AgLink - Summer, 2024

message from the dean : dr . chandra reddy

Greetings from the Tennessee State University College of Agriculture! In this issue of AgLink, we share with you, our stakeholders, alumni, and friends some of the highlights of the second semester of the 2023-2024 academic year, and what a year it was at TSUAg! Research was the buzzword frequently bandied about on campus throughout the spring semester and for good reason, as the College of Agriculture hosted a series of important research summits both on campus and in the case of the Association of 1890 Research Directors Biennial Research Symposium (ARD Symposium), at the nearby Gaylord Opryland Convention Center.

The College’s hosting of the ARD Symposium was undoubtedly the seminal event of the spring semester. The biennial gathering of the best research minds from across the 1890 land-grant university system was the largest in the event’s nearly 50-year history so it’s a good thing we chose the cavernous Opryland as our venue.

Our students, faculty, and staff members were tremendous throughout the symposium, performing well in offering up their meticulous research, networking with students and faculty members from our fellow 1890s, and being gracious hosts to all in attendance. We were pleased to see TSU President Dr. Glenda Glover in attendance as well, it was great to spend time with her in advance of her retirement this summer. You can read more about the symposium by checking out this issue’s cover story on page 12.

And while the ARD Symposium may have been our biggest research-focused event in the spring semester, it was far from our only one. On several occasions we welcomed dignitaries from the USDA, the Southern Research Station, faculty from other universities, and industry stakeholders to campus. You can read about a couple of those moments on pages 8 and 30, where you can read about a pair of symposiums we took part in right here on campus.

In this issue we turn our attention to the Otis L. Floyd Nursery Research Center in McMinnville, TN. Having recently undergone a momentous change in leadership from the long-serving Dr. Nick Gawel, to newly-established Director Dr. Karla Addesso, we thought it an apt time to dive into the history of the NRC. Take a look at page 36 to learn more about that history, Dr. Gawel’s time, and his successor, Dr. Addesso.

We spent time celebrating our successes this semester as well, taking a week to commemorate the establishment of our new department structure installed last semester. Each of what is now five academic departments operating at the College had their day in the sun during Ag Week, which you can learn more about on page 32.

As always, this issue of AgLink brings to you stories about our amazing students and faculty members as well, highlighting their achievements in the classroom, the field, and the lab. Our goodbye to longtime faculty member Dr. Sam Dennis and a profile of graduate researcher Devin Moore are highlights you should enjoy.

Thank you for reading and for your continued support of Tennessee State University, the College of Agriculture and our land-grant programs!

Chandra Reddy Dean and Director of Research Administrator of Extension

Advocacy in Action!

TSUAg’s Human Sciences Dept. Holds Important Food Waste Prevention Summit

By Charlie Morrison

Determined to positively impact the interconnected conversation of food waste, hunger, and sustainability that’s happening across the globe and right here in Nashville, TSUAg’s Department of Human Sciences in April hosted the “No Food Left Behind” food waste prevention summit. The event brought together leaders from Nashville’s Metro government, food waste and sustainability non-profits, mission-based for-profit companies, and of course, TSUAg faculty members who collectively took a deep dive into the urgent matter of of food sustainability at the event.

Held in the TSUAg Agricultural Information Technology Center on the evening of April 1, the No Food Left Behind event kicked off with a slew of presenters from across the public and private sectors here in Nashville. The panel assembled for the discussion featured representatives from many of the key organizations addressing food sustainability in the Music City. In addition to the inperson event, a further 150 individuals took part in the event virtually, heightening the reach of No Food Left Behind beyond the key players and the TSUAg campus.

Linda Breggin, longtime senior attorney with the Environmental Law Institute in Washington, D.C., and now a Lecturer in Law at the Vanderbilt University Law School, provided the group her overarching legal perspective of the issues surrounding the topic. Rev. Karen McIntyre, founder of the Village at Glencliff, a non-profit shelter providing relief from homelessness and food insecurity, provided a counterpoint to Breggin’s talk, an examination of the issue from a “boots on the ground” perspective.

“Food waste prevention is the one thing all of us can do to impact climate change, save money, and feed the hungry simultaneously,” said Rev. McIntyre in an interview with AgLink after the summit. “An event like this helps make people aware of the severity of this problem and its relatively easy solution. Awareness makes us encourage

each other, our employers, businesses, and schools to solve the food waste problem. Rescuing food costs next to nothing and the benefits more than outweigh the costs.”

The concept of community feeding community espoused by Rev. McIntyre was backed by another pair of food and sustainability non-profits who appeared at No Food Left Behind, the Nashville Food Project and the Society of St. Andrew. The Nashville Food Project’s Chief Program Officer Hanes Motsinger spoke on the important role community gardening can play in feeding the food insecure, and the Society of St. Andrew’s Regional Director for Tennessee, Rev. Jeannie Hunter, redirected the talk to the agriculture industry, where food waste is rampant.

“There’s so much work to be done to understand what’s happening upstream that is actually creating the food waste at our grocery stores, at our farms, at our distribution facilities,” said Motsinger in an interview with AgLink. “Those are the entities where food waste is getting passed on to the landfills in the greatest quantities.

Environmental law attorney and Lecturer in Law at Vanderbilt Linda Breggin brought a legal perspective to the discussion of food insecurity.

U.S. WASTED FOOD FACTS:

Putting numbers to the issue of food waste in the U.S.

40% of all food in the United States is wasted

$166 BILLION (retail value of preventable waste) is spent on the food we never eat

25% of all freshwaters we consume goes to produce food we never eat

4% of the oil we consume goes to produce food we never eat

Yes, individuals are wasting food, but the broader system is an almost bigger problem.”

Jenn Harrman, Program Manager of the Metro Nashville Government Waste Service’s Zero Waste program brought public policy and an examination of the problem through a local lens into the No Food Left Behind discussion. “Food waste and other organic materials make up a quarter of all the waste we send to landfill in Nashville, where it is the single largest contributor to methane gas emissions in landfills,” said Harrman to AgLink. “All of this material could readily be kept out of the landfill through waste prevention, recovery, and composting benefitting our environment and enriching local soils.”

Sustainability consultant and Sheeco Events co-owner Diana Andrew, along with Compost Company Co-Owner and CEO Jeffrey Ezell spoke on their approaches to facilitating food waste prevention from the perspective of mission-based for-profit companies.

“It is critical to talk about food waste and solutions to the problem because if we are going to make a significant difference, we need to engage everyone,” said Ezell to AgLink. “We are making amazing strides through huge efforts of people and organizations working to combat food waste at every level. That said, there is so much more we can do and achieve. As long as there are hungry people and food going to landfills, we aren’t doing enough.”

TSUAg Human Sciences Adjunct Professor Sharon Suggs rounded out the event by bringing the message of food waste prevention back to the individual. “The core message that I presented was advocacy for food waste from the household perspective,” said Suggs. “Simple changes to household food practices can begin a significant contribution to food waste.”

Suggs and the Human Sciences team brought in TSUAg Human Sciences grad and chef Tim Winn of Lighthouse on the Lake to put that message into practice during the “Waste to Taste” demonstration during which Suggs and Winn demonstrated recipes utilizing leftovers and food waste. “Waste to Taste shared how household waste impacts the food waste situation, as well sharing ways to utilize existing foods in one’s cupboard and donating items not used to stakeholders, organizations and other programs for people in need,” said Suggs.

The Human Sciences Department was encouraged with the turnout for the event and the quality of the discussions, and is considering making No Food Left Behind an annual event.

“Food waste is a universal concern throughout the nation, from the farms, manufacturers, and consumers. Holding the event showed how Tennessee’s advocacy has and continues to position us as a vital constituent for food insecurity, sustainability, and waste prevention, especially with food waste.”

- TSUAg Department of Human Sciences Adjunct Professor Sharon Suggs

More than 150 participants joined the event virtually, complementing folks like Department of Human Sciences Chair Dr. Veronica Oates (top left) and Adjunct Professor Sharon Suggs (top right).

Sheeco Events Co-founder Diana Andrew offered up her perspective on food waste at the summit.

Rev. Karen McIntyre, founder of the Village at Glencliff brought a “boots on the ground” perspective to the No Food Left Behind food waste prevention summit. AL

A Tiger Tradition

TSUAg Research on Display at University-wide Research Symposium |

By Charlie Morrison

For nearly a half-century, student and faculty researchers from across the Tennessee State University (TSU) campus have come together for a seminal event in the University calendar, the Tennessee State University-wide Research Symposium. Now in its 46th year, the 2024 University-wide Research Symposium featured the work of students and faculty from five of the University’s eight colleges, who from March 25-29 delivered poster and oral presentations on their research for judging by event host the Division of Research and Sponsored Programs.

Following some opening remarks by Director of Engagement Reginald Cannon on Monday morning, the

symposium kicked off with “College of Agriculture Day,” a day entirely dedicated to the research pursuits of the undergraduate and graduate students at the College (TSUAg). A total of 25 undergraduate and graduate research students delivered oral presentations throughout the day as part of the oral presentation competition, and a further 19 showed off their research work as part of the poster competition.

After three days dedicated to the research efforts of students and faculty of the Colleges of Engineering, Health Sciences, Life and Physical Sciences, and Education respectively, the TSU research community’s focus again returned to TSUAg, where the community of students and scholars

descended upon the Farrell-Westbrook Auditorium for the TSU Research Symposium Awards Banquet.

Following an address by Director of Research and Sponsored Programs Dr. Quincy Quick, keynote speaker and TSU graduate Dr. James T. Brown addressed the room in anticipation of the awards.

Dr. Brown, who got his Bachelor of Science degree in Electrical Engineering from TSU, spent 16 years working for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), an experience he touched on in his remarks.

“At NASA I discovered something because it was the first time I truly applied myself,” said Dr. Brown. “And because I applied myself people

Graduate student Mustapha Olawuni delivered an oral presentation of his research titled “Screening of Bacterial Endophytes for Biocontrol of Southern Blight in Cannabis Sativa L.” on College of Agriculture Day at the TSU research symposium.

I worked with who’d gone to M.I.T., Stanford, all of these big schools, they started asking me questions. This is when I discovered the beauty of engineering, of science in general, and of research in general: the problems don’t care about your race, your age, your socioeconomic background, or what school you went to... the problems just need to be solved.”

The winners of the College of Agriculture day competitions were announced first during the awards banquet. Niraj Ghimire brought home first place in the graduate oral research presentation competition for his presentation on soybean cyst nematode control. Sai Prakash Naroju took home second place for her presentation

on cover crops, and Shivani Dharam brought home third for her work in identifying peptide-responsive histone modification genes.

In the graduate student poster competition, Diksha Tamang won the top prize for her poster detailing her research on urban soil management and its influence on tree growth and long-term ecosystem services. Taina McLeod’s poster on eastern hellbenders released to the wild earned her second, while third went to Niraj Ghimire, who won for the second time for his presentations of his soybean research.

TSUAg was represented in the University-wide undergraduate competition as well, as Charity

McWilliams won third place in the undergraduate poster competition for her presentation on the global impact of fertilizers in agricultural intensification.

“This is an important opportunity for the College of Agriculture to be a part of a long-standing TSU research tradition,” says TSUAg Associate Professor and Associate Dean of Research Dr. Fulya Baysal-Gurel.

“The students gain public-speaking experience, they receive feedback regarding their research from their peers and faculty and they benefit from the practice in getting ready to deliver presentations at professional conferences. On top of that, it’s a great networking environment.”

TSU Research Symposium Awards Banquet keynote speaker Dr. James T. Brown delivered some insightful remarks to the research community assembled at the Farrell-Westbrook Auditorium on the final day of the symposium.

Diksha Tamang took home the top award in the graduate poster competition for her work on urban soil management as part of “College of Agriculture Day” at the TSU University-wide research symposium.

TSUAg graduate student Niraj Ghimire took home two awards from the Tennessee State University-wide research symposium.

TSU’s chapter of Minorities in Agriculture, Natural Resources, and Related Sciences (MANRRS) had a banner year in 2023-2024 that culminated in a strong showing at the MANRRS 38 Annual Training Conference and Career Expo. At the event, students (from left) Dacia Ringo, Dominique Smith, and CheKenna Fletcher took home awards for their research presentations.

One for the Ages

The 2023-2024 academic year was a banner one for TSU’s MANRRS chapter | By

Charlie Morrison

The Tennessee State University College of Agriculture-based chapter of the Minorities in Agriculture, Natural Resources, and Related Sciences (MANRRS) extracurricular organization had what was a banner year in 2023-2024, hosting a slew of events, fostering countless new connections, assisting members in earning scholarships, and generally changing lives for the better here at TSUAg.

