Contact: Harriet Laird

STARKVILLE, Miss.—Mississippi State Department of Communication Instructor Amy Knight is the university’s first Luckyday Scholars Program Faculty Fellow.

Knight’s career has deep roots with the Luckyday Program, having begun her service with the initiative in 2004 as a graduate assistant and then as assistant director in 2006 for two years at the University of Southern Mississippi.

MSU’s program, established in 2019 by the Luckyday Foundation in Jackson, welcomed 24 new students this fall. Plans are for a major expansion over the next several years of the university’s program, which engages a community of student scholars in servant leadership through Luckyday’s core values of scholarship, community, service and leadership.

A recipient of a 2021 MSU Department of Communication Faculty Award for Excellence in Teaching, Knight was nationally recognized as Lambda Sigma Honor Society’s Outstanding Advisor last fall. She was the recipient of the society’s sole advisor award, selected for her work with the university’s Alpha Iota Chapter and her skills in leadership, scholarship, fellowship and service—the national organization’s four tenets.

Professor Terry Likes, head of MSU’s Department of Communication, said of Knight’s accomplishments, “Amy has been exceptional in the classroom for many years, and I’m happy we’re able to honor her teaching in this way. In student evaluations of classes, Amy features exceptional scores, often 4.8, 4.9 or 5.0—on a 5.0 scale.”

A native of Southside, Alabama, Knight joined MSU’s faculty in 2009 as a communication instructor and began serving as a Lambda Sigma advisor in 2010. She teaches Interpersonal Communication, Small Group Communication and Introduction to Communication, in both face-to-face and distance formats. She received her bachelor’s degree from William Carey University and her master’s degree from USM.

For more information about the Mississippi State University Luckyday Scholars Program, visit www.luckyday.msstate.edu.