In pre-pandemic days, the Office of Research and Engagement launched Coffee and Convergence, a series of casual gatherings focused on the University of Tennessee’s strategic areas of emphasis. Tom Zawodzinski, the UT-ORNL Governor’s Chair Professor for Electrical Energy Conversion and Storage, was among the first to participate, and he said the event helped him build new collaborations. Continue reading
RD Highlights
String Project Brings Private Lessons to Inner-City Kids
Photo by Providence Doucet | Unsplash
Geoffrey Herd’s passion for the violin is infectious. His enthusiasm has attracted students from China, Thailand, and throughout the United States to study at the University of Tennessee. But now he is sharing his love of string instruments a little closer to home. Continue reading
Nursing Uses Collaboration to Strengthen Research Culture

Staff and faculty from the College of Nursing discuss strengths and weaknesses of an external funding proposal (photo from August 2019).
To complement research development in the Office of Research and Engagement (ORE), some colleges take proactive steps to support faculty members’ research with targeted RD activities of their own. The College of Nursing is one of those, and it offers financial incentives to encourage participation. Continue reading
Harper Taps Training and Support to Fund STEM Education Research

Frances Harper presents preliminary robotics work at the Association of Mathematics Teacher Educators conference in February 2020.
Frances Harper first tapped into the programs and services available through the Office of Research and Engagement at a new faculty orientation event in 2017. Three years later, that early connection has paid off—literally—with a recent $1 million grant from the National Science Foundation’s Computer Science for All program. Continue reading
SPARKing New Collaborations to Battle the Pandemic
Nina Fefferman has a knack for applying mathematical modeling to biological systems. The more complex, the better. On April 28, she shared some of her research related to COVID-19 at the UT Office of Research and Engagement’s SPARKS event. As a result, she created two new collaborations related to the virus, and one is already working on its first publication. Continue reading