John Cullum, two-time tony award winner and known for his role in the TV show Northern Exposure, speaks about his time at the Clarence Brown Theatre.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q4DYiM-bGMQ

Alan Wilson, chairman and CEO of McCormick & Co., talks about how his education at UT prepared him to lead one of the world’s most well-known and successful spice manufacturers.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bCmVtuJqiNk

Renee Womack

Renee Womack, Peggy Hsu, and Whitney Vickery are graduating this week as doctors of veterinary medicine and will then join the ranks of the US Army Veterinary Corps.

The College of Veterinary Medicine convocation and hooding ceremony will be held at 10:00 a.m. on Saturday, May 12, in the James R. Cox Auditorium of the Alumni Memorial Building. These students will be commissioned at the War Dog Memorial on the UT agricultural campus following the conclusion of the college’s hooding ceremony.

Through the US Army’s Health Professions Scholarship Program, three years of the students’ education were paid for in exchange for three years of active duty immediately after graduation.

US Army veterinarians conduct and oversee veterinary service activities within the Department of Defense at installations from Washington, DC, to Hawaii and in more than ninety countries around the world. As Army vets, the students’ jobs will include tending to family-owned pets, military working dogs, ceremonial horses and wildlife on base; working with stray animal facilities; and helping with third-world relief programs.

Renee Womack comes from a military family, so joining the ranks was not a big stretch for her.

Peggy Hsu

“I found out about the US Army Vet Corps after my interview with the college, and the more I found out, the more I liked. I liked the benefits and the idea that I will be able to run my own clinic on base. I am currently a second lieutenant, but will be promoted to a captain,” Womack said.

“I am obligated for a three-year active duty return payback, but I decided to also do a one-year internship with the military before beginning active service. The internship will be at a large clinic on joint base Lewis-McChord in Tacoma, Washington, where I will rotate through different services, including food inspection.”

Peggy Hsu said she decided to join the Army for financial reasons and because she has lived abroad and loves the prospect of traveling as an Army vet. She is working on a dual-degree program for her Doctor of Veterinary Medicine and Master of Public Health degrees.

“Overall, I thought joining the Army was a great opportunity to learn and explore different possibilities,” Hsu said. “At this time, I do not know if I will stay on for my entire career, but who knows? I have already had some awesome opportunities with the Army through basic training, meeting great people, and participating in externships back home, like one with the Navy Marine Mammal Program.”

Hsu will be stationed at Fort Stewart near Savannah, Georgia, and be in charge of the clinic on base.

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C O N T A C T :

Amy Blakely (865-771-9127, ablakely@utk.edu)

Dale Dickey, an actress known for her roles in the TV series My Name is Earl and the movie Winter’s Bone, recalls her time on and off the stage at the Clarence Brown Theatre.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5eIg0Rjal4E

There are more than fifty veterans, reservists, and National Guard members graduating from UT Knoxville this spring and summer in various colleges as undergraduates, graduates, and law students.

The cords are red, white, and blue and serve as a token of appreciation from UT’s Office of Veterans Affairs.

Nancy-Ann DeParle, former Deputy Chief of Staff for Policy in the administration of President Obama, says her favorite times were football game days—but not for the reason you would expect.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QOBIKjnzA44

These students arrived at UT four years ago as part of the inaugural class of the Haslam Scholars Program, a premier four-year scholarship program created with generous contributions from Jimmy and Dee Haslam and Jim and Natalie Haslam.

“It is not easy to participate in the founding of a new honors program at the same time you’re working on your own major and growing as a young adult,” said Steve Dandaneau, associate provost and director of the Chancellor’s Honors and Haslam Scholars Programs. “The inaugural class of Haslam Scholars took a chance on a new and untested program. And, as they have in so many endeavors, they made it look easy.”

Each year, the Haslam Scholars Program admits up to fifteen first-year students from the university-wide Chancellor’s Honors Program and supports them with the university’s most prestigious scholarships. Haslam Scholars are part of an intimate academic and leadership group mentored by top faculty.

The soon-to-graduate Haslam Scholars took twenty-eight credit hours together, including general education seminars drawing on UT’s recognized academic strengths in the humanities, natural sciences, and social sciences. Each student participated in service-learning and an executive-level internship.

During the summer following their sophomore year, the students went for three week s to China, where they learned about that country’s writing, history, politics, economics, philosophy, and similar topics in special lectures at Tsinghua University in Beijing.

