Meet Media-Maker Georgia Fort
Georgia Fort is a force to be reckoned with. She has accomplished so much in her career and she’s just getting started. You might as well call her hurricane Georgia because she’s coming in like a category five!
Georgia Fort was born and raised in Minnesota. She grew up in the Rondo area of St. Paul. She attended Harding High School, where she was an excellent athlete and also dabbled in band. After graduating high school, she went straight to the University of St. Thomas. She was a young mother, balancing the responsibilities of being a full-time student and also holding down a full time job. Life’s obstacles never daunted her. While attending school she joined KUST, a radio station on campus that sparked her interest in broadcasting. She then pursued an internship at KMOJ, a local nonprofit radio station in the Twin Cities that primarily serves an urban audience. Georgia started as an intern and was quickly promoted, landing her own show in the primetime midday time slot. She wore many hats during her four year employ at KMOJ. She was the digital media director, which means she created the station’s website and visibility on the extensive social media platforms we have today. Along with being digital media director, she also was promoted to programming assistant.
Subsequently, Georgia cast her net and transitioned to a commercial radio station in Columbus, Georgia where she eventually transitioned into news. All the while her career was growing, so was her family! In addition to her 10-year-old daughter, she and her husband welcomed a baby girl in December 2017 and she will welcome her third child in December 2018.
When I asked Georgia about her philosophy as a journalist, she said this: “I am a human being first, journalist second.” To elaborate on her point sometimes people forget their empathy chip and dehumanize people or the stories that they are covering. Unaware that they are compartmentalizing and devaluing an individual’s experiences for a headline. She has practiced that sentiment by not exploiting a tragedy for her or her stations’ ratings. This has shown to be prosperous as she has been nominated for an Emmy, twice!
With the upcoming birth of her third child, Georgia wanted to come back to her roots. She came back to Minnesota to be with family and friends. Family is very important to her. When she isn’t working on TALK AVE or building her brand, she spends time with her family. Whether it be at the boxing gym that her husband owns, or helping her daughter grow her Youtube cooking channel. In the midst of her adept family, she got involved with SPNN where she has launched her own talk show called TLK AVE. The purpose of the show is to provide a platform for a diverse group of women to be portrayed in a positive light. The panel of women speak and report about topics and issues that largely affect marginalized communities in the Twin Cities. Having your own show is a major coup, but Mrs. Fort is not done yet. She also played a big role in the completion of the Rondo documentary as well as working on her solo project. Through SPNN Doc U fellows program she is creating a documentary about femicide. She’ll be taking an in-depth lens through statistical data and the effects it has on women who were murdered by their spouse or former partner.
Lastly, I asked Georgia, “If you had no budget constraints or obligations what would you do with your new found wealth and time?” She answered with conceptualizing and building her brand through developing content on her website, expand and grow TLK AVE, finishing up her book that she is writing and homing in on what it means to be an independent multimedia journalist.
