Wesleyan College is pleased to welcome Anita Howard, District Attorney for the Macon Judicial Court, as speaker for the College’s 2023 commencement ceremony.

Anita R. Howard is the District Attorney for the Macon Judicial Circuit. She is the first African American and woman elected to her position, having won more than seventy percent of the votes in the 2020 election. Anita is a career prosecutor with eighteen years of experience in Superior, Juvenile, Accountability, Probate, and Appellate Courts and has argued before the Georgia Supreme Court.

A Middle Georgia native, Anita is married to Todd Howard. She is a proud Valdosta State University and Oklahoma City University School of Law graduate. 

She is a member of the Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc., and for the last two years, she has been a panelist at AKA Day at the Georgia Capital, where she motivated women to get involved in politics to better their communities.

Since taking office on January 1, 2021, Anita has intentionally engaged in the community by launching several initiatives and partnerships. These endeavors include her Campaign Against Co-sleeping to prevent infant deaths, partnerships with Compass Cares for Know Your Status Day, and Black Voters Matter for the first-ever warrant clinic in Georgia.

 Anita also launched her R.I.S.E. (Restoring Inspiration by Success in Education) Initiative for juvenile offenders. This initiative focuses on children who have been traumatized by living with various adverse childhood experiences. She also started her educational DA 101 video series aimed toward demystifying the criminal justice system by bringing accurate and readily understandable information to the public platform. In addition, her implementation of new grand jury processes and scheduling methods for Bibb County has saved taxpayer dollars and increased public safety by decreasing officer waiting times. This added efficiency to the grand jury system has allowed more cases to be presented in fewer sessions than ever before.

Her many honors include:

• Being the first Chairperson of the newly formed Urban District Attorney Coalition of Georgia.
• Receiving the 2021 Presidential Award from the Macon Chapter of the N.A.A.C.P.
• Receiving the 2022 GBI’s Child Fatality Prevention Award.
• Receiving the 2021 - 2022 Fair Fight District Attorney Program Award.

Wesleyan College will host its commencement ceremony on
Saturday, May 13, at the campus’s Porter Auditorium.
The event is the first undergraduate commencement
to be presided over by the school’s 26th President, Meaghan Blight.

Date: Saturday, May 13, 2023
Time: 10 AM
Location: Porter Auditorium, Wesleyan College