Born in New Orleans, Louisiana and raised in Picayune, Mississippi, Melonee Griggs has lived a life destined for service and leadership.  Her parents, Thomas and Catherine Gaines, inspired a love of reading in her and her siblings at an early age.  She was surrounded by books that allowed her to learn more about the world and which unleashed an imagination that allowed her to think outside the box. Her father was one of the founders of the Democratic Party in Pearl River County, Mississippi, the first African American member of the Picayune School Board, and a leader in OMIK, the first African American amateur radio organization.  Her mother is a self-taught and gifted horticulturalist who was denied a higher education due to racial intimidation despite the Brown vs. Board of Education ruling.  Her parents taught her the importance of education, community, and justice by not just talking about it, but living a life committed to it.  



Melonee attended Pearl River Community College and The University of Southern Mississippi (USM) where she earned a degree in English with a minor in biology.  While attending USM, she found her voice in service and joined the college chapter of the NAACP and served as the Political Action Committee coordinator.  She actively helped with voter registration drives and participated in the humbling 6 mile prayer and justice march for Raynard Johnson with Jesse Jackson and Mamie Till-Mobley, the mother of Emmett Till.  She was also the co-Minority Affairs Coordinator for USM's Student Government Association.  She later attended The University of Memphis and received her master's degree in English literature.  While in graduate school, she was the president of the Black Graduate Student Association.  She graduated with high honors and received 1st place in the 18th Annual Student Research Competition in the category of Liberal and Fine Arts.



After graduate school, Melonee returned home to South Mississippi post-Katrina.  She worked at Southern University at New Orleans and served as Program Coordinator and Outreach Specialist for the Center for African and African African Studies (CAAAS).  She revised and published the African Studies department's manual; created a departmental newsletter; served on the editorial board for the Journal of Africana Studies; and served as principal investigator for grants.  She partnered CAAAS with several Orleans Parish schools, such as Sophie B. Wright Charter School, and organizations like Patois: New Orleans International Human Rights Film Festival (board advisor), Black Inventions Museum, New Orleans Food and Farm Network, and the Pontchartrain Park Neighborhood Association.  Most notably, she was responsible for year round programming which included Amiri Baraka and Molefi Asante Jr.  She created Ma'afa Awareness Week, a week of programming that served as a reminder of the atrocities of slavery and genocide of African people and to promote the principles of Kwanzaa.



She is currently the Senior Capstone chair at the Memphis Academy of Health Sciences in Memphis, TN.  She is the author of the MAHS Capstone Research Manual and of the Capstone curriculum.  She also serves as the faculty coordinator for the inaugural Africana studies and distance learning program for her school.



Most notably, she is the wife of Charles Anthony Griggs III and has been happily married for 11 years.  She is the proud mother to a precocious 5 year old, Audrey Pearl.