The group rounded out what was an incredibly productive year with a pair of events this spring, MANRRS’ 38th Annual Training Conference and Career Expo, and the group’s own 2024 Awards Gala.

The MANRRS 38 national conference offered the tight-knit, productive TSUAg chapter of the organization the chance to be recognized for their achievements and contributions to both the MANRRS cause and to the lives of its members.

At the conference, held March 14 to 17 in Chicago, the TSU chapter was selected as the third-place winner in the national MANRRS Chapter of the Year Award competition.

In winning third place in the Chapter of the Year Award competition, the TSU chapter demonstrated that they were building chapter membership, conducting leadership development, participating in community service,

and promoting the national society. To finish third among 85 participating universities represents a huge honor for this year’s MANRRS group. The chapter was presented with a check for $250 for taking home third.

“Our TSUAg students truly shone at the National MANRRS38 conference this year. With a record number of attendees, they competed well and seized every opportunity to network and actively participate. Their remarkable achievements are a testament to their hard work and dedication. We are excited to build on this success and reach even greater heights in the future,” said Dr. De’Etra Young, Associate Dean of Academics and TSUAg MANRRS Advisor.

In addition to the chapter of the year award, a number of TSUAg MANRRS leaders were also honored for their contributions to the organization.

Former MANRRS national Graduate Student President Emmanuel Wallace was named the winner of the Foster Spirit of Excellence Award. Wallace was joined by Kaylin Hughes in being recognized as 2023-2024 national officers, while rising senior Blake Wright was honored as a national officer for the coming year.

There were a number of MANRRS 38 competitions that TSUAg chapter members placed in as well. In the hard science portion of the competitions, CheKenna Fletcher took home third

place in the graduate oral presentation competition. In the soft skills competitions, TSUAg performed well. Dominique Smith won first place in the essay writing competition, Jhanya Chenault took home the top prize in photography, and Dacia Ringo was named the runner-up in the public speaking competition. First-place winners took home checks for $300, runners-up $200, and third-place finishers $100.

The group wrapped their year here on campus in April when they held their 2024 Awards Gala. The event, held on April 25 at the new Pavilion down on the TSU farm, brought together the group with some honorees, faculty advisors, and alumni for a special evening.

Keynote speakers included the USDA National Resource Conservation Service’s Jahnari Edwards and TSU alumni and Cargill food safety supervisor Kourtney Daniels.

The event culminated with the presentation of a variety of awards TSU MANRRS gave out, to student leaders and impactful faculty members, awards commending participants for their contributions to the group over the past year. AL

A meeting of the Minds

TSUAg Hosts Largest 1890 ARD Research Symposium in History | By

Charlie Morrison

The Tennessee State University College of Agriculture served as the host university for the 21st Association of 1890 Research Directors Biennial Research Symposium, held April 6 – 9 at the Gaylord Opryland Convention Center in Nashville. As the immediate past Chair and steering committee member of the symposium, TSUAg Dean Dr. Chandra Reddy was instrumental in getting the event to be held here in Nashville, and the venue, program, and participants did not disappoint as the event was by all accounts, the biggest, best-attended symposium in the organization’s nearly 50-year history.

More than 1,500 faculty researchers, college administrators, staffers, and students from each of the 19 1890 land-grant historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs) attended this year’s symposium, the premier event bringing together agriculture-focused researchers from across the 1890 land-grant university system. In addition to showcasing the talents and achievements of the 1890 community, this year’s symposium offered attendees the opportunity to interact, share knowledge, and build networks for expanded research collaborations.

The theme of this year’s symposium was “Climate, Health and Cultivating the Next Generation of Agricultural Leaders: Creating Solutions in Food, Agriculture and Natural Resources,” and as such, this year’s event put the focus on students.

Students had the opportunity to present their research work both orally and through poster competitions, network with like-minded scientists from across the 1890 community, and take part in engaging and important

discussions on topics such as climate science research, navigating grantsmanship and outside funding activities, and presenting their research effectively.

A large contingent of faculty, staff, students, and administrators from TSUAg took part in the conference, presenting research, judging competitions, fostering networking connections, and even giving tours of the TSU Agricultural Research Complex. TSU blue was out in force at the event, which also featured a talk by TSU President Glenda Glover herself.

“TSU recognizes the importance of agriculture, I recognize the importance of agriculture having grown up on a farm in Memphis, so I know and love the industry,” said Dr. Glover during her address to the entire conference. “Here we’re doing more to move agriculture forward on our campus in Nashville. Thank you for being here today and for such a meaningful engagement. Continue to perpetuate the legacy of research excellence.”

Students at the College of Agriculture made their mark on the event as well. In addition to TSUAg contributing 124 of the more than 400 posters presented and 300 oral research presentations that were put forth at the symposium, several students walked home with awards, cash prizes, and memories from the event after being recognized for their efforts in presenting their research. Of the 124 presentations, 38 were faculty presentations, nine were made by postdoctoral students, 61 by graduate students, and 16 were given by TSUAg undergrads.

TSUAg had a particularly strong symposium when it came to graduate students’ competitive oral presentations of their research. College of Agriculture graduate students delivered a clean sweep of the competitive oral presentation competition in the category of Food Safety, Nutrition, and Health. Amritpal Singh took home the top prize in that competition, with Aakash Sharma winning second place, and Pallavi Rathore taking third.

TSUAg also performed exceptionally well in the oral competitions in the category of plant health, production, and plant products with graduate student Divya Jain winning the top prize, and fellow College of Agriculture graduate student Sudip Poudel taking home second. In the category of family, youth, community, and economic development, standout graduate student Jazmine Norwood finished first in the competitive poster presentation competition.

TSUAg Dean Dr. Chandra Reddy was warm in welcoming ARD Symposium attendees to the Gaylord Opryland Resort. As the host university of this year’s symposium, TSUAg was thrilled to have leaders from across the 1890 land-grant university system here in Nashville.

Tennessee State University President Dr. Glenda Glover addressed the ARD symposium.

student

Graduate students Amritpal Singh and Aakash Sharma (with faculty advisior Dr. Ankit Patras) took home first and second place respectively in the graduate oral research presentation competion in food safety, nutrition, and health.

Fellow undergraduate student Kerrington Howard excelled in speaking to the collection of researchers, students, and supporters at this year’s ARD Research Symposium.

Kennedy Bentley also spoke to the more than 1,500 in attendance at this year’s ARD Research Symposium.

Undergraduate

Dominique Smith was one of three B.S. students to address the ARD Research Symposium en masse.

TSUAG’S YOUNG WINS MENTORING HONOR

TSUAg Professor and Associate Dean of Academics and Land-grant Programs Dr. De’Etra Young was awarded the inaugural McKinley Mayes Mentoring Award at the Association of 1890 Research Directors (ARD) Biennial Research Symposium, held April 6 through 9 at the Gaylord Opryland Convention Center in Nashville.

In keeping with the theme of the symposium’s focus on students, event creators the 1890 Foundation introduced the McKinley Mayes Mentoring Award this year, making Dr. Young the award’s inaugural recipient. The award was created to recognize an administrator who has demonstrated an outstanding commitment to mentoring both students and early faculty members, making the multitalented Young an ideal inaugural recipient.

“For me working closely with some of the brilliant, young, scientific minds we have throughout our student and faculty bodies here at the College is what brings me professional joy,” said Dr. Young. “And fostering growth in these students and faculty members gives me the satisfaction that we’re fulfilling our core mission here at TSUAg, to educate the next generation of agricultural leaders in how to succeed at both student life and their professional lives following school. I love what I do.”

Professor, administrator named McKinley Mays Mentoring Award winner at 21st ARD Symposium | By Charlie Morrison

For TSUAg Dean Dr. Chandra Reddy, Dr. Young’s true impact is as the connection between the College’s administration and its most important group of stakeholders, its students.

“We are proud of Dr. Young for so many things, including her research and scholarly accomplishments, her outstanding grantsmanship, her leadership in my administration, and of course for her role as a teacher,” said Dr. Reddy. “It is Dr. Young’s steadfast commitment to mentoring both students and young faculty members however, that perhaps best defines her success here at the College of Agriculture. Her compassion, her connection to our students, her mentoring and leadership abilities deliver real value to our campus.”

The McKinley Mays Mentoring Award is just the latest in a long line of awards and distinctions Dr. Young has received including the 2017 TSUAg Outstanding Teaching Faculty Award, the 2018 National Adviser of the Year award from the national student organization Minorities in Agriculture, Natural Resources and Related Sciences, and the prestigious USDA Excellence in College and University Teaching in the Food and Agricultural Sciences Award for which she was honored in 2024.

TSUAg Professor and Associate Dean of Academics and Land-grant Programs Dr. De’Etra Young was awarded the inaugural McKinley Mayes Mentoring Award at the 21st ARD Symposium.

Representing the undergraduate student body on the podium was another TSUAg standout, junior Aaliyah Cotton, who won second place for her competitive oral presentation in the category of Renewable Energy, Natural Resources, and Environment for Undergraduate Student Competitive Oral Presentations.

The TSUAg faculty brought home some hardware during the event’s awards banquet as well, with TSUAg Professor and Associate Dean of Academics and Landgrant Programs Dr. De’Etra Young winning the inaugural McKinley Mayes Mentoring Award. The award was created to recognize an administrator who has demonstrated an outstanding commitment to mentoring both students and early faculty members, and Dr. Young’s work both on a day-to-day basis at the College and with the multi-university MENTOR program earned her the attention of the ARD’s awards committee.

On top of the awards portion of the four-day symposium, TSUAg students stepped up during the symposium’s opening session as well, when three TSU College of Agriculture undergraduates addressed the Presidential Ballroom at Opryland, a venue that seated all of the more than 1,500 participants. Junior Kennedy Bentley, along with seniors Dominque Smith and Kerrington Howard

all addressed the room with poise and eloquence during the opening session.

“It felt great to address the symposium because I wanted to show what the male leadership at the College is doing, I wanted to show everyone that we’re doing something here (at TSUAg), I wanted to show the symposium what they were investing in... me,” said Howard, a senior and a Dean’s Scholar.

TSUAg’s hosting of the event attracted the support of event organizers, teams from the 1890 universities, and the scientists and students themselves. The Gaylord Opryland Convention Center’s expansive size accomodated the event, the largest symposium in history.

“It’s important for scientists and students to come together and share their research. What that does is it spurs more thought, more collaboration, more problem-solving. Also, it lets the outside world know we’re actually doing important work,” said event co-chair Dr. Louis Whitesides, who serves in his day job as the Vice President & Executive Director of 1890 Land Grant Programs at South Carolina State University.

“This has been excellent, I don’t think I’ve been to a meeting like this before,”

award winners

said Kevin Kephart, the deputy director of the Institute of Bioenergy, Climate, and Environment (IBCE) at the USDA’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture. “Having all of these important institutions come together, to have the students involved, to have these great scientists involved, the leaders from these institutions... it’s just been outstanding.”

For his part, TSUAg Dean Dr. Chandra Reddy was buoyant about the College’s performance at the ARD. For Dr. Reddy, a successful showing at the symposium took everyone from the College’s participation, involvement, and engagement.

“I am extremely happy that the event went so well. Our students and faculty succeeded in all the sessions and competitions, with outstanding preparation and engagement,” said Dr. Reddy. “So many of the attendees visited the College and were thoroughly impressed with our research labs and the cutting-edge research being conducted by our faculty, graduate students, and even undergraduate students.”

“It was a prideful moment for my team and I to have our peer institutions treating us as a model for their own institutions and leaders, and we heard that a lot at this year’s symposium,” Dr. Reddy continued.

A total of seven undergraduate and graduate students joined Dr. De’Etra Young in winning ARD awards

Undergraduate:

Aaliyah Cotton – 2nd Place for Outstanding Achievement in Renewable Energy, Natural Resources, and Environment for Undergraduate Student Competitive Oral Presentations.

Graduate:

Divya Jain – 1st Place for Outstanding Achievement in Plant Health and Production and Plant Products for Graduate Student Competitive Oral Presentations.

Sudip Poudel – 2nd Place for Outstanding Achievement in Plant Health and Production and Plant Products for Graduate Student Competitive Oral Presentations.

Amritpal Singh – 1st Place for Outstanding Achievement in Food Safety, Nutrition, and Health for Graduate Student Competitive Oral Presentations.

