Melissa Riggs

Melissa Riggs graduated from Cornell University before quickly entering into a graduate program at George Washington University to complete a Master of Public Health degree. After completing her degree, Melissa departed for the Peace Corps in 2004, and has since worked with a variety of NGOs in Togo, Morocco, India, South Africa, Rwanda and most recently South Sudan. In 2010, Melissa felt the draw to photojournalism and spent the summer at Maine Media Workshops in a documentary photography residency. The skills she gained through this program proved invaluable in her position as the Director of Communications for PSI-South Sudan from 2011-2012, and the desire to enhance her visual storytelling capabilities lead her to the graduate program at Ohio University’s School of Visual Communications. Melissa is currently completing a master’s project examining a sisterhood of five Muslim woman in Jordan as they deal with the struggles and joys of life.