’s in management from APSU (2006), a Doctor of Education in higher education administration and supervision from Tennessee State University (2011), and a master’s in instructional design from the University of Kentucky (2021), where she also received a Certificate in Distance Education. She is pursuing a fourth master’s, library and information science, at the University of Arizona. She has a Teaching Online Certificate from Quality Matters (QM), considered the gold standard in online education, and is certified as a QM Master Peer Reviewer.
Shemberger began her Murray State career in 2012 as an adjunct instructor and became an assistant professor in the journalism and mass communications department in 2013. She was promoted to associate professor in 2018, earned tenure in 2019, and promoted to full professor in 2023.
At Murray State, Shemberger serves as assessment coordinator for the undergraduate programs in the Department of Journalism and Mass Communications, one of 111 programs in the nation and one of three in Kentucky (including WKU and the University of Kentucky) accredited by the Accrediting Council on Education in Journalism and Mass Communications.
Shemberger is in her second term as faculty regent on the Murray State board. The faculty elected her to a three-year term in 2019 and re-elected her in 2022, with her current term expiring June 30, 2025. Since 2019, she has chaired the board’s Academic Excellence and Scholarly Activities Committee.
Outside of her work at Murray State, Shemberger is campus director of the Governor’s Scholars Program at Murray. She and her husband, Russ, a Certified First Assist/Certified Surgical Technologist, are avid triathletes and runners. The couple resides in Murray.
Shemberger is the 27th winner of the Talisman Award, which honors alumni of WKU Student Publications who have made significant contributions in the communications fields and built a reputation for excellence in their work.
Those wishing to attend the Centennial Weekend celebration, during which the Talisman Award will be presented, can register by no later than April 4 at https://alumni.wku.edu/centennialweekend.
WKU Student Publications is celebrating a century of excellence, with the Talisman founded in 1924 as a yearbook and the College Heights Herald publishing its first edition on Jan. 29, 1925. It is one of the most honored student-run media groups in the country, amassing 50 Associated Collegiate Press Pacemaker awards, the highest honor in student media, since its first in 1978 for Talisman and in 1981 for the College Heights Herald. Since then, the Herald has won 25 Pacemakers; Talisman, 22; Cherry Creative, 1; and Cherry along with Student Publications Advertising, 2.