Author: erikbledsoe

A power outage at a core location is causing network problems in many buildings and for many OIT services including email. OIT is working with Facilities Services to restore service as soon as possible.

OIT will post status updates on the IT Traffic Center Web site.

All students and faculty involved in the UT’s full-time MBA program trip to Chile are fine and have been accounted for, the MBA program director confirmed this morning.   All of the students and all but three of the faculty members involved in the international business experience had not yet arrived in Chile at the time of the earthquake.

Three faculty members arrived in Santiago, Chile, on Thursday and were in their hotel in the Central City downtown area at the time of the event.  They felt the earthquake, but are fine. All of the students and the rest of the faculty began their trip Friday afternoon and were en route to Santiago when the earthquake hit.  Those 67 students and four remaining faculty members were traveling on three different planes, all which were diverted to other cities en route due to the earthquake.

The full-time MBA trip is being rescheduled; all students and faculty are on their way back to Knoxville, according to college administrators.

The trip was set for Friday, Feb. 26 through March 6.  The program activities were set to begin today.

The purpose of the trip is to familiarize the class with the complexities of doing business internationally through experiential learning.  Students were expected to evaluate a specific business issue and meet with educators, government officials as well as with high-level leadership in both local and foreign companies to discuss how business is conducted in this specific global business environment.

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Contact:  Karen Collins (865) 216-6862

KNOXVILLE — Not many high school kids use their free time to ponder topics such as cardiac arrhythmias or wireless electricity transmissions, let alone devise research to better understand such topics. However students attending the 45th Tennessee Junior Science and Humanities Symposium (JSHS) at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, do.

The symposium will be held from 1:30 to 9 p.m. on Thursday, Feb. 25, in UT Knoxville’s Conference Center Auditorium (Room 406) in downtown Knoxville with student oral presentations being held between 1:30 and 6:30 p.m.

More than 20 students from high schools across the state will compete to determine who has the best research in sciences, mathematics and engineering. The presentations will be judged by a panel of UT Knoxville science and engineering faculty members. Three winners will be awarded a total of $4,500 in scholarships.

Dan Roberts, director of the Tennessee JSHS and professor of biochemistry and cellular and molecular biology, says the students are very intelligent and highly motivated to determine why things work the way they do.

“As a professor, I’ll see college students who want to know the minimum amount so that they can get to the next stage,” said Roberts. “These kids have a very unique personality trait of people driven to do research, and to see this at such a young age is really unusual.”

Roberts says there are two ways students conduct research. In one way, research is done in the university setting where there is an established lab and mission. Mentors engage students, determine their interests, and the students will advance the project. The other way is more of a “backyard approach” where students conceptualize and execute the study and project on their own.

“I am not sure that all of this comes to them while they are sitting in their beds at night looking at the ceiling, but I think the part of this that is really amazing is that they take the seed of an idea and make it happen,” said Roberts.

For the past 44 years, students’ projects have covered a wide spectrum, and this year is no different. One project by Oak Ridge High School student Yajit Jain examines electric field calculation for fluid simulation. Roberts says the project is very sophisticated and admits its mathematics may even scare some judges. Conversely, Cleveland High School student Lillie Brown headed to her backyard for her project analyzing sedimentation in creeks.

Roberts adds that while these students are extremely smart, they are also typical high school kids with various interests, noting one past winner who was also a state tennis standout.

“These students are bright, driven and creative. The judges who are tenured faculty are always blown away by how good these kids are,” Roberts said.

The symposium is one of 48 in the United States, and the only one in Tennessee. The winners will advance to the national competition in May; national winners advance to the international contest in London this summer.

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C O N T A C T:

Whitney Holmes (865-974-5460), [email protected])

By Chancellor Jimmy G. Cheek

Even during challenging economic times, we’re making progress on key strategic goals by adding as many as 77 new graduate assistantships and fellowships in just this past year.

Graduate students contribute significantly to our research and teaching mission. Our proportion of graduate students to undergraduate students is significantly smaller than the ratio found at both our peer research universities, and comparable flagship state universities. Offering competitive assistantships and fellowships is critical to recruiting talented students who will contribute to our knowledge-based economy.

As we plan for anticipated budget reductions, we must work to sustain support for graduate programs and take creative approaches for meeting this and all strategic priorities.

Through private dollars, and by reallocating existing funds and partnerships for new revenue sources, we’ve been able to add the following:

• Twelve new slots for top graduate students in science and engineering through the recently announced UTK-Oak Ridge National Laboratory Distinguished Fellowship program. Recruiting is now under way and the deadline to apply is Feb. 1

• An additional $800,000 in support from the UT Athletic Department for graduate stipends. The funds allow each college dean to create new slots or enhance existing positions for both master’s and doctorate students, depending on the college. The new $1 million revenue stream for the academic programs of the campus was made possible through the new television contract with the Southeastern Conference (SEC) and ESPN, and we thank UT Athletics for their support for our goals. This funding will eventually create 40 new graduate slots. Because of the timing of receiving the new funds, most deans chose to supplement existing positions, with plans to create new slots in subsequent years. The additional $200,000 from athletics went to support our student success efforts and the new Tennessee Teaching and Learning Center.

• Twelve new fellowships spread among all the colleges through the new J. Wallace and Katie Dean Fellowship Fund program. This one-time allocation will provide four years of funding for the students, with each college matching the private gift through a fee waiver or existing grant or contract. While students will pursue specific degree programs, they will be mentored by faculty, who encourage interdisciplinary connections, international collaboration and scholarly training.

• Thirteen new fellowships for doctoral students in the humanities and social sciences through the new Newton W. and Wilma C. Thomas Graduate Fellowships program. This one-time allocation will allow the campus to support 13 additional graduate students in the incoming class of Fall 2010 over and above existing totals in these areas. These students will receive four years of guaranteed support, and will not have a teaching obligation during their first year.

In this strained economy, we’ve seen a surge in applications for our graduate programs, as people look to broaden their skills or change career paths. Providing opportunities and funding for top notch students will ensure that we grow our graduate programs to the maximum benefit of the university.