Jason M. Payton leads the recruitment and enrollment efforts of the Morehead Honors College. His primary focus is on the development and implementation of innovative strategies for enrolling talented and diverse cohorts whose superior accomplishments set the standard for academic achievement for each first-year class at UGA. He is passionate about sharing the story about the good that UGA does in the state and in the world with prospective students and their families.

This passion is born of a lifelong interest in the power of stories to shape our understanding of the world and our sense of our place within it. Jason has devoted much of his life to the study of narrative, earning a bachelor’s degree in humanities and philosophy from Milligan College, a master’s degree in English language and literature from the University of Kentucky, and a doctoral degree in English language and literature from the University of Maryland.

He joined the Honors team in 2022 after holding academic appointments in the English departments at Sam Houston State University and the University of Georgia, where he specialized in early American and Atlantic-world literatures.