The students are currently researching their honors theses, monitored by top UT faculty.

The Haslam Scholars have excelled academically but also set the bar high for outreach activities.

Haslam Scholars recently organized the Running with Hope 5K on our campus to raise funds for Redeeming Hope Ministries located near campus.

Being a part of the Haslam Scholars Program has afforded the students opportunities to broaden their horizons in ways that would otherwise not have been possible, according to scholar Caitlin Conley Wise.

“I also have been connected to the best professors and the best students to maximize my learning experience,” she said. “Being a Haslam Scholar has made UT into a smaller and more welcoming university, where I feel encouraged to be the best that I can be and free to be who I need to be.”

Here’s a look at the first class of Haslam Scholars who will soon be graduating:

Morgan Baltz
Mt. Juliet, Tennessee
Baltz got plenty of real-world experience during her college years, thanks to a two-part internship with ExxonMobil. She worked as a process engineer in the chemical plant in Baytown, Texas, and as a business analyst for the Global Marine Transportation Optimization group in Fairfax, Virginia. She plans to pursue a doctorate after finishing her degree in chemical engineering.

Anna-Lise Burnette
Seymour, Tennessee
Burnette is majoring in global studies and Asian studies and is working her honors thesis project—writing a children’s book in Japanese and English, the kind of book she wishes she had available to her as a child. During the past few years, she’s honed her writing skills by interning with Metro Pulse and writing a weekly column in The Daily Beacon. In May, she will chaperone sophomore Haslam Scholars during their immersion in Japan.

Kelley Callaway
Knoxville, Tennessee
Callaway, who is majoring in chemistry and psychology, has found a variety of ways to put her studies into practice. She’s interning at Oak Ridge National Laboratory and doing research with a post-doctorate student. She has had a chance to attend meetings at ORNL and shadow a doctor who works there. Callaway will work in a psychology lab over the summer and plans to pursue a master’s degree in neuroscience.

Caitlin Conley Wise
Franklin, Tennessee
Wise, a nursing major, has found many ways to help the less fortunate here and abroad. Last year, she went to Beijing to work with New Hope Foundation, an organization that provides medical treatment for babies with surgically correctable deformities. Now, she’s busy interviewing Knoxville’s homeless to learn about their health care needs for her senior thesis. Wise is a board member for Redeeming Hope Ministries, a group that helps Knoxville’s homeless. She will work in an emergency room this spring and plans to pursue her master’s degree in nursing to become a nurse practitioner.

Margaret Conley
Jonesborough, Tennessee
Conley, an animal science major with a pre-vet concentration, has surveyed Tennessee’s dairy producers to find out how they communicate with employees and how they get information about their business. Her goal is to help the dairy industry communicate more effectively with the general public. She will earn a doctorate in veterinary medicine at UT and then practice large- and small-animal medicine.

Charlie Edwards
Lawrenceburg, Tennessee
Edwards is a Global Leadership Scholar in the College of Business Administration. He spent a semester studying international business in Sydney, Australia, where he also interned with the renowned Commonwealth Scientific Industrial Research Organization. For his thesis, Edwards is researching how small businesses will be affected by federal health care legislation. After graduation, Edwards will work for Pilot Flying J and plans to earn his MBA.

Alexander Happ
Germantown, Tennessee
Happ spent a semester studying in Budapest. He also interned with Professor Suzanne Lenhart at National Institute for Mathematical and Biological Synthesis (NIMBioS) and helped add mathematics to the “Biology in the Box” project, which provides hands-on materials for school teachers to use with their students. Happ performs with three UT choral groups and serves as treasurer for the Navigators on-campus ministry. He has been recognized by the US Fulbright Program and plans to seek a graduate degree in mathematics.

Aeron Glover
Memphis, Tennessee
Aeron Glover already has made a name for himself as a young entrepreneur. The industrial engineering major worked with a fellow student to start a company called How’s The Living Inc., which runs the website www.howstheliving.com. They won $25,000 in Movers and Changers, a national competition sponsored by the New York Stock Exchange and mtvU; $23,000 in prize money and services from the Fall 2010 Vol Court Competition; and a $10,000 business development grant from the Tennessee Technology Development Corporation. After graduation, Glover plans to work full-time with Google, where he did an internship.