Graduate Continued:

Aakash Sharma – 2nd Place for Outstanding Achievement in Food Safety, Nutrition, and Health for Graduate Student Competitive Oral Presentations.

Pallavi Rathore – 3rd Place for Outstanding Achievement in Food Safety, Nutrition, and Health for Graduate Student Competitive Oral Presentations.

Jazmine Norwood – 1st Place for Outstanding Achievement in Family, Youth, Community, and Economic Development for Graduate Student Competitive Poster Presentations.

Faculty:

Dr. De’Etra Young – McKinley Mays Mentoring Award

Living their Best Lives on Campus

TSUAg students taking advantage of USDA’1890 Scholars Program to live their best lives here on campus | By Charlie Morrison

The current TSUAg class of USDA 1890 Scholars, made up of Charity McWilliams, Jai Lewis, Dominique Smith, Zaria Hobbs, and Lauryn Jones (Aidan Dunn and Taryn Nooks are not pictured) takes a moment to pose with Eston Williams, TSU’s dedicated, on-campus liaison.

“Having the scholarship has enabled me to stay more on top of my schoolwork, put much more effort into things, and remember why I am here.”

- Rising Senior Lauryn Jones

The USDA’s 1890 Scholars Program, a program that has since 1992 impacted the lives of students across the 1890 land-grant university system, continues to do so right here on campus at Tennessee State University’s College of Agriculture (TSUAg). Last year, the program saw seven TSUAg students get full rides to the University and here at TSUAg, the recipients are utilizing the support to live their best lives here on campus.

Here at TSUAg, the seven scholarship recipients are sponsored by a variety of USDA agencies, reflecting the students’ varied interests in agriculture. Lauryn Jones and Jai Lewis are sponsored by the USDA’s Agricultural Research Service. Dominique Smith is sponsored by the USDA’s Rural Development agency, while Taryn Nooks is backed by the USDA Farm Service Agency. Zaria Hobbs and Charity McWilliams receive their scholarship support from the USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service and Aidan Dunn’s scholarship comes from the USDA National Insititute of Food and Agriculture.

The 1890 Scholars Program was kicked off in 1992 after the USDA reached a working agreement to support the 19 1890 land-grant universities, including TSU. This past year the organization sponsored 100 students across the 1890 system. The scholarships, backed financially by respective agencies within the USDA, provide recipients with full tuition, fees, books, room, and board. Students must perform in the classroom and hold a cumulative GPA of at least 3.0 to keep the scholarship, which may be renewed each year.

The USDA’s Office of Partnerships and Public Engagement manages the program, which is aimed at improving the availability of educational and career opportunities for students from rural or underserved communities and driving students from rural and underserved communities who study food, agriculture, natural resources and other related sciences to 1890s like TSU.

For the recipients of the scholarships themselves, the biggest benefit of being supported by the USDA is that it frees them to pursue their academic interests with complete abandon, free from the financial pressure university attendance can come with. In short, the backing of the USDA allows them to truly live their best lives on campus.

“The receipt of a USDA scholarship has impacted my life at TSU by allowing me to be more receptive to opportunities that come my way,” said rising senior Lauryn Jones, who studies food and animal science at the College.

“Without this scholarship, I do not know if I would be able to receive internships for the summer. Having the scholarship has enabled me to stay more on top of my schoolwork, put much more effort into things, and remember why I am here.”

“It was very helpful in regard to my studies. It took some stress away from my schoolwork and allowed me to focus on getting into my actual field. I was able to contribute to organizations I was a part of and I didn’t have to worry about all of these balances that are due,” said agribusiness student and scholarship recipient Dominique Smith.

“I was able to branch out and develop leadershipwise in such a way that I’ve been able to speak to large crowds at events, participate in organizations, and just grow,” she continued. “I was just able to develop skills that I didn’t come to TSU with my freshman year.”

For Smith, living her best life on campus includes the bonus that her USDA scholarship provides her, the opportunity to shadow work and intern as a loan technician with USDA’s Rural Development Agency right here in Nashville. There she assists with direct loans, repair grants, and loans for the rural communities.

“Through my studies, I aimed to not only acquire the skills necessary to address food insecurity and food deserts in disadvantaged communities but also to leverage opportunities to actively contribute to healthier living environments,” says Smith.

For more information on the USDA’s 1890 Scholars Program, scan this QR code.

Above: TSUAg Dean Dr. Chandra Reddy congratulates Associate Professor Dr. Jianwei Li after he won the TSUAg 2024 Outstanding Graduate Mentor award.

To the right: Dr. Reddy provided the introductory remarks at the 2024 TSUAg Awards Luncheon.

our best brightest&

TSUAg Celebrates 2024 Award Winners at Annual Luncheon

By Charlie Morrison

The Tennessee State University College of Agriculture (TSUAg) celebrated some of its best and brightest back in March at the 2024 College awards luncheon. The event highlighted some of the top students, faculty members, and staffers for their commitment over the previous year, and as such, it was a joyous affair.

but all of the faculty, Foster’s impact on academic life at the College has been significant.

At the event, held March 15 at the FarrellWestbrook auditorium on the campus of the College of Agriculture, a total of 15 from the College were singled out for their contributions to academic life at TSU over the past year. Five committee chairs took on the task of announcing the awards, but first TSU Assistant Vice President for Academic Affairs Dr. Erik Schmeller grasped the microphone to deliver opening remarks.

Administrative Awards

TSUAg Director of Marketing and Communications “Coach” Rod Reed was the next to don the microphone, announcing Jason Foster as the winner of the Outstanding Administrative Support Award. Foster, a Senior Office Assistant who works directly with TSUAg Department of Food and Animal Sciences Chair Dr. Samuel Nahashon, has called TSUAg home for the past three years. Given his outstanding work supporting not just Dr. Nahashon

Beloved TSUAg staffer Donna Hinton won this year’s Beyond the Call of Duty Award. Hinton, a native Nashvillian and accomplished musician, serves as the Office Manager for the College, where she leads the team of staffers in the Dean’s Suite. Hinton long served as an educator herself, working at both the high school and collegiate levels, including a 10-year stint as a Certification Officer for Fisk University. Hinton joined the TSUAg family in 2019.

Extension Awards

is an associate professor at TSUAg and a state-wide Extension Specialist who brings her knowledge of entomology to growers and Extension offices throughout the Volunteer State.

Graduate Awards

The Associate Dean of TSU Extension, Dr. Latif Lighari, was next to the podium to announce the winners of two awards, for Outstanding Extension Agent and Outstanding Extension Faculty. Rutheford County 4-H Extension Agent Raquel Victor took home the prize for Outstanding Extension Agent and Dr. Kaushalya Amarasekare won as the Outstanding Extension Faculty member.

Victor is a 16-year veteran of TSU Extension who works primarily with Rutheford County youth on life skills, proper nutrition, leadership, and citizenship. Dr. Amarasekare

Graduate Coordinator Dr. Bharat Pokharel next announced the graduate student awards. The winner of the Outstanding M.S. Student Award in Agribusiness and Leadership was Purshottam Dhungana. Dhungana’s research is centered on enhancing decisionmaking for small farms in the areas of marketing, diversification strategies, and financial decision-making.

Second-year M.S. student Aakash Sharma took home the Outstanding Student Award for Food and Animal Sciences. Sharma is currently working on a U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and National Science Foundation-funded project to develop a UV irradiation for the disinfection of food contact services. Sharma serves as both the President of the Food Science Club and as the Secretary of the Agriculture Graduate Student Association.

Graduate research assistant Christina Jennings

DonnaHinton

Jason Foster

RaquelVictor

Dr . Kaushalya Amarasekare

Purshottam Dhungana

AakashSharma

was named the winner of the 2024 Outstanding Doctoral Student Award. Jennings plies her trade out at the Otis L. Floyd Nursery Research Center, where she works under Dr. Fulya Baysal-Gurel and the USDA’s Dr. Lisa Alexander on the identification and functional verification of powdery mildew-resistant genes in bigleaf hydrangea plants.

The award for Outstanding Graduate Mentor in 2024 went to Dr. Jianwei Li. The climate change researcher and soil biogeochemistry Associate Professor was named the winner of this year’s award for his work mentoring a bevy of graduate and undergraduate students over the past year. The students advised by Dr. Li serve as a reflection on his leadership; they have been proficient in publishing, promoting their own research, and winning both academic and travel awards.

Undergraduate & Teaching Awards

TSUAg’s Associate Dean of Land-grant Programs Dr. De’Etra Young took over as the master of ceremonies for the undergraduate and faculty researcher awards. Dr. Young presented Kyla Hughes with the Outstanding Undergraduate Student Award for the Department of Agricultural Science and Engineering. The sophomore is pursing a degree in Agricultural Science with a concentration of Biotechnology.

Aaliyah Cotton was presented with the Undergraduate Student Award for the Department of Environmental Science. Cotton is a junior at TSUAg who sports a spiffy 3.9 grade point average. The Dean’s List regular and member of the Honors College is a regular at the Tiger Bay Wetland, where under the tutelage of particularly Dr. Tom Byl, she performs research on algal toxin accumulation, among other things.

The Outstanding Undergraduate Student Award for the Department of Food and

GraceColvin

Animal Science went this year to Grace Colvin. Colvin also touts a 3.9 G.P.A. and is a feature on both the President’s and Dean’s Lists. You can often find Colvin out at “the Farm,” the Agriculture Research and Education Center, where she serves as a Dean’s Scholar and plays a vital role in the management of the facility.

Tramaine Moore was named the Outstanding Undergraduate Student for the Department of Human Sciences. The junior Family and Consumer Sciences major and Dean’s Scholar serves on the leadership team for the newly established TSU Fashion Society, and also on the Public Relations Committee of the Chi Psi chapter of the Alpha Kappa Psi professional business fraternity. Moore is also a winner of a NextGen award that will support her upcoming travels to the United Kingdom.

This year’s Outstanding Teaching Faculty Award went to plant breeding and genetics professor Dr. Matthew Blair. The affable Dr. Blair brings a zest to his teaching that has seen him have impacts in the classroom teaching biotechnology and plant breeding. Dr. Blair has been proficient as both an advisor and as a researcher, mentoring over 100 students of various levels and authoring over 200 refereed publications on his focus area, the climate change tolerance and nutritional traits of amaranth, common beans, cowpeas, and mung beans.

Research Awards

It was TSUAg’s Associate Dean of Research, Dr. Fulya Baysal-Gurel who was the final awards committee chair to present a pair of awards for research. Dr. Brahmaiah Pendyala was named the 2024 Outstanding Young Researcher Award. The Food and Animal Science Assistant Professor focuses on natural products and their roles in promoting human and animal health. Dr. Pendyala’s research spans the disciplines

of bioinformatics, food science, microalgal technology, and bioproducts and he has published extensively on these topics.

The final award of the 2024 Awards Luncheon, for Outstanding Research Faculty went this year to Dr. Anjit Patras. Dr. Patras is and Associate Professor of Food Science and Engineering at TSUAg, where he focuses his research on developing non-thermal technologies, process sustainability, scale-up engineering, process validation, and computational modeling. Dr. Patras has made significant contributions to scholarly publications and he has secured important grants for the College.

2024 awards committee chairs:

Coach Rod Reed Outstanding Administrative and Technical Support Awards

Dr. Latif Lighari Outstanding Extension Agent and Outstanding Extension Faculty Awards

Dr. Bharat Pokharel Outstanding Graduate Student and Outstanding Graduate Student Mentor Awards

Dr. De’Etra Young Outstanding Undergraduate Student and Outstanding Teaching Faculty Awards

Dr. Fulya Baysal-Gurel Outstanding Young Researcher and Research Faculty Awards

Dr.Jianwei Li

Ky

laHughes

Dr . Anjit Patras

Dr . Matthew Blair

Long Live the Gentleman Scholar

Dr. Sam Dennis retires after four decades at TSUAg

By Charlie Morrison

The absence of recently retired soil and water scientist Dr. Samuel Dennis from the Tennessee State College of Agriculture’s (TSUAg) campus is palpable. You can feel it. Known for a smile that lit rooms and a willingness to help both students and his fellow scholars alike, Dr. Dennis’ brought a unique skill set to TSUAg, and when this spring he brought his magnificent career to a close with his official retirement, it was bittersweet. While all were happy to see him earn his retirement, it is safe to say the College of Agriculture began missing him almost immediately.

At retirement, Dr. Dennis was TSUAg’s longest serving faculty member. His career at the College spanned more than four decades, multiple Deans, four University Presidents, and hundreds, if not thousands of students. Over that time Dr. Dennis

coached countless young faculty members, supporting them in hurdling the obstacles a new researcher and faculty member can face. Dr. Dennis may have hung up his lab coat for the final time, but his impact will endure.

