Melissa Harrison
Melissa Harrison is a bilingual journalist with more than 20 years of experience in television and radio news. She has worked as a news anchor/reporter in six different television newsrooms around the country including WNBC in New York City and WFAA and KXAS in Dallas/Fort Worth. Harrison has also worked as a writer for ABC's World News Tonight and as a morning news anchor for CBS Radio.
Harrison began her career at the NBC affiliate in Waco as an executive producer. She landed her first on-air job at KRBC-TV in Abilene where she co-anchored the evening 6 p.m. and 10 p.m. newscasts. Harrison went on to report at WAPT-TV in Jackson, MS, and then was an anchor/reporter at WBRC-TV in Birmingham, AL. She returned to her hometown in North Texas when she joined the team at WFAA-TV as a weekend morning anchor/weekday reporter.
Harrison moved to New York City to earn her master’s degree from Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism. Her dissertation focused on grief and traumatic loss and included the stories of people she interviewed over the years. While in NYC, Harrison continued her career in television news as a reporter at WNBC-TV and later as a freelance writer at ABC's World News Tonight.
In addition to her professional experience, Harrison has six years of experience as a full-time professor, including her previous appointment as a professor of practice in the Journalism Department at TCU. She earned a master’s degree from Columbia University in New York City and her bachelor’s degree at Baylor University, where she double majored in communications and Spanish.
Harrison also studied with Syracuse University at the Instituto Internacional in Madrid, Spain. She speaks frequently at conferences and industry events globally each year including recently in Santiago, Chile; Jakarta, Indonesia; Prague, Czech Republic and Manila, Philippines.
Harrison is passionate about helping students prepare for a career in digital journalism and is honored to serve on the faculty in SMU's Division of Journalism.
