About The Team

David Zelski

David Zelski has over a dozen years in the television business. He began his TV career in New York City with MTV Networks (Viacom) in 1997. Then in January 2000, after spending one year with the post-production house, Magick Latern, David was hired by Georgia's PBS station, Georgia Public Broadcasting. There he began work on a variety of programs, including Lawmakers, Georgia Business Report, Georgia Week in Review and Prep Sports Plus. His reports have aired nationally on Nightly Business Report and he has garnered several awards including two Emmy awards and over ten Emmy nominations. Zelski is currently an editor, producer and co-host of GPB's top-rated weekly program, Georgia Traveler. David has been with Georgia Traveler since the very first show.

A native Georgian, Zelski holds a Bachelor of Arts in English from the University of Tennessee in Knoxville with a minor in Broadcasting and Cinema Studies.

Michelle DeShields

Michelle Elliott DeShields is an educator, educational consultant, entrepreneur, and television personality. With over 14 years of educational experience as a certified educator in Georgia, she has been a teacher, school counselor, education project manager, and private tutor in the entertainment industry. In 2002, Michelle served as an Education Project Manager with Georgia Public Broadcasting traveling throughout the state training educators on effectively integrating technology into the classroom. In 2008, while teaching in Fulton County Schools, she founded Consult With ME!, a full service educational consulting company that assists students in grades PreK – 12. Michelle also stayed involved with Georgia Public Broadcasting by following her childhood passion of working in television. In 2010, she began volunteering her time at the station with the on-air television membership drive. From there she worked with the New York production company Morphenix, LLC, on “Real Stories, Real Savvy, Real Moms,” a television series produced for public broadcasting stations. In 2011, while continuing as a volunteer on-air personality at Georgia Public Broadcasting, Michelle was thrilled to become the new co-host of Georgia Traveler. She brings her knowledge about Georgia to show viewers what the state has to offer through both an educational and entertaining platform.

Michelle donates her time in the community and professionally through Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc, The Delino DeShields Baseball Boot Camp, Ladies Who Launch, Baseball Wives Charitable Foundation, American School Counseling Association, and the Professional Association of Georgia Educators. Michelle was honored by Who’s Who in Black Atlanta in both 2009 and 2010 for her positive contribution to the city.

Michelle received her Bachelors of Science in Education from Alabama A&M, and went on to receive her Masters of Education in Guidance and Counseling from the University of West Georgia. Michelle is the wife of former MLB player Delino DeShields, currently coaching in the Cincinnati Reds organization and their blended family includes five children; Delaney, Denim, D'Angelo, Diamond, and Delino Jr.

Rickey Bevington

Award-winning journalist Rickey Bevington is in her second season with Georgia Traveler bringing you up close and personal with Georgia’s Civil War sites. Her Civil War stories have also appeared on the PBS NewsHour, National Public Radio, The Takeaway, and in Fodor’s travel guides. Rickey has been recognized with awards and nominations from the Atlanta Press Club as “Journalist of the Year,” the Southeastern Emmy Awards, the Society of Professional Journalists, Public Radio News Directors International, the Georgia Association of Broadcasters, and the Associated Press of Georgia. Rickey is also GPB’s Senior News Editor.

Atlanta-born but Boston-raised, Rickey made her way from high school on a dairy farm in southern Vermont to Barnard College in New York City. While at Barnard, she began her broadcast career at Sundance Channel. After graduation Rickey joined Showtime Networks as a Production Coordinator until moving to Hartford where she spent two years as an Assignment Editor and Associate Producer for WFSB-TV 3, Connecticut’s CBS television news affiliate. Her foray into public broadcasting came when she started as a volunteer at Connecticut Public Radio. She eventually landed a position hosting Saturday morning programming for the station. Rickey joined GPB in 2006 as host of GPB-TV’s quarterly arts magazine State of the Arts and as anchor of GPB Radio’s Morning Edition. She has since also anchored GPB Radio’s All Things Considered, Georgia Gazette and the Consumer Call-In, and GPB TV’s Georgia News Briefs.

Bruce Burkhardt

Bruce Burkhardt is an award-winning reporter and documentary producer who wrote and produced the Emmy-nominated GPB original production, Augusta's Master Plan: From Sherman's March to Arnie's Army. In addition to his duties with Georgia Traveler, Burkhardt is producing another documentary, As If We Were Ghosts, about African-American scholastic athletes during the era of segregation.

Burkhardt spent 14 years as a CNN correspondent before embarking on a career as an independent film maker. Recognized for being a natural story-teller with a distinct "everyman" presence, Burkhardt has been honored with numerous awards including a National Emmy, two CableAce Awards and the National Headliner Award. He won a CableAce Award for a documentary titled "America's Cup" which he produced, wrote and hosted. The program which was shot almost entirely in Costa Rica explored the environmental and human costs of America's love affair with coffee.