Dr. Dennis’ path at TSU was as extraordinary as the man himself. After coming to the U.S. from his native Nigeria in the late 1970s and graduating from Middle Tennessee State University, Dr. Dennis began his time at TSU as a graduate student in the early 1980s. He engaged in an accelerated master’s program and in 1982, after just one year in TSU’s graduate program, he received his Master’s of Science degree in Agricultural Sciences from TSU.

Though he considered his options after graduating with his master’s degree, he was

Longtime TSUAg faculty member Sam Dennis was instrumental in, amongst many other things, bringing TSUAg Dean Dr. Chandra Reddy to campus.

Those who knew Dr. Dennis well knew that he kept an office in the corner of his labratory in the Carp Building, and that his official office in the Farrell-Westbrook Building (the Barn) was in name only.

“

When I first started here the Barn was really a barn... no offices, just a barn. When you walked in you would see rabbits roaming around, someone was doing research on them at the time, so there were rabbits everywhere. The other side was used for chickens.

- Dr. Sam Dennis

convinced to stay at TSU, taking a job at the College assisting the faculty. “I was always very, very technical. The computer was coming into play then and I was one of the only people here that was ‘good with computing,’” Dr. Dennis laughed during in an interview with AgLink.

“I was also very good on instrumentation, I was good at analyzing soils, plant samples, water samples... so much so that the other departments and even people from other universities would come here to watch me working on instruments such as the gas chromatograph and the atomic absorption spectrometer,” Dr. Dennis continued.

His skill enabled Dr. Dennis to assist his colleagues at the College, but not undertake research of his own. At the prompting of longtime, now-retired TSUAg professor Dr. Carter Catlin, Jr. However, Dr. Dennis addressed that, continuing his work at TSU while

simultaneously pursuing a Ph.D. in Plant & Soil Science from Alabama A&M University (AAMU). The degree took him three years, but by 1994 Dr. Dennis was a proper member of the TSUAg faculty body.

“It was the best thing that could have happened to me. And that’s where I met Dr. Reddy. He wanted me to work with him but he was working mostly in plants, and I was in waters and soils. All of my work at AAMU had to do with soil physics, and when I finished training in soil physics I brought it here.”

Dr. Dennis’ research in his three decades as an active TSUAg soil and water researcher dealt with water resources and environmental soils. When it came to soil science, Dr. Dennis was proud to have matriculated over a dozen research assistants to positions with the USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service. On the topic of water research, his impact on not only

TSUAg but also the entire 1890 system can still be felt.

When he began as a Ph.D.-holding research professor at TSUAg, none of the 19 1890 land-grant universities were performing water quality research. Determined to remedy that, Dr. Dennis wrote a grant proposal that was funded by the USDA and ultimately led to the creation of the USDA-NIFA 1890 Institutions National Facilitation Project for Water Resources. Nine of the 1890 universities began

undertaking water quality research as a product of that program.

“What I found out was that I needed to carve out a niche for both the 1890 schools and the 1862s... that niche was pharmaceuticals in water,” said Dennis. “We use prescription medicines everyday, and I was finding traces of those medications in river water. Just looking at water quality on its face, its PH, its dissolved oxygen wasn’t enough for me, I said ‘let me carve out a niche, let me look at these pharmaceuticals.’

My conclusion was that people literally take medication they don’t use and throw it out into the environment.”

“I would advise young researchers to do what I did, first find a niche, an area they want to work in and then bring in some collaborators,” said Dr. Dennis. “I was looking at areas that are urbanizing. That became my niche and I stuck with that until my retirement.”

He published dozens of research papers over the decades, wrote countless

grants and educated thousands of students. To him, the time is right to hang up his lab coat for the final time.

“It feels great, I feel great,” said Dr. Dennis with his signature smile. “When I told the students I was going to be retiring they didn’t like it, they told me to stay. I had to explain to them, ‘look, I’ve been here for 40 years,” before they would admit that ‘yes, Dr. Dennis perhaps it’s time for you to go.’”

Job well done Sam. Congratulations. AL

“Finis has built an impressive career meeting the needs of new and beginning farmers across Tennessee, and he is incredibly deserving of this award.”

- Marcus Tyler, Farm Credit Mid-America

Longtime TSU College of Agriculture staff member Finis Stribling, III was named the 2023 recipient of Farm Credit Mid-America’s inaugural Community Excellence Award, presented to him this past January.

In Honor of Excellence

Small Farm Academy Director

In late 2023, word arrived on to the Tennessee State University College of Agriculture (TSUAg) campus that one of its longest-serving staff members had been named the recipient of a national award for his contributions to the community of the Tennessee small farmer. The campus rejoiced.

That staffer was TSUAg’s Finis Stribling, III, in December named the 2023 recipient of Farm Credit Mid-America’s inaugural Community Excellence Award, an honor created to recognize “a community leader, agricultural professional or volunteer who belongs to a community-based agricultural organization and is creating pathways for the next generation of agriculture.”

Stribling, III is a nearly 30-year employee of the TSU Extension program, serves the College as the Director of both the Tennessee New Farmer Academy program and its sister event, the TSU Small Farm Expo. Throughout his career, Stribling has addressed the challenges that small farmers face while ensuring they have the necessary resources to be successful.

“Small farms play a vital role in our communities, state and country, and if

| By

Charlie Morrison

you didn’t grow up in the agricultural industry, that’s OK,” said Stribling. “If you are a military veteran, interested in leaving the private sector, or even looking for something post-retirement, we want to provide the hands-on experience needed to build solid, viable and successful agricultural businesses for farmers from all walks of life.”

Stribling established the Tennessee New Farmer Academy, a seven-month certification program for new and beginning farmers across the state, in 2014. The program helps individuals who are new to farming or looking to transition into farming from another field learn how to establish and maintain an efficient, productive agricultural business through both classroom instruction and hands-on sessions. Participants learn about a variety of agricultural topics, from soil health and irrigation strategies to livestock production best practices.

Stribling also chairs the Tennessee Small Farm Expo. This annual event brings farmers, educators and state and local leaders together to discuss the needs of small farmers and emerging research.

“We value the work of community leaders and farmers who are forging

pathways to help others in their communities find success in the field of agriculture,” said Marcus Tyler, emerging ag business development manager for Farm Credit MidAmerica. “Finis has built an impressive career meeting the needs of new and beginning farmers across Tennessee, and he is incredibly deserving of this award.”

The Community Excellence Award is made possible through Growing Forward®, Farm Credit Mid-America’s program for young, beginning and small farmers. This multi-year program provides eligible customers with continuing education opportunities that focus on financial management and help them position their operations for growth and long-term success.

Winners of the Community Excellence Award receive $2,500 and the opportunity to be recognized at one of the cooperative’s Know to Grow® conferences. Stribling was recognized at Know to Grow® in Indianapolis held January 30-31.

Stribling has another big summer and semester in front of him now. At time of printing, the New Farmer Academy is in full swing, with the Small Farm Expo to take place in September. AL

Stribling, III takes home huge honor from Farm Credit Mid-America

From Asheville to Nashville

By Alexis Clark and Charlie Morrison

Tennessee State University’s College of Agriculture hosted the USDA Forest Service-Southern Research Station HBCU Research Summit this spring, commemorating 30 years of research, partnership, and collaboration among the USDA, Southern Research Station (SRS), and HBCUs engaged in agricultural research.

The 2024 SRS-HBCU Research Summit welcomed USDA Undersecretary Dr. Homer Wilkes as a special guest. Dr. Wilkes’ participation provided additional opportunities for sharing partnering successes, exploring challenges and

intersections, and fostering ongoing collaboration.

Held on campus in various College of Agriculture buildings, the event featured SRS Director Dr. Toral Patel-Weynand, presentations on the university’s history and its SRS partnership, and a panel discussion on future collaborations. Sessions throughout the day mapped out future interactions between research universities and their government counterparts at the USDA.

This marks the second consecutive year the College of Agriculture has hosted the

summit in collaboration with SRS and the USDA, showcasing the institution’s commitment to fostering relationships with government agencies.

Dr. De’Etra Young, Associate Dean of Academics and Land-grant Programs, highlighted the importance of collaborative partnerships during the event. “We wanted to host the summit again this year because fostering collaborative partnerships with the Southern Research Station and other 1890 institutions is critical to our mission of bringing the best research opportunities to our talented student body,” Dr. Young said during the event.

TSUAg Welcomes Wilkes, HBCUs for Southern Research Station Summit

Representatives from the USDA Forest Service and the Southern Research Station came to campus this spring for the USDA Forest Service-Southern Research Station HBCU Research Summit, a formative research summit highlighting the work between the two organizations and 1890 universities like TSUAg.

“The end result of our work to collaborate with our industry partners is to improve the quantity and quality of the research avenues available to our student body and that’s always going to necessitate a close relationship with the USDA,” Dr. Young continued.

USDA Undersecretary Dr. Homer Wilkes, an HBCU alumnus ppointed to his position under the Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack by President Joe Biden in 2021, expressed gratitude for TSU hosting the event.

“I took this opportunity today to come out because I want to hear from you all,” Wilkes said. “It gives us an opportunity to have an exchange of information. If we say we want to be helpful, we need to know how can we be helpful. And that’s the type of dialogue we have with these deans and the university setting.”

Dr. Toral Patel-Weynand notes that the SRS has had more than 200 research, education, and outreach activities with HBCUs or 1890 land-grant schools since 2017. “My vision

is to keep building on the solid foundation we’ve established over the past three decades, and to set the stage for even greater engagement and expansion to include more 1890 schools,” Dr. Patel-Weynand said.

“TSU and the other HBCUs can look forward to a continued commitment from SRS to work with faculty at each of the six universities to design a program to grow and enhance the relationship for mutual benefit while building capacity and developing scientists at the undergraduate and graduate level.”

Dr. Quincy Quick, TSU’s Associate Vice President of Research and Sponsored Programs, participated in the HBCU panel discussion alongside representatives from other HBCUs. They discussed industry partnerships, grant funding efforts, student recruitment and retention, and diversity at governmental organizations. Dr. Quick addressed the importance of diversity in thinking and research.

“We have diversity in that our mission is to train and develop African-American

students, but what should not get lost in any discussion about diversity, and it gets lost, is that really what you’re talking about is diversity of thinking,” Dr. Quick said. “That’s what helps create, develop, and sustain partnerships, accepting that diversity.”

During the day-long summit, TSU hosted not only USDA and SRS but also representatives from Tuskegee University, Florida A&M University, Southern University, Alabama A&M University, and North Carolina A&T University.

The USDA Forest Service-Southern Research Station HBCU Research Summit serves as another demonstration of the university’s commitment to research and its pursuit of an ‘R1’ designation under the Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Learning.

The summit event highlighted TSU’s dedication to advancing research collaboration not only with the USDA and SRS but also with fellow HBCUs.

Held on campus in various College of Agriculture buildings, the USDA Forest Service-Southern Research Station HBCU Research Summit featured presentations and more.

USDA undersecretary of agriculture for natural resources and environment Dr. Homer Wilkes joined Souther Research Station Director Toral Patel-Weynand and the headliners of the event.

TSUAg undergraduate student Omari Mason took a moment during the summit to introduce himself to USDA undersecretary of agriculture for natural resources and environment Dr. Homer Wilkes.

TSUAg’s Agricultural Information Technology Center was the venue for much of the summit, offering presenters to connect with a full room of stakeholders

Representatives from other 1890s like Tuskeegee University’s Dr. Olga Bolden-Tiller (in red) brought their ideas to the USDA Forest Service-Southern Research Station HBCU Research Summit too.

Attendees of the TSUAg Department of Agriculture Science and Engineering Day took time to jump on the hayride for a tour of the College’s farm acreage.

A week of our Own Own

TSUAg Highlights New Departments in First Post-Covid “Ag Week” Celebration

By Charlie Morrison

Spring break may have come and gone in 2024, but a partylike atmosphere continued to circulate about the Tennessee State University College of Agriculture (TSUAg) campus this spring as the school played host to “Ag Week 2024,” a six-day celebration of student life at the College.

The week-long celebration of the College was held Monday, March 11 through Saturday, March 16, and featured interactive activities, guest speakers, tours, discussions, and of course, catered lunches. As evidenced by the smiling faces, laughing voices, and rounds of applause that permeated the event, it was well received by the student body. The event coincides with national Ag. Week, which kicked off Monday, March 18 across the country.