Chelsea Knotts
Ripley, West Virginia
Knotts runs track, helps the homeless, and does research that could help unlock the keys to cancer. For her senior thesis, this biochemistry and cellular and molecular biology major is looking at how different chemicals interact with estrogen—which could play a role in tumor formation. The research has fueled her desire to attend medical school. Knotts is a member of the Lady Volunteer track and field and cross country teams and also serves on the Student Athletic Advisory Committee. She also started a running group for the homeless to teach them goal-setting skills and commitment.

Bert Ruyten
Tullahoma, Tennessee
Ruyten has studied drama with the UT English department in New York City, has helped write policy for the Student Government Association, and has tutored students at a Title I elementary school in East Knoxville. For his thesis, this English major is working on a critique of how English is taught in American higher education.

Candance Swanigan
Memphis, Tennessee
A psychology and French major, Swanigan has volunteered as a cognitive evaluator in the Cole Neuroscience Clinic at UT Medical Center. She recently completed a two-year appointment on the Knoxville Opera Executive Board and is working with fellow Haslam Scholar Mark Walker to create a program that introduces high school students to the opera. She’s spending this semester studying in Grenoble, France, and will join the Peace Corps when she returns. Eventually, she hopes to go to medical school and work with a charitable group like Doctors Without Borders.

Elizabeth Tiller
Tuscaloosa, Alabama
Tiller is majoring in public administration and Spanish. She’s had internships at Hospice of West Alabama and Tuscaloosa’s One Place where she helped organize that city’s first annual Hispanic Diversity and Wellness Fair. She is on the Lady Vol track and field and cross country teams. She is also the director’s assistant at Redeeming Hope Ministries. She plans to earn an MBA at UT with a focus on entrepreneurship and innovation or nonprofit management.

Brittany Vasquez
Morristown, Tennessee
An anthropology major, Vasquez has been working at the Forensic Anthropology Center, also known as the Body Farm, to research human decomposition. She helped work on the National Missing and Unidentified Persons System and gathered information from the department’s cold-case files. Vasquez works in the campus admissions office and volunteers with the Big Brother Big Sister program of East Tennessee. She also writes a weekly column for The Daily Beacon. Her goal is to attend medical school and become a forensic pathologist.

Mark Walker
Oak Ridge, Tennessee
Mark Walker is a nuclear engineering major and a research student at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, where he is involved with the Nuclear Materials Identification System (NMIS) project. A 2011 Barry M. Goldwater Scholar, Walker chaired the 2011 UT Engineers’ Day. Walker also enjoys playing the piano and is serving on the Board of Directors of the Knoxville Opera Company. He will attend the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton University.

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NOTE: Photos of Haslam Scholars are available upon request.

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C O N T A C T :

Amy Blakely (865-974-5034, ablakely@utk.edu)

Lowe will address graduates and their families at 8:30 a.m. Thursday, May 10, in Thompson-Boling Assembly Center and Arena.

“As one of the communication and information industry’s top executives, Ken Lowe’s remarkable career has been characterized by innovation, across-the-board excellence, and a strong commitment to diversity and inclusion,” said CCI dean Mike Wirth. “We are very fortunate to have Ken as our commencement speaker, and we know that the wisdom and advice he shares will provide our graduates with an inspirational send-off as they leave UT to pursue professional careers.”

Lowe was president and CEO of the E. W. Scripps Company from 2000 to 2008, when Scripps Networks Interactive became a separate, publicly traded company.

Prior to 2000, he served as chairman and CEO of Knoxville-based Scripps Networks. He built the company into one of the nation’s fastest-growing and most successful creators of unique brands for television and the Internet. He founded and launched HGTV in 1994; oversaw the acquisition and transformation of the Food Network into an American pop culture icon; and presided over the launches of the DIY Network and the Cooking Channel, as well as the acquisitions of the Travel Channel and the Great American Country network.

Lowe joined Scripps in 1980 as general manager of the company’s radio properties. In 1988, he became vice president of programming, promotion, and marketing for the company’s nine network-affiliated television stations.

The many honors and awards Lowe has received during his career include the Museum of the Moving Image’s 2011 media industry leader of the year award, the National Cable and Telecommunications Association’s 2008 Vanguard Award for Programmers, and the T. Howard Foundation’s 2008 Executive Leadership Award. Lowe was inducted to the Broadcasting and Cable Hall of Fame in 2005.

