2023 Distinguished Alumni Award

Anissa Coss Centers has had an award winning career in broadcast journalism during which she anchored the news at the number one station in Atlanta, Georgia, and was the primary evening news anchor at WALA-TV in Mobile, Alabama. Her earliest years in broadcasting were in Lufkin, Nacogdoches, and Waco, Texas. Today she works as a confidence coach, motivational speaker, and continues as a broadcast journalist in Tyler, Texas at KLTV-TV. 

Her work during Hurricane Katrina in 2017 impressed the Alabama Associated Press to name her the Best News Anchor in the state. She won that award three more years in a row along with a regional Emmy for Broadcast News Anchoring. She was also inducted into the Stephen F. Austin University Communications Department Hall of Fame. 

She’s been honored by the Alabama Broadcasters Association, the Mobile Press Club, Lagniappe Magazine, The National Association of Black Journalists, and The Longview News Journal and Riley College as a Woman of Distinction. Anissa has most recently served with the 1:3 Survivors Foundation, BeaYOUtiful Girls Foundation and Longview Queens United.