One of UGA's 40 Under 40 honorees this year is from Columbus
The University of Georgia has released its 40 Under 40 Class of 2018, and one UGA alumnus from Columbus is on the prestigious list.
Aflac social purpose manager Ivey Evans, a 2002 graduate of Brookstone School, is the only local member of this year's distinguished UGA alumni younger than 40 being celebrated for their achievements.
The eighth annual UGA 40 Under 40 Awards Luncheon will be Sept. 13 at the Georgia Aquarium in Atlanta, followed by another moment of recognition during the Sept. 15 football game against Middle Tennessee State University.
"It's such an honor and very humbling, especially when you look at your peers in the group," Evans told the Ledger-Enquirer in a phone interview Friday.
This year’s honorees include Hulu’s Emmy Award-winning producer Chase Cain, former NFL wide receiver Mohammed Massaquoi, Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta complex care medical director Dr. Margaux Charbonnet Murray, Mercedes-Benz Stadium vice president for corporate partnerships Tameka Rish, National Security Council director Latham Saddler and Google’s Area 120 incubator co-founder Adrianna Samaniego.
“We look forward to announcing the 40 Under 40 class each year, because this program demonstrates the far and wide reach of our incredible graduates,” Meredith Gurley Johnson, executive director of UGA alumni relations, said in a news release. “These young alumni are giving back to their communities and reshaping their professions. They deserve to be celebrated.”
For example, the UGA 40 Under 40 web page quotes Evans as saying, “Columbus has a budding art community, and I am very involved in our (Columbus) Museum, co-chairing our recent fundraiser, and serving on the steering committee for ‘Friends of Art,’ which supports art students at Columbus State University. I hope to mentor young artists in the CSU program about the business side of art to show them that art can be a career option.”
Evans also serves on the board of Girls Inc. and is silent auction chairwoman and assistant race director for the Steeplechase at Callaway Gardens, which raises money for local arts organizations. She will be race director next year.
Nominations for 40 Under 40 were open from February to April. More than 550 alumni were nominated for this year’s class. Honorees must have attended UGA and uphold the Pillars of the Arch, which are wisdom, justice and moderation. Evans was nominated by Josh Ball of Atlanta advertising agency Dagger, which has worked with Aflac,.
Evans, 34, has three degrees from UGA: a bachelor's in marketing and a bachelor's in advertising in 2006, then a master's in business administration in 2013. In between, she worked for two advertising agencies in Atlanta, as an account coordinator and creative traffic coordinator for Nurun from February 2007 to Februrary 2008, and as a project manager for Engauge from March 2008 to December 2009. Then she was e-commerce marketing manager for shapewear company Spanx, also in Atlanta, from January 2010 to July 2011.
While returning to UGA full-time for her MBA, Evans also returned to Columbus, where she interned at Aflac. And that turned into a full-time job at Aflac, first as digital marketing manager from June 2013 to February 2017, then as social purpose manager, helping the supplemental insurance company's philanthropic initiatives, such as the Aflac Cancer and Blood Disorders Center at Children's Healthcare of Atlanta. She also has led the My Special Aflac Duck project, which helps comfort pediatric cancer patients by giving them a robotic toy duck for interactive play.
Her last day at Aflac will be Wednesday. She is leaving to help chlidren in a different way, as digital marketing director for Columbus-based Childcare Network.
"It's just a new opportunity," Evans explained. "They reached out to me."
Her new boss, Childcare Network vice president for sales and marketing Missy Jones, is a former colleague at Aflac, where Evans said she has worked with "wonderful people."
"It's always flattering when someone you worked with wants you with them," Evans said. "But I'm very proud of all the things I did at Aflac, helping kids with cancer. So it's very hard to leave, but education is the great equalizer, so I’m excited to go help kids in a different way. It's really hard to leave a meaningful and purposeful job, but this has a different purpose.”
UGA helped prepare her to pursue those purposes, Evans said.
"Especially my MBA," she said, "It gives you the strategic framework for solving a problem, to just tackle anything that comes your way. Going from a small school like Brookstone to a big school like Georgia, academically I felt very prepared, and Georgia really prepared me for the workforce. It also has great connections. So many people have gone to Georgia, and that always looks favorably when you're applying for jobs."
Evans, daughter of Shirley and Johnny Cargill, is married to Cal Evans, a fellow Double Dawg graduate of UGA, where they met. He is director of credit market intelligence at Synovus and serves on the faculty for the graduate schools of banking at UGA and LSU.
UGA's 40 Under 40 honorees are chosen by a selection committee of UGA staff, alumni and alumni association board members. The three previous honorees from Columbus are (with their job title and employer at the time of their recognition):
▪ 2013: Travis Canova, special agent, Federal Bureau of Investigation; Thomas Forsberg, first vice president, SunTrust Bank.
▪ 2015: Andy Roddenbery V, general surgeon, St. Francis Hospital and The Medical Center.
“I am amazed by the diversity of our alumni and how engaged they are in their philanthropy, careers and community,” Johnson said. “Our graduates are solving the grand challenges of our time in every corner of the globe, which makes it more difficult every year to narrow the list down to 40 people. They represent us well and we could not be prouder of the positive impact they are making.”