Burkhardt also won a national Emmy award for his contributions to a documentary about the devastating Mississippi River floods of 1994. He was a contributor to CNN’s longstanding documentary series, CNN Presents, most notably as the host and reporter of a program titled "Summer of Fire" about the 2002 forest fires that consumed much of the West.

Burkhardt was a correspondent and one of the hosts for the experimental newsmagazine, "American Edge" which turned out to be an ideal outlet for his finely observed pieces on American life and culture. In the inaugural program, he invited viewers to join him as an atomic tourist on a road trip to famous sites of nuclear history in the American Southwest. In 1998, Burkhardt was among the core team of correspondents for the news magazine programs, CNN Newsstand/Fortune and CNN Newsstand/Entertainment weekly.

Ashley Mengwasser

Ashley Mengwasser is a Buford native turned Atlanta urbanite with a passion for people and communicating through story. Graduating Phi Beta Kappa and Magna Cum Laude with a degree in English Literature from Agnes Scott College in 2009, Ashley first embraced her career in media—a ripe three years in the making—through her current position as Client Services Coordinator for studio productions at GPB. She has since become a familiar talent during GPB television fundraising campaigns for primetime concert features and kids programming alike, a highlight being her role as co-host for the 2012 national PBS special “We Walk the Line: A Celebration of the Music of Johnny Cash.”

While serving as a public speaking tutor to her undergraduate peers at Agnes Scott, Ashley realized the power of storytelling as a gateway for forging deeper connections with a larger audience, immediate or mediated. Today, her contributed segments are peppered with traces of her own anecdotal past: former scholar, cheerleader, thespian, rock ‘n roller, reader, dancer, and dog lover. (Ashley’s three dogs Agnes, Lily, and Pearl are loyal viewers of the travel series, and are hoping for cameos in upcoming seasons, to join Grandmother Judy Thompson, veteran skydiver.)

Notorious for her lack of professional inhibition, Ashley has braved high altitudes, roller skates, triathlons, and more for Georgia Traveler audiences for two seasons and counting. Family, friends, and coworkers have noted great improvements to her risk-averse nature as a result of the show. Continue watching Georgia Traveler to see what remarkable tales and improbable new feats she’ll share with the state in Season 6.

Chef Marvin Woods

Is an Emmy® Award-nominated television host, celebrity chef and author of lauded cookbooks, Home Plate Cooking and The New Low Country Cooking. He has garnered wild acclaim for his inventive health conscious approach on foods rooted in Southern tradition, specifically Low Country. Chef Woods has been regularly featured on the Today Show and in national publications, including O Magazine, Food & Wine, Southern Living and many more.

Chef Marvin Woods was chosen as the first chef to kick off Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move! cooking series to help busy families create nutritious and affordable meals on a budget. www.letsmove.org For more than seven years, Chef Marvin has been traveling around the country and abroad educating and motivating kids and parents through his program called, Droppin’ Knowledge. This national program focuses on a positive way to reduce childhood obesity and other children health issues stemming from poor diet choices and eating habits.

Traveling internationally for appearances and cooking demonstrations, Chef Woods consistently draws a large audience. In 2011 Chef Woods received an National Service Award from the American Heart & American Stroke Foundation for his work with the foundation. Chef Woods also has been working with the American Diabetes Foundation for the past 5 years, Atlanta Public Schools.

As a 30-year veteran in the hospitality and restaurant industry, Chef Woods was recently celebrated by his culinary school (Academy of Culinary Arts) where they awarded him a lifetime achievement award.

Chef Woods is currently working on a new restaurant project in Atlanta Georgia and several “better for you” food products. For more information, please visit www.chefmarvinwoods.com.

Parker Wallace

Atlanta-based, award-winning journalist Parker Wallace covers the Georgia legislative session and also specializes in stories about Georgia’s Latino community. She joined GPB in 2012 after working as a general assignment reporter for CBS Atlanta.

While working for CBS, she won an Associated Press award for Best Feature story. Parker started her career in Los Angeles as an assignment desk assistant at KTTV. Her first on-camera job was as a reporter for News 12 The Bronx, where she produced, shot and edited her own stories.

Parker also was a freelance reporter for WTNH in New Haven. She is a nationally published author, with articles appearing in Shape Magazine and USA Today. She received a Bachelor of Arts degree from James Madison University with dual majors in Communications and Spanish. Parker also spent a semester studying in Spain at the University of Salamanca.