This year’s Ag Week festivities represented a return to normalcy for the College, as it was the first such event held since the breakout of the Covid-19 pandemic over four years ago. As was the case before the pandemic, Ag Week 2024 demonstrated once again the fact that free lunches, fun activities, and lively discussions never go out of style on a college campus. Students, faculty members, and College administrators came out in droves for each of the festivities’ six days of events, which this year, took on a different structure than their pre-pandemic predecessors.

The College, having just last semester introduced three new academic departments, built this year’s Ag Week festivities around the new structure, dedicating one day to each of TSUAg’s now five respective departments (two departments shared the first day). Following the respective celebrations held by the departments, the week-long event rounded out with the College’s annual Awards Luncheon on Friday, and the “Ag Alumni and Friends Day” event on Saturday.

The Departments of Agriculture Science and Engineering and Food and Animal Sciences shared the first day of Ag Week 2024 on Monday, March 11. The events that day began with the Agricultural Science and Engineering department hosting a department showcase in which faculty presented their vision for the department’s future, before shifting gears to a Food and Animal Sciences Department trivia competition. One happy undergraduate took home a $100 for winning the trivia contest, but all were happy about the final event of Ag Week’s first day,

a build-your-own ice cream sundae event featuring therapy animals. Several hayride tours of the TSU Agricultural Research and Education Center farms took place throughout the day as well.

Day two of Ag Week 2024 was dedicated to the newly established Agribusiness Department. “Agribusiness Day” began at the Farrell-Westbrook Building Auditorium (the Barn) with a video presentation on the art of making a formal business pitch, followed by presentations and discussions on the topic led by TSUAg undergraduates Kerrington Howard and Omari Mason.

Following their own round of trivia questions, the Agribusiness Department presented guest speaker, Kroger Operations Coordinator and TSUAg Advisory Board member Jules Smith. Smith discussed the Kroger-backed scholarships at TSU before doling out some real-world advice for the undergraduates in attendance at the event.

The Department of Environmental Science took over on day three of the celebration, kicking things off in the morning with a battery recycling event in the Barn preceding the annual TSUAg Student Appreciation Day cookout held that Wednesday at the Farrell-Westbrook Auditorium. The event, featuring free barbecue cooked up by TSUAg’s own “Coach” Rod Reed, primed the party for the afternoon event, an electric vehicle car show held in the roundabout at TSUAg.

The final day of departmental celebrations was hosted by the faculty of TSUAg’s Human Sciences Department and kicked off first thing on the morning of day four on Thursday with a student recognition breakfast in Humphries Hall.

Undergraduates from the Human Sciences program joined several faculty members in one of the Humphries Hall kitchen classrooms at lunch, where they had a lot of laughs and a few near cries while creating homemade pizzas.

The signature event of the day was a custom tote bag and hat creation event sponsored by the TSU Fashion Society and held in the Barn in the late afternoon. TSUAg alumni and tailor to the stars Randolph Williamson gave the opening remarks for the event, which featured TSUAg fashion students creating their own custom tote bag accessories.

For Associate Dean of Academics and Land-grant Programs Dr. De’Etra Young,

the department days and Ag Week as a whole make a significant contribution to the building of a real community at the College.

“The College of Agriculture is one big family where we share in hard work, camaraderie, and school spirit,” says Dr. Young. “Ag Week is really just about celebrating that family, having some fun and sharing some laughs with that family.

“It is a moment each year when the academics side of things take a back seat to the community aspect of the College, when we chat, we eat, we do activities all in the name of growing that sense of family, that sense of community here at TSUAg.”

After wrapping up the department days, TSUAg returned to the Barn one more time for the TSUAg’s annual Awards Luncheon. The annual awards ceremony recognizes the standout students, faculty members, and staffers at the College of Agriculture over the past calendar year in categories such as Outstanding Young Researcher, Outstanding Extension Agent, and

Outstanding Teaching Faculty.

The final event of Ag Week 2024 was the TSU Ag Alumni & Friends Day event held this past Saturday morning at “the Farm,” the College’s Agricultural Research and Education Center, in the beautiful new Farm Pavilion building. Current students got the opportunity to rub elbows with TSUAg alumni at the event, which, in keeping with the theme of the week, featured food, fun, and lots of laughs.

Ag Week 2024, for College of Agriculture

Dean Dr. Chandra Reddy, was a week for TSUAg to turn its attention inwards, a time to focus on the vibrance of community at the College of Agriculture.

“We like to take a moment each year to celebrate who we are as an academic community,” says Dr. Reddy. “We think happy students are productive students, and as we begin what will be a difficult second half of the spring semester, I think it’s important to create an environment of joy around our community, and that’s what we tried to do with Ag Week 2024.”

TSUAg undergraduate student Omari Mason presented on forming a business plan during Agribusiness Day during Ag Week.

Kroger and the TSUAg Advisory Board’s Jules Smith spoke to students during Agribusiness Day at Ag Week 2024

TSUAg Environmental Science student Aaliyah Cotton celebrated her award as the Outstanding Student in Environmental Sciences

Nashville-based tailor and business owner Randolph Williamson spoke to a large group of TSUAg fashion merchandising students during day four of Ag Week.

TSUAg doctoral student CheKenna Fletcher spends some time with a new friend at the Departments of Agriculture Science & Engineering and Food & Animal Sciences Day at Ag Week 2024.

Nashville-based tailor and business owner Randolph Williamson pictured with TSUAg fashion merchandising students (from left) Brighton Gillum and Jaylen Turner during day four of Ag Week.

The TSU Fashion Society sponsored a fun accessory creation event at the Barn as part of Ag Week 2024.

TSUAg current students, faculty, staff, and alumni gathered at the Pavilion at the TSUAg Agricultural Research and Education Center last Saturday for an afternoon of fun, food, and conversation.

the Inflection point

At this critical moment at the Otis L. Floyd Nursury Research Center, we examine the past, present, and future of the facility | By

Charlie Morrison

It was in February of 1997 that a relatively new, then-four-year employee of the Tennessee State University College of Agriculture (TSUAg), research faculty member Dr. Nick Gawel, was hired to be the first full-time director of the College’s brand-new nursery research facility, the Otis L. Floyd Nursery Research Center (NRC) in McMinnville, TN. Though at that time he was merely an associate investigator in the cooperative agriculture research program, “not even really a part of the College,” as he says it, Dr. Gawel took a leap.

He applied. He impressed. He was hired, and for 27 years Dr. Gawel guided the facility to a place of prominence in the nursery industry in Tennessee, in the scientific community, and in the TSUAg family. With Dr. Gawel’s January retirement and the

subsequent introduction of Dr. Karla Addesso as the facility’s new Director, the NRC is at an inflection point, a point at which to take a glance at the people, the politics, and the passion that brought the facility to be, and keeps it on the cutting edge.

Origins

The story of how Tennessee’s only agricultural research facility dedicated to the well-being of the woody ornamental industry came to be features everything you’d want from a movie script, larger-than-life personalities, power brokers from a long-established rural industry lobbying maverick lawmakers in big city Nashville, unexpected partnerships, and even a happy ending. There were twists, there were turns, there were moments of both celebration and doubt

in the story of the NRC. That said, there would not have been a story if not for the growers. They were the spark.

By the mid-1980s the woody ornamental industry had been, for about a century, established as one of the Volunteer State’s most important agricultural industries. Over the generations, growers in Tennessee had utilized their proximity to the Smoky Mountains and the Cumberland Plateau in developing more than 1,400 species and 14,000 genera of woody ornamentals, mastering the art of accessing the great diversity of naturally grown plant materials from which they could take cuttings and propagate at their nurseries.

After 100 years of solid growth, leaders in the industry were looking to both protect what they had and invest

in the future. For the growers that meant creating an ally in the scientific community that would promote the industry, serve the industry, and further the industry. For some of the prominent growers of the time like Ed Porter of Triangle Nursery, Bill Boyd of Flower City Nursery, and Frank Collier of Pleasant Grove Nursery, a facility like the NRC represented the next step in the evolution of their industry. And with that belief in mind, they pushed to make that vision become a reality.

As Collier describes it, it took “the perfect storm” of circumstances to get the people, the money, and the passion on board for the facility to be built, and the perfect storm they got. “It goes back a long, long time, before my time. The old guys of the industry tried to get the University of Tennessee or someone to start a similar type of facility and no one would bite,” says Collier. “It was tried way before us, we just hit a perfect storm. The timing was perfect, and it just came together.”

“Back in the ‘80s the growers had the foresight to say ‘we need a place that’s going to look out for our interests,’ and so they’re the ones who got the political will together and did all the lobbying and all the convincing to get someone to say ‘yes’, to get TSU to say ‘yes, we’re going to do that, we’re going to work with you to put this together,’” says Dr. Gawel.

The first friendly ear the growers found on the topic of creating a research facility in middle Tennessee to support the nursery industry was that of State

Floyd. Working with then Tennessee Governor Ned McWherter and Tennessee Commissioner of Economic and Community Development Johnny Hayes, Floyd and Cooper collaborated with industry representatives to secure about $2 million in funding for the project from the State of Tennessee, the Appalachian Regional Commission, Warren County Commission, and the USDA.

When it came to securing funds from the Federal government, Tennesseebased U.S. Senator Jim Sasser took the lead, working the project from D.C. and ultimately securing Federal funds of $240,560, $413,320, and $355,990 respectively over three years from 1991 to 1993. Additional funding was obtained when TSU sold property to the Nashville Airport Authority that had previously been donated to the university by the Tennessee Department of Agriculture.

Funding a facility was one thing, but acquiring the land was another hurdle. The unofficial faction behind the construction of the NRC worked tirelessly behind the scenes, beating the bushes for leads on a sizable, yet affordable tract of land. In the end, word reached the group that an 83-acre tract of land in McMinnville, Tennessee was available, in default to the Farmers Home Administration. They pursued the land, and on March 4, 1988, U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Richard Lyng conveyed it to TSUAg after signing a quitclaim deed changing the owner of the land.

Early Leaders

With the land acquired in 1988, and funding secured over the subsequent five years, the project to physically construct the world-class research facility itself took years. In the meantime, the NRC needed a leader, an

Longtime NRC Director and TSUAg research faculty member Dr. Nick Gawal was the first permanent head of the facility after being hired in 1997. Dr. Gawel stewarded the facility to a place of prominence during his tenure as the head of the NRC, before retiring in 2024.

experienced Director who could serve as a stop-gap administrator until the school could make a permanent hire. Enter retired USDA research facility administrator Bill Butt.

Butt unretired for the opportunity to guide the NRC along in its earliest days, and it was he who oversaw the first two phases of the facility’s construction, made the first hires for the facility, and was on hand with some of the other key players who’d contributed to the effort for the August 15, 1996 ribbon cutting ceremony of the brand-new $5 million, 20,000 square-foot office and laboratory building, the equipment building and two greenhouses.

Collier called Butt’s service to the facility “marvelous,” service that in a way continues through to today. After all, it was Butt who suggested to

Dr. Gawel that he should apply for a position he himself felt underqualified for. It was Butt that put in the calls behind the scenes backing Gawel for the position, and it was Butt who pushed Gawel ahead of each stage of the interview process. Given his role is supporting Dr. Gawel’s candidacy and the fact that current NRC Superintendent Dr. Karla Addesso was Dr. Gawel’s choice to replace him, you might say Butt is the grandfather of the NRC.

In February 1997, Dr. Nick Gawel was hired as the Director of the Nursery Research Center. Dr. Gawel coordinated the completion of Phase III of the construction in 1998. His early years at the helm of the facility spoke volumes about who Dr. Gawel was and is, and what his leadership was going to be about. Before the facility was fully

integrated into TSU, Gawel was often seen on the lawn mower, keeping the facility’s grounds in tip-top shape.

When rumors reached him that locals in McMinnville were anxious to know what the facility was and what went on there, he opened the doors to the public, serving hot dogs and hamburgers and giving tours. “When I first got hired I didn’t know what the heck I was doing,” says Dr. Gawel. “We had this brand-new building, we had just a few people coming in to work, I was out there on the mower mowing grass, things were very different. From there to where we are now has been a big change.”

Since opening unofficially in 1995, the Center has grown to contain 12,000 square feet of greenhouse space, a state-of-the art pesticide mixing and

(From left to right) Tennessee Board of Regents (TBR)

Commissioner Dan Wheeler, former TBR Commissioner Charles Smith, TSU President James Hefner, Mrs. Otis Floyd, USDA/ARS Administrator Floyd Horn, Ed Porter, and Frank Collier at the ribbon cutting of the Otis L. Floyd Nursery Research Center on August 15, 1996.