More than 300 students will graduate with bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degrees from the college this semester.

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C O N T A C T :

Charles Primm (865-974-5180, charles.primm@tennessee.edu)

More than 3,600 undergraduate and graduate students will receive degrees this spring. For information about parking, how to view the ceremonies on the Web, or other details, visit www.utk.edu/commencement.

Wednesday, May 9

• 8:30 a.m., College of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources, Thompson-Boling Assembly Center and Arena
• 11:30 a.m., College of Engineering, Thompson-Boling Assembly Center and Arena. Speaker: Thom Mason, director, Oak Ridge National Laboratory
•  3:30 p.m., College of Education, Health, and Human Sciences, Thompson-Boling Assembly Center and Arena. Speaker: Joe Johnson, president emeritus of the UT system

Thursday, May 10

• 8:30 a.m., College of Communication and Information, Thompson-Boling Assembly Center and Arena. Speaker: Ken Lowe, chairman of the board, president and chief executive officer, Scripps Networks Interactive
• 11:00 a.m., Audiology and Speech Pathology, James R. Cox Auditorium, Alumni Memorial Building
• 1:00 p.m., College of Nursing, Thompson-Boling Assembly Center and Arena
• 4:30 p.m., Graduate Hooding Ceremony, Thompson-Boling Assembly Center and Arena

Friday, May 11

• 8:30 a.m., College of Arts and Sciences, Thompson-Boling Assembly Center and Arena. Speaker: John Hubbard, senior vice president and worldwide head of development operations for Pfizer, Inc.
• 10:00 a.m., College of Architecture and Design, James R. Cox Auditorium, Alumni Memorial Building. Speaker: Carol Johnson, founder and chairman emeritus of the board of Carol R. Johnson Associates, Inc.
• 1:30 p.m., College of Social Work, James R. Cox Auditorium, Alumni Memorial Building
• 2:00 p.m., College of Business Administration, Thompson-Boling Assembly Center and Arena. Speaker: Agenia Clark, president and chief executive officer, Girl Scouts of Middle Tennessee
• 5:00 p.m., College of Law, Thompson-Boling Assembly Center and Arena. Speaker: Ray Mabus, United States secretary of the Navy

Saturday, May 12

• 10:00 a.m., College of Veterinary Medicine Convocation and Hooding Ceremony, James R. Cox Auditorium, Alumni Memorial Building

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C O N T A C T :

Beth Gladden (865-974-9008, bgladden@utk.edu)

The ceremony is set for 8:30 a.m. Thursday, May 10, in Thompson-Boling Arena.

“Alexia Poe has had a remarkable career in the area of public communications,” said CCI Dean Mike Wirth. “Her distinguished public service, coupled with her communication work in the private sector, inspires our students to think big and pursue their dreams. We are proud of everything Alexia has accomplished and very pleased to present her with the college’s 2012 Hileman Award.”

Poe earned a bachelor’s degree in communications from UT in 1995, and began her career as a reporter and morning news anchor in Northeast Tennessee. She moved to Nashville in 1997 to join Governor Don Sundquist’s staff, where she became the second female and youngest person in the state’s history to serve as press secretary to a governor.

In 2002, Poe moved to Washington, DC, to work for First Lady Laura Bush at the White House. She then moved from the East Wing to Capitol Hill, where she established US Senator Lamar Alexander’s communications office.

Poe returned to Nashville in 2007 and worked for nearly four years as director of public affairs for Gaylord Entertainment. She joined Haslam’s office after most recently serving as the director of economic and community development for Nashville Mayor Karl Dean.

The Donald G. Hileman Award is named for the first permanent dean of the College of Communications, the forerunner to the College of Communication and Information. The award was established in 1994 in celebration of the college’s twenty-fifth anniversary. It is awarded to college alumni who have made notable contributions to the field of communication and information.

Past recipients include McCormick & Company Inc. chairman, president and CEO Alan Wilson; former Esquire magazine publisher Alan N. Greenberg; former UT quarterback and four-time NFL MVP Peyton Manning; and two-time Pulitzer Prize winner and noted science writer for the New York Times, John Noble Wilford.

For a complete list of past Hileman Award winners, visit http://cci.utk.edu/AlumDevel/hileman.

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C O N T A C T :

Charles Primm (865-974-5180, charles.primm@tennessee.edu)