The August 15, 1996 ribbon cutting ceremony opened the doors on the NRC’s 20,000 square-foot office and laboratory building space, the equipment building and two greenhouses.

storage facility, a fire ant quarantine facility, back-up generators, a soil mixing/potting facility, shade houses, propagation houses, multiple irrigated container yards, a pot-in-pot yard, a 2-acre irrigation pond, and office space for Tennessee Department of Agriculture plant inspectors. The entire site is plumbed for irrigation using either well water or municipal water.

A History of Partnerships

By its very nature, the Otis L. Floyd Nursery Research Center is a collaborative endeavor between TSU, growers and various governmental agencies with a stake in woody ornamentals. The partnerships that exist today were all part of the original plan for the facility, according to Dr. Gawel. “The original vision for the center was one that had research,

Extension, and regulatory all in one spot and when we opened officially in 1996, we were only research,” says Dr. Gawel. “In the ensuing years, we added the Extension piece and since the Tennessee Department of Agriculture (TDA) people came onto the property we added the regulatory piece.”

Indeed, the collaboration that gave rise to the TDA housing plant inspectors at the NRC beginning in 2010 is just one of a handful of key partnerships that backs the facility, but a key one. With the introduction of the TDA component of the NRC, the facility gained the regulatory piece its originators envisioned for the site.

“It’s been just a wonderful partnership because we’ve been able to work so closely with the researchers, and they’re doing practical, on-the-ground research

and our folks have been able to assist with a lot of their projects when they needed extra hands,” says TDA Plant Certification Administrator Anni Self, who has worked extensively with TSUAg folks at the NRC.

“We’ve also worked together with them on different disease and pest issues over the years. It is so very collaborative, and (Dr. Gawel) has been the tread that’s run through all of this. He put his heart and soul into that place,” Self continues.

“I think what I’ve appreciated the most and what I think will definitely continue is that any time something new shows up they’re on it. They hear about things that are coming and they know to look for it and they start on it before it is a problem and that’ll continue.”

Partnerships are a huge component of how the facility is funded as well. At its

Former Tennessee First Lady Martha Sundquist planted the first landscape tree at the Nursery Research Center in 1998.

The Otis L. Floyd Nursery Research Center as it looked in the late 1990s.

real strength. We are here to keep the industry moving forward and the mission hasn’t changed.”

“What’s unique and what’s great about this place is that we do have a constant dialogue with our stakeholders with our growers and we’re not there making the decisions for them we are interacting with them, understanding their needs, understanding their wants, understanding the industry itself, the pressures of the industry, the ebbs and flows of the industry, and we’re doing things that are based on the needs the growers themselves express,” he says.

On Walking Away

After 31 years at TSUAg and 27 years as the Director of the NRC, Dr. Gawel is the first to admit that stepping away from the University and stepping away from the Research Center comes with both a sense of pride and a touch of sadness.

THE NRC’S NEW FACE

Addesso takes over as head of NRC | By

Charlie Morrison

Withthe retirement of Otis L. Floyd Nursery Research Center (NRC) Director Dr. Nick Gawel in January of this year, there is new blood atop the key Tennessee State University College of Agriculture (TSUAg) research facility. TSUAg associate professor and entomology research scientist Dr. Karla Addesso took over as the Director of the facility following Dr. Gawel’s retirement, stepping in as the first new Director to lead the NRC in over 27 years.

Anytime you lose a leader who spent nearly three decades on the job you lose something, but given that Addesso was both Gawel’s and TSUAg Dean Dr. Chandra Reddy’s pick to take over after he left demonstrates the confidence the College has in the new Director’s management and leadership abilities.

The blood, sweat, and tears he put into his time at the NRC, for the part of the College of Agriculture, won’t soon be forgotten either.

“I’m leaving behind a big part of myself. It’s almost like a child, it was something that started very small and it’s something that really grew into something pretty big step by step by step... It feels good to leave that behind and know that, yes we’re thriving and I’m leaving something that’s doing well and will continue to do well.”

With Dr. Karla Addesso now serving as the Director of the facility, Dr. Gawel can walk away from his longtime service to the College with his head held high and his smile wide.

“We’re in good hands, we’ve got a good system, the industry still needs us, and the industry is growing,” he says. “It’s a strong industry with good people, good research, and good science. It’s been a good time to be here and it’s going to be still good when I’m gone.”

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“I’m happy to be leaving the facility in extremely, extremely capable hands and excited that Karla is taking over with her ideas and her energy and her leadership ability,” said Dr. Gawel of his successor in an interview with AgLink just before he wrapped up his tenure. “She’s going to do great things.”

Dr. Addesso is quick to credit her predecessor and mentor for everything he gave to the NRC, noting that in the world of science it’s rare to walk into a new position with all systems going strong. “Nick has done a great job over all these years keeping us steady, keeping the industry engaged, keeping the legislature engaged as well as the growers,” said Addesso in an interview with AgLink.

“I’m glad that when I walked into this position everything was working great, (Dr. Gawel) got us there,” she continued. “I’m not walking into a disaster I have to fix, I’m walking into a position that’s going really well, where we can look to plan.”

And when it comes to planning Dr. Addesso took over the NRC with ideas of her own, goals she’s set, and places she wants to take the facility as it moves into the future. Expanding the facility with a new wing is one of Dr. Addesso’s big goals, along with introducing quarantine facilities, re-engaging the NRC Nursery Advisory Group, expanding the facility’s museum collection, and creating facilities to house visiting scientists.

CLASS OF

Dozens of graduating TSUAg undergraduate and graduate students from across the College’s five departments donned their caps and gowns on May 3 and May 4 for the TSU commencement ceremonies. The ‘24 graduating class was notable for negotiating the Covid-19 pandemic shutdown on route to graduating this spring. We’re sad to see these wonderful students leave us, but thrilled to see them build from their TSU degree to bigger and better things. Congratulations graduates!

OF 2024

AZIA TANKS

ALAIZIA HAYES

Major (and concentration): Agriculture Science with a concentration in Leadership, Education, and Communication

Level: Undergraduate

Favorite Course at TSU: All Agriculture Classes

Favorite Professors: Dr. Browning

Plans After Graduation: After graduation Alaizia will be interning with the UT/TSU Cooperative Extension Program.

Major (and concentration): Agriculture Science( Food and Animal Science) minor Spanish

Level: Undergraduate

Favorite Course at TSU: Reproductive and Physiology

Favorite Professors: Dr. Nahashon

Plans After Graduation: Azia will possibly be applying to vet school and pursue a Master’s Degree at TSU until admission to vet school.

DACIA RINGO

Major (and concentration): Agricultural Science (Biotechnology)

Level: Undergraduate

Favorite Course at TSU: Too many good ones to choose

Favorite Professors: Drs. Aliar and Christine

Plans After Graduation: Dacia will be pursuing a Master’s Degree in Food Safety at Virginia Tech.

ARIA MCELROY

Major (and concentration): Agricultural Science concentration Environmental Science

Level: Undergraduate

CHAMPAGNE CUNNINGHAM

Major (and concentration): Environmental Science concentration Natural Resources

Level: Graduate

Favorite Course at TSU: Entomology

Favorite Professors: Dr. Thomas Byl

Plans After Graduation: Attending the University of Memphis for a PhD.

Favorite Course at TSU: Natural Resource Management

Favorite Professors: Dr. Byl

Plans After Graduation: Working for the NRCS in Tennessee and potentially applying for graduate school to study natural resource management or natural resource and environmental policy.

DESIRAI JONES

Major (and concentration): Agricultural Science with a concentration in Animal Science and a minor in Political Science

Level: Undergraduate

Favorite Course at TSU: Farm Production and Management

Favorite Professors: Dr. Browning

Plans After Graduation: Interning at the Nashville zoo and perhaps going back to school to get a degree in Veterinary Nursing.

GABRIELLE CAMERON

JADA WILDER

Major (and concentration): Human Sciences with a Fashion Merchandising Concentration

Level: Undergraduate

Favorite Course at TSU: Fashion Illustration

Favorite Professors: Michael McBride

Plans After Graduation: After graduation Jada Plans to Internship and pursue Grad school.

Major (and concentration): Agriculture Sciences concentrating in Agriculture Leadership Education and Communications (ALEC)

Level: Undergraduate

Favorite Course at TSU: Intro to Agricultural Communications

Favorite Professors: Drs. Blair, Ricketts, and Rockers

Plans After Graduation: Gabrielle will be spending the summer gaining more experience in agriculture extension work before potentaiily pursuing a master’s degree in ALEC.

DOMINIQUE SMITH

Major (and concentration): Agricultural Science with a concentration in Agribusiness

Level: Undergraduate

Favorite Course at TSU: Introduction to Plant Sciences

Favorite Professors: Drs. Prabodh Illukipitya and Arvazena Clardy

Plans After Graduation: Dominique will be working with USDA Rural Development in Nashville, TN and in the fall of 2024, starting to pursue a Master’s of Science in Family and Consumer Sciences focusing on Family Studies at Texas Tech University in Lubbock, Texas.

JUSTIN WALKER

MACARIUS “JJ” JONES

Major (and concentration): Agricultural Science with a concentration in Agribusiness

Level: Undergraduate

Favorite Course at TSU: Agribusiness Management

Favorite Professors: Dr. Illukpitiya

Plans After Graduation: After graduation Macarius plans to attend grad school.

Major (and concentration): Agricultural Science with a concentration in Agribusiness

Level: Undergraduate

Favorite Course at TSU: Introduction to Agribusiness

Favorite Professors: Dr. Illukpitiya

Plans After Graduation: Justin will be pursuing attending graduate school at the University of Georgia.

MARIAH NICHOLSON

Major (and concentration): Family and Consumer Science with a concentration in fashion merchandising and product development

Level: Undergraduate

Favorite Course at TSU: Fashion Merchandising Seminar

Favorite Professors: Dr. Davis

Plans After Graduation: Mariah is considering attending graduate school.

RICKY BUCK JR.

OLAOLUWA OGUNYEMI

Major (and concentration): Child Development and Family Relations

Level: Undergraduate

Favorite Course at TSU: Adulthood & Cultural Interpretation of Dre

Favorite Professors: Drs. Machara and Davis

Plans After Graduation: Olaoluwa will be looking for a full-time position this summer following graduation.

Major (and concentration): Agricultural Science with a concentration in Agribusiness

Level: Undergraduate

Favorite Course at TSU: Quantitative Techniques in Decision Making

Favorite Professors: Dr. Lap Tran

Plans After Graduation: Ricky plans to pursue a Master’s Degree here at Tennessee State University.

SHAUN WIMBERLY JR.

Major (and concentration): Agricultural Science with a concentration in Agribusiness

Level: Undergraduate

Favorite Course at TSU: Accounting

Favorite Professors: Dr. Kofi

Plans After Graduation: After graduation Shaun will be pursuing law school.

AUBREE MORRISON

Major (and concentration): Enviromental Science, Natural Resource Management, Applied Geospatial Information Systems Graduate Certificate

Level: Graduate

Favorite Course at TSU: Wetlands Ecology and Management

Favorite Professors: Drs. Bill Sutton and Reginald Archer

SHEROD MITCHELL

Major (and concentration): Agricultural Science with a concentration in Environmental Sciences

Level: Undergraduate

Favorite Course at TSU: Energy Resource and Sustainability

Favorite Professors: Dr. Byl

Plans After Graduation: Sherod plans to pursue his aspirations to be an environmental engineer working in the clean energy and sustainability industry.

Plans After Graduation: After graduation Aubree will work for the Tennessee Department of Agriculture.

KERRINGTON HOWARD

Major (and concentration): Agricultural Science with a concentration in Agribusiness

Level: Undergraduate

Favorite Course at TSU: Quantitative Decision-making

Favorite Professors: Drs. Illukpitya and Wu

Plans After Graduation: After graduation Kerrington will work as a Commodity Trader with ADM Investor Services.

I want to make an impact on how the food supply works.” “

- TSUAg Student, Kerrington Howard

Recent TSUAg graduate Kerrington Howard, here addressing the more than 1,500 attendees of the ARD Research Symposium held in Nashville this April, is taking his message of food security to the Fortune 500 after landing a job with financial firm Archer Daniels Midland.

Onward and Upward

TSUAg graduate lands fortune 500 job

By Alexis Clark

Kerrington Howard, a recent graduate of Tennessee State University, secured a job with a Fortune 500 company as a commodity trader, marking a significant step towards his goal of combating world hunger and assisting communities that suffer from food insecurities. “The end goal is to acquire the knowledge and then commit to action,” Howard said.

While the United States grapples with the challenge of food insecurity, Tennessee State University is producing students like Howard, who are determined to make a difference. More than 27 million Americans suffered from food insecurity as of July 2023, according to U.S. News.

Howard, of Maryland, D.C., is an agricultural science major who graduated on May 4 and headed to Illinois this summer to pursue his career at Archer Daniels Midland (ADM).

Howard’s agricultural journey began at the age of eight when he was introduced to his father’s land in Florida, where fruits were grown, and goats were raised. “That’s when I got accustomed to country life,” Howard said. While his mother and stepfather own a business in Maryland, it was his experiences on his father’s land that sparked his interest in agricultural business, leading him to concentrate on it at TSU.

When Howard was in high school, he was accepted into TSU’s 1890 summer apprenticeship where he gained hands-on experience with agriculture professors at the university. He then received a fullride scholarship as a Farm Bill Scholar to attend TSU and took full advantage of his opportunities and resources.

Throughout his collegiate years, Howard secured internships at Mammoth Cave as an environmental education intern and at Waste Management as an environmental protection intern that extended through his junior year.

During his job search, he discovered the role of a commodity trader through Thurgood Marshall and secured the job after three rounds of interviews. “It was luck, and it was God,” he said regarding securing the job. “I want to make an impact on how the food supply works.”

ADM is a global leader in both human and animal nutrition. As a commodity trader for the company, Howard will trade resources like seeds, corn, and other grain products within the agriculture industry.

What inspired Howard to enter this field is to combat food deserts and underrepresented communities battling with food insecurities. “We’re the leaders in food production, yet we have communities that don’t have access to food,” he said.

According to Feeding America, 92 billion pounds of food annually, equal to 145 billion meals, are wasted in the U.S., which is 38% of all the food in America.

“Since we are in the city (of Nashville), we should be able to walk to food,” he said. “Knowing that we have many food deserts right in Tennessee, that’s part of my motivation.” In Tennessee, 21% of the state’s population lives in areas considered food deserts, 15% in urban food deserts and 6% in rural food deserts.

Howard said he considers TSU “comforting” and looks forward to applying what he has learned at the university in the workforce. “TSU is the whole reason why I’m here today. They provided the education, the internship skills, and the resources so I can get where I am today,” he said. “So, I’m always grateful for TSU.”

Dr. De’Etra Young, agriculture professor and Associate Dean for Academics and Land-grant Programs, said that Howard’s achievements speak volumes of the caliber of students the college produces. “As a Farm Bill Scholar, engaged in rigorous undergraduate research and internships, Kerrington embodies the dedication and preparedness fostered within our institution,” Young said. “His success in securing a position with Archer Daniels Midland not only reflects his individual excellence but also underscores the value of the education and opportunities provided by TSUAg.”

Howard walked the stage with a 3.5 GPA at the undergraduate commencement ceremony on Saturday, May 4, with more than 550 fellow classmates.

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behind the desk:

Conversations with our Department Chairs

Six months into what TSU College of Agriculture Dean Dr. Chandra Reddy has often called the “historic” restructuring of the College from two academic departments to five, AgLink took a moment to check in with the (predominantly) new department chairs. We went “behind the desk” with Drs. Veronica Oates, Bharat Pokharel, Korsi Dumenyo, Prabodh Illukpitiya, and Samuel Nahashon to hear from them on how their respective projects to develop, buildout, and recruit for the now five TSUAg departments is going. Here’s what we found out:

Department of Environmental Science

Dr. Bharat Pokharel - Chair

New Department of Environmental Science Chair Dr. Bharat Pokharel is not alone in celebrating the College’s departmental restructuring. Dr. Pokharel and his colleagues in the newly established Department of Environmental Science are basking in the glow of self-determination, celebrating that they of the same mind when it comes to issues of curriculum development, student recruitment and retention, and departmental structuring. And while Dr. Pokharel is the first to admit that they are only just beginning their work, he’s excited with the progress they’ve already made.

Dr. Pokharel, who has served the College in a leadership role as the graduate student coordinator, takes over as Chair of one of the TSUAg’s smallest departments. That said, the job of establishing departmental leadership, building committees, taking the reins on environmental student mentoring is no small task, but one that Dr. Pokharel and the department as a whole is embracing. The challenge of balancing the department’s respective teaching, research, and Extension responsibilities is all part of the early planning process according to Dr. Pokharel.

Like the other new departments, Dr. Pokharel and the Environmental Science leadership is examining the possibility of adding both a Ph.D. and Bachelor of Science degree programs to their lone master’s degree-level degree program. Depending on how the group does with recruitment in the coming semesters, the Ph.D. program may end up being developed first, says Dr. Pokharel. The size of both the undergraduate student body and that of the Environmental Science graduate students enables him to be optimistic about the prospect of building out the department’s degree offerings. Growth will be a challenge, but it’s one Dr. Pokharel and the folks at Environmental Science are ready to take on with gusto.

Department of Food and Animal Science

Dr. Samuel Nahashon - Chair

In trading out his position as the Chair of the now-reshaped Department of Agricultural & Environmental Sciences (now the Department of Agricultural Sciences and Engineering), for his new role leading the Department of Food and Animal Sciences, Dr. Samuel Nahashon has brought a wealth of experience to the new department. As the Chair of the Department of Food and Animal Sciences, Dr. Nahashon still heads one of the larger departments at the College. And while it’s still large, the fact that the 14 faculty members and scores of undergraduate and graduate students in the Department Food and Animal Sciences are able to better focus on their discipline post-restructuring is important for Dr. Nahashon.

Making the job easier too is the buy-in Dr. Nahashon has received from faculty members who have enthusiastically greeted the creation of the department. The group now sets to the task of establishing a new Ph.D. in Food and Animal Sciences degree offering that will complement its master’s degree program. With that degree offering established, Dr. Nahashon and his team will then turn to the undergraduate offering

After years of managing a stable, strong, large academic unit with a predictably strong track record of enrollment and productivity, taking on the task of building out the new department and developing the curriculum, faculty infrastructure, and structure for a brand-new undergraduate degree program certainly presents a new kind of challenge for Dr. Nahashon. The department’s new strategic planning committee is leading the effort to create a five-year growth plan that Dr. Nahashon and the Department of Food and Animal Sciences’ leadership can lean on in executing their project to grow their new department. For that to happen, the department will rely on the focused enthusiasm the group is feeling, after all, according to Dr. Nahashon, “everybody has to contribute for the program to grow.”

Department of Agricultural Business and Education

Dr. Prabodh Illukpitiya - Chair

Just months into his term as the Chair of the newly established Department of Agricultural Business and Education, Dr. Prabodh Illukpitiya’s first task as the head of the program was to reign in the excitement bubbling about his fellow agribusiness and ag education faculty members that was generated when the program was established. Having their own dedicated agricultural business and education department meant Dr. Illukpitiya and his colleagues had the blessing and burden of self-determination; the department was blessed with the freedom to grow the department as they saw fit, but also the responsibility to ensure the new program would deliver on its core mission: serving the student body.

One semester into the project to build out the program, Dr. Illukpitiya’s drive continues to be building a foundation on which TSUAg’s agribusiness and education program can grow. Beginning with the creation of a host of new committees to help oversee the program and continuing to explore introducing a new undergraduate B.S. program, the affable Dr. Illukpitiya has a full plate, to be sure.

And while a successful creation of the agricultural business and leadership M.S. program will guide plans to later develop a Ph.D. program, the process of bringing that program to bear crowds that plate even further. Undeterred, Dr. Illukpitiya and his team’s first prioritized creating the mission, strategic goals, and objectives by which the new department would evaluate itself. With that accomplished, Dr. Illukpitiya can now set to the long-term goal of his department going forward, the recruitment and retention of students. And while student recruitment and retention is a difficult, work-intensive, important task, that he has the support of his colleagues in the new Department of Agricultural business and Education makes all the difference.

Department of Human Science

Dr.

Veronica Oates - Chair

For Department of Human Sciences chair Dr. Veronica Oates, the College’s shift from two to five departments offers the department the opportunity to reinvent itself. The Department of Human Science, colloquially known as “The People-Centered Sciences,” is looking to

Department of Agricultural Science and Engineering

Dr. Korsi Dumenyo - Chair

In taking the reins on the newly rebranded Department of Agricultural Science and Engineering (formerly the Department of Agricultural and Environmental Science), Dr. Korsi Dumenyo assumed leadership of what was and remains the College’s largest department. After restructuring, the department has slimmed to be sure, but remains an integral part of the consummate agriculture education at TSU. Like his other colleagues chairing new departments, Dr. Dumenyo will lean on the experience of longtime department chairs Dr. Samuel Nahashon (Department of Food and Animal Sciences) and Dr. Veronica Oates (Department of Human Sciences), but Dr. Dumenyo brings to the role plenty of his own ideas, as evidenced by his first few months as Chair.

Before he could put his own stamp on his reformed department, however, Dr. Dumenyo has to matriculate through the program students who were part of the Agricultural and Environmental Science department. Though the new, respective departments have assumed mentorship and guidance responsibilities over the students with concentrations in their disciplines, until the new departments have their own Bachelor of Science degree programs available, the students technically all still fall under Dr. Dumenyo’s purview. Undeterred, Dr. Dumenyo has progressed with his plan to reform the department.

Back in February, Dr. Dumenyo led the process to conduct a SWOT analysis of the department, examining who and what remained after the restructuring and what elements of the program needed to evolve. A total of 13 departmental committees have been established to tackle a wide range of topics including technology, strategic planning, and curriculum development. On the topic of the latter, Dr. Dumenyo and the Agricultural Science and Engineering leadership team is beginning the process to morph what was one huge, catch-all department into a hyper-focused department with its own concentrations in biotechnology, plant science, and precision agriculture and engineering.

A Simple Twist of Fate

Environmental Science master’s student Moore looks back on the circuitous route that took him to TSU |

By Charlie Morrison

Filled with classes, field research, time in the lab, numbers to crunch and presentations to make, the academic life of a graduate student in the hard sciences is a busy one. The rigors of building one’s success around the acts of capturing and processing data, developing a thesis on what the data’s telling you and presenting that data present a challenge to any student. Graduate students in the hard sciences that come from STEM-bases undergraduate experiences generally find the step up to be a challenge, but when your undergraduate experience equated to a Bachelor of Arts degree it’s “a whole different world.”

Those are the words of Tennessee State University College of Agriculture (TSUAg) master’s degree student Devin Moore, who not only made that transition, he did it with gusto. Before all of that took place however, it took a twist of fate to even get the talented student to the TSU campus in the first place.

TSUAg master’s student Devin Moore enjoyed his time working in the field here at TSUAg. The Yale undergraduate made the difficult transition from a Bachelor of Arts degree to that of a Master of Science, but he jumped in with both feet upon arriving to campus here in Nashville.

The Twist

It was the summer of 2020. The pandemic had arrived, the world was in turmoil, and Moore was in a place of contemplation. Having graduated from prestigious Ivy League school Yale University that May, Moore’s future was bright, and yet his path forward was unclear.

The Master of Science degree in Environmental Science Moore is pursuing at TSU wasn’t even on the radar for him at that point. Moore knew he wanted to take the Bachelor of Arts degree he’d earned from Yale with the dual majors in Environmental Studies and African-American Studies and pursue the topic of environmental justice. Knowing that put him in a position for fate to intervene, and in the end, it did just that.

Moore had been doing due diligence on his future by meeting with select environmental lawyers for advice on his career. One of those lawyers operating in his home state of Michigan was environmental lawyer John Byl of the firm Warner, Norcross and Judd. It turns out, the attorney had a brother at TSU, Dr. Tom Byl, and in his view doing some hard science would only

help the aspirational Moore get to the cause of environmental justice with a solid foundation. Maybe, he suggested, Moore should speak with him.

Jumping in Feet First

With the COVID lockdown in full effect during his time between schools, Moore never got the chance to visit TSU’s Nashville campus before signing up for graduate school at the College of Agriculture. He did however speak extensively with Dr. Byl, a research biologist and TSUAg assistant professor, along with other faculty members and in the end, it was those discussions that brought him to campus.

After speaking with Moore, Dr. Byl invited him to conduct a guest lecture on environmental justice over Zoom for some TSU students. Moore held the lecture with aplomb, and an invitation to join TSU as a master’s student followed soon after. That he was able to secure a Title III “POTUS” scholarship assisting him with all his expenses while pursuing his graduate work only solidified things.

“I wasn’t able to come visit the campus before I signed on to join TSU, but I

was able to look up the facilities, see the big farm and wetlands, and know what I was getting myself into,” said Moore in an interview with AgLink. “Through the lens of environmental justice, the opportunity to look at a farm in an urban area was really cool to me, and the opportunity to do it at an HBCU was really cool to me.”

Once on campus, Moore’s life as a graduate student accelerated quickly. He began his classes, an experience he described as “a plunge into cold water,” but too he got out into the field and almost immediately since arriving in Nashville, began to do field work. Backed by Drs. Byl and Bill Sutton, his education soon gained focus. “I said to myself ‘man, you are really back in school.’”

It was his connections with the faculty that has propelled Moore through his time at the TSUAg graduate school. His interactions with not only Drs. Byl and Sutton, but too Dr. De’Etra Young and towards the end of his TSU run, thesis advisor Dr. Reginald Archer put him in a place to succeed, according to Moore, who graduates this fall.

“Coming into TSU, the people and the potential to make those connections was a factor. It’s been really rewarding to have faculty members that I’m really close with to lean on if I need help,” he said. “Going from the social sciences to a hard science, it’s just a different world. I’m sure a lot of times it took me a little bit longer to understand some of these concepts. They helped out a lot.”

Secrets to Success

Moore credits not only the faculty members proper who assisted him in his journey, but also his research colleagues like Graduate Assistant Kristi

TSUAg master’s student Devin Moore has spent a significant portion of his field research time right here on campus, knee-deep in the water of Tiger Bay Wetlands. It was there that Moore collected research on harmful algae blooms with veteran TSUAg research professor Dr. Tom Byl.

Hill, who was “very, very patient with me as I learned. She really definitely took me under her wing when it came to learning the hard science.”

“To have success in science you have to be methodical, but more so you have to have organization, those are the two things you have to have,” Moore continued Moore. “She’s very methodical, very organized and that makes everything, whether it’s in the lab or the field 100 times easier because you know where everything is. You can work really hard on getting good data but lose some hold over it if it’s not organized.”

Moore certainly leaned on his support in performing what is inevitably the most arduous task in pursuing any graduate degree in the hard sciences, that of writing and defending a thesis.

Moore’s thesis, titled “Harmful Algae in Nashville’s Urban Watersheds: Challenging Traditional Monitoring Programs,” called on all the skills he’d amassed his time at Yale and the two years he spent working the science here at TSU. That said, he did complete the work and will be defending it over the summer during his public defense of his thesis.

Definitive Results

For Moore, the results of his research were definitive. “Not only do harmful algal blooms exist in Nashville’s urban water bodies, they exist in concentrations that pose a threat to the nearby ecosystem and organisms that interact with the affected water bodies,” he said to AgLink. “And very, very few people know actually what to do about toxic algal blooms and how to address them.”

Moore, like the scientist he now is, will review all the data and work with it before making a decision on his post-TSU future. As he did before coming to campus, he is surveying his environment for the logical next steps, steps he believes as of now will be a job in the field of hard science, followed by an eventual pursuit of a law degree. First however, he needs that diploma.

With his impending graduation this fall in sight, Moore is able to look back at his time on campus at TSU and smile with fondness at his time here in Nashville. “I feel like TSU has provided me with a really good foundation. TSU ended up being the perfect place for me,” he said. The number one thing has been the support that I’ve gotten, and I’ve had fun too, I’ve had fun in the wetlands, in the lab, everything has been great.” AL

Moore collaborated with students of all levels here at TSU. Here he works in the field collecting samples with undergraduate student researcher Avion Brown.

look good, feel good

Rising juniors from West Memphis wrap first year at the head of new TSU Fashion Society | By Charlie

Morrison

SStudent organizations come in all shapes and sizes, and for all purposes. Some bind students together around a common cause and are fun to be a part of. Some push participants to greater heights through networking and those are important to join. Some exist to further classroom studies in a way that puts aspiring students in real-world situations, and participation in them is essential. The newly established TSU Fashion Society is one of the latter.

Formed in January of this year, the Fashion Society was an organization that just had to happen at TSU, but it didn’t start on its own. The group needed leadership, it needed human energy, it needed to be created in the first place. Enter now rising junior TSUAg students Brighton Gillum and Jaylen Turner, a duo from West Memphis (Arkansas, not Tennessee) who have provided that human energy and stepped into leadership roles for the organization.

Gillum and Turner, pursuing Bachelor of Science degrees in Family and Consumer Sciences with concentrations in Fashion Merchandising and Product Development, were elected to their respective positions of President and Vice-president of the organization at the turn of the new year, joining Mariah Nicholson and Jada Wilder on the organization’s leadership team. With more than 80 members committing to the organization at the outset, the need for the group was real.

“It was really something TSU needed because there’s so much fashion at this school, students here take fashion really seriously, and that’s what we’re trying to highlight, because here it is a huge industry,” said Gillum in an interview with AgLink.

“It’s almost like putting the fashion industry here on campus, so if you want to be in the fashion industry, you already have kind of a practice run,” said Turner. “We’re trying to really make it beneficial for everyone involved. We’re trying to connect people in any way possible.” It didn’t take long for the group to begin that process of connecting people either, as soon after their formation the Fashion Society began holding events. Many of the 80 Fashion Society participants showed up to the FarrellWestbrook auditorium for a custom tote bag creation event

during the College of Ag Week. That event, in March, was kicked off by guest speaker and tailor to the stars, TSU alumni Randolph Williamson.

The creation of the Fashion Society is concurrent with some amazing work being done by Dr. LaPorchia Davis, a leading faculty member in the Department of Human Science’s Fashion Merchandising and Product Development program. Dr. Davis has been scoring points with her students both in the classroom and out in the world, where she has led a number of outstanding study abroad trips.

The fashion students under Dr. Davis have gone on fashionrelated study abroad trips to Los Angeles, Milan, Rome, London, and more, and that’s just in the past couple of years. It’s work that’s earned Dr. Davis the praise of the fashion students themselves, who credit Dr. Davis for exposing them to the greater world of fashion. “I love Dr. Davis. She helps with everything she can and always tries to put us first,” said Turner of the uniquely talented Dr. Davis. “She was the first person that ever made me realize that I can do whatever I want to do in fashion.”

“We took the culture of fashion class right before we traveled to Italy and that was really helpful. We’ve been across the world, and we’ve seen the big fashion houses, we’ve seen it thanks to her,” he continued.

The TSU Fashion Society took all they’d learned and put it into the seminal event of their first semester, the April 18 TSU Fashion Show. The event was a massive undertaking but, according to Turner, simply had to happen. “It doesn’t make sense to me that TSU is so into fashion and we never had a group or a fashion show, it needed to happen,” he said.

The event had it all: a runway; lighting; music from a DJ; models; photographers; stylists; even vendors. Running from 5:30 to 7 p.m. on the evening of the 18th, the event was well-received by the students crowding around the amphitheater for the proceedings. And while late rain did dampen the mood towards the end of the show, the hard work Gillum, Turner and the Society’s leadership put in to the event paid off.

“What do I want to do in the fashion space? I want to do everything from modeling, styling, photography... I want to do everything in fashion. And me running this organization like a business I’m just seeing and learning and grabbing every piece from it. It’s really like a life thing.”

- Brighton Gillum, TSU Fashion Society President

“I was consistently in contact with people throughout the leadup to the event. People inside the organization, people outside the organization, really anyone who could help make the event a success,” said Turner. “It was hard getting students to be active and bring their brands over to the show. They had to trust me. It was tough but we got it in our heart to keep going and we just kept pushing.”

The group hopes to complement the spring fashion show event with another major event in the fall, Fashion Week. The group is planning five days of events for Fashion Week, some showcasing designers, some vendors, others brand-owners. The event may even feature a second fashion show. For Gillum and Turner, the key with whatever they create, is that it lasts.

“We’re trying to build things that can consistently happen. If we have a fashion week, they can have it after us, if we have an annual fashion show, those who come after us can consistently have that going forward. It’ll just transfer to the next people,” said Gillum.

“The organization going to be bigger than a lot of people think. We’re trying to unite the Fashion Society throughout the city, throughout the community, with Nashville as a whole,” said Turner. “We started early so we can finish strong, and we’re not yet satisfied. Stay tuned.”

Scan this QR code to visit TSU Fashion Society on Instagram.

The newly-established TSU Fashion Society is led by President Brighton Gillum (right) and Jaylen Turner (left). The rising juniors’ goal is to establish the organization to be something that continues on after they graduate.

On April 18, the Fashion Society held their seminal event of the year, the TSU Fashion Show. The event brought the fashion industry to the heart of TSU’s campus. The group utilized the walkway from the Love Student Success Center to the Averitte Amphitheater as a runway with models making their turns around the amphitheater circle.

Determined to provide her students a more well-rounded understanding the issue of food security and justice inside and outside of the continental U.S., Department of Human Sciences Chair Dr. Veronica Oates led a study-abroad trip this spring focused on food security and justice to St. Croix in the U.S. Virgin Islands.

The week-long “capstone” trip, titled “Food Security & Justice: The Role of WIC, SNAP-ED and EFNEP Experience in St Croix, V.I.,” took place during TSU’s 2024 spring break from March 1 to 8. The crux of the trip was an examination of the role food security programs play in St. Croix and in the Virgin Islands. According to Oates, “the

experience was an important one for the students.”

The trip offered students the opportunity to gain firsthand knowledge about food justice issues. The itinerary included a two-day workshop funded by the Nashville Children Eating Well project.

This workshop, developed by Dr. Oates, provided a platform for students to explore the critical role of programs like WIC (Women, Infants, and Children), SNAP-Ed (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program Education), and EFNEP (Expanded Food and Nutrition Education Program) in promoting food security and justice.

Highlights of the conference included student presentation on WIC recipes and an impromptu fireside chat with Diana E. Collingwood, Assistant Commissioner of Agriculture for the U.S. Virgin Islands.

“This trip was an invaluable opportunity for our students to connect the theoretical concepts of food justice with real-world challenges faced by communities,” said Dr. Oates. “By engaging with local stakeholders in St. Croix, they gained a deeper understanding of the unique barriers to food access and the solutions being implemented.”

The trip served as a capstone project for students enrolled in the NUFS

Department of Human Sciences Chair and professor Dr. Veronica Oates led a study-abroad trip this spring focused on food security and justice to St. Croix in the U.S. Virgin Islands. Pictured with Dr. Oates are students Nia Gonzo, Ameena Wimberly, Janani Oates, Dashia Ramsey, Morgan Gill, Assistant Professor Rita Fleming, Associate Professor David Padgett, and Mr. Mark Brinkley of the Office of International Affairs.

4620: Special Problems in Food and Nutrition: Food Justice course. Throughout the semester, the course delved into the challenges surrounding access to healthy and affordable food in the United States and its territories, with a particular focus on Tennessee and St. Croix.

During the trip, students gave 21 hours of service, for which they earned academic credit. “Studying abroad in St. Croix was one of the most rewarding experiences I’ve ever had,” said TSU Human Sciences student Ameena Wimberly. “It was a privilege to learn about the territory. On this trip, I was able to work with the Virgin Islands WIC program.”

“There, I gave presentations celebrating the establishment of the WIC

Program along with strategies to help participants utilize it best. I toured numerous farms and even helped host a workshop at the University of Virgin Islands. Most importantly, I was able to get an understanding of the special problems in nutrition found in Virgin Islands,” she continued.

The trip to St. Croix coincides with a national celebration of the 50th anniversary of WIC. WIC plays a vital role in ensuring the nutritional wellbeing of low-income pregnant women, new mothers, and young children. Programs like WIC, SNAP-Ed, and EFNEP are crucial components of a comprehensive approach to achieving food security and justice.

Participating students were Nia Gonzo, Ameena Wimberly, Janani

Oates, Dashia Ramsey, and Morgan Gill. Assistant Professor Rita Fleming, Associate Professor David Padgett, Mr. Mark Brinkley of the Office of International Affairs, and Ms. Akela Barnett, Director of the Early Learning Center presented at the two-day conference.

“Studying abroad in St. Croix was one of the most rewarding experiences I’ve ever had.”

- TSU Human Sciences student Ameena Wimberly

The itinerary included a two-day workshop developed by Dr. Oates and funded by the Nashville Children Eating Well project that provided a platform for students to explore the critical role of programs like WIC, SNAP-Ed, and EFNEP in promoting food security and justice.

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