MTSU Magazine Summer 2023

Ready for Takeoff

Propelled by its burgeoning Pro Pilot concentration, MTSU’s flagship Aerospace Department is celebrating 80 years—and charting its future course

Poetry in Motion

At the inaugural MTSU Arts Celebration Concert in February, MTSU Dance students perform select movements from “Clique,” a piece choreographed by faculty member Aaron Allen (’14). MTSU now offers the only B.S. in Dance degree at a Tennessee public university.

Middle Tennessee State University

Summer 2023, Vol. 28 No. 1

University President

Sidney A. McPhee

University Provost

Mark Byrnes

Vice President for University Advancement

Joe Bales

Vice President for

Marketing and Communications

Andrew Oppmann

Senior Editor

Drew Ruble

Associate Editor

Carol Stuart

Contributing Editor

Nancy Broden

Senior Director of Creative and Visual Services

Kara Hooper

Designers

Darrell Callis Burks, Brian Evans, Aaron Grayum, Micah Loyed, Brittany Blair Stokes

Contributing Writers

Skip Anderson, Gina E. Fann, Allison Gorman, Jimmy Hart, Gina K. Logue, Stephanie Wagner, Patsy Weiler, Randy Weiler

University Photographers

James Cessna, Andy Heidt, J. Intintoli, Cat Curtis Murphy

Special thanks to Lynn Adams, Beth Dye, Ginger Freeman, Savannah Richardson

LoTempio, Matt Taylor

Address changes should be sent to Advancement Services, MTSU Box 109, Murfreesboro, TN 37132; alumni@mtsu.edu.

Other correspondence goes to MTSU magazine, Drew Ruble, 1301 E. Main St., MTSU Box 49, Murfreesboro, TN 37132. For online content, visit mtsunews.com. 133,000 copies printed at Courier Printing, Smyrna, Tennessee. Designed by MTSU Creative and Visual Services.

0323-1931 / Middle Tennessee State University does not discriminate against students, employees, or applicants for admission or employment on the basis of race, color, religion, creed, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity/expression, disability, age, status as a protected veteran, genetic information, or any other legally protected class with respect to all employment, programs, and activities sponsored by MTSU. The Assistant to the President for Institutional Equity and Compliance has been designated to handle inquiries regarding the non-discrimination policies and can be reached at Cope Administration Building 116, 1301 East Main Street, Murfreesboro, TN 37132; Christy. Sigler@mtsu.edu; or 615-898-2185. The MTSU policy on non-discrimination can be found at mtsu.edu/iec.

Photo by Cat Curtis Murphy

On the Cover: Flight instructor and alumnus Matthew Champagne with MTSU aircraft

Photo by J. Intintoli

Working on the Moon

There’s a concrete True Blue connection to NASA’s plan to establish a human settlement in space by 2035.

NASA selected the Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, to lead the federal agency’s lunar habitat project, a series of increasingly complex missions that will culminate in rocket flights from the moon to Mars.

Marshall in turn aligned with an elite group of commercial and academic partners nationwide to accomplish the mission—arguably the most ambitious construction project in human history.

Among them is MTSU’s renowned Concrete Industry Management (CIM) program, the oldest and biggest of its kind at a higher education institution in the nation.

CIM is taking the lead on the development of construction materials made from moon soil to build needed infrastructure, including habitats, landing pads, roadways, berms, and blast shields.

Said another way, MTSU’s concrete program is developing “moon beams” to build in outer space.

Ferrying loads of construction materials to the moon is financially and environmentally dubious. In fact, the only cargo NASA plans to send to the moon for the project is a large umbrella-like structure to create an atmosphere in which astronauts can work (remember, gravity on the moon is weak) and a 3D printer to print structures.

All the raw materials needed for construction will be mined from the surface of the moon.

Enter MTSU. The good folks in Huntsville may be rocket scientists, but experts in concrete chemistry they are not. They smartly reached out to MTSU’s CIM program for help.

by Drew Ruble

MTSU is busily testing construction material made with manufactured lunar dust, or regolith, created by the Colorado School of Mines. ( Apollo missions more than 50 years ago gave scientists a clear sense of the makeup of lunar soil.)

CIM’s goal? Perfect the use of the regolith to build failproof “concrete” for lunar construction.

CIM has already produced “lunar beams” in campus labs, using simulant soil the exact composition chemically and in particle size as lunar soil.

What’s different about these earthly moon beams? The regolith is very fine, almost powdery, compared to the mix of large rocks, small rocks, and powder used in concrete. And unlike concrete, material made with regolith can’t be reinforced with steel. CIM solved that problem by printing latticework to give it some rigidity.

Early mixes were too soupy to print. Eventually, CIM got the consistency right. Then, when it did another print and the regolith material settled, the moon beams began cracking deep into the structure.

The quest continues. Working in partnership with Drake State Technical and Community College in Huntsville—which has a concrete printer—CIM is working to embed structural health monitors inside its next batches of moon beams.

Aligned with MTSU’s core mission to prepare students for the jobs of the future, CIM’s involvement in the moon beams project provides learning experiences for students. NASA grants currently pay four CIM students to serve as interns.

I’ve always thought an MTSU education was out of this world. Now, it truly is!

Build It and They Will Come

Applied

The physical landscape of the MTSU campus continues to evolve and grow in positive ways. More than $1.6 billion in new construction has occurred on the MTSU campus during your 22year tenure as president. Tell us about the most recent changes and additions.

Students began using MTSU’s new $40.1 million School of Concrete and Construction Management Building on the west side of campus in October 2022, as they prepare for professional careers in a high-demand sector throughout the booming Nashville area and beyond.

I’m amazed at the many ways concrete was utilized in the design and construction. Students and visitors can see firsthand how the many forms of concrete can add value and creativity to a structure. The building is a true living laboratory, with examples of various construction techniques and operating systems in full view of students.

Along with a neighboring Applied Engineering Building, under construction after a June

groundbreaking, which will serve as the home for the Engineering Technology and Mechatronics Engineering programs as well as provide space for future engineering programs, the CCM facility marks the latest expansion of MTSU’s Science Corridor of Innovation.

It was with great excitement that we announced in fall 2022 our success in securing $66 million to build a new Student-Athlete Performance Center as well as make stadium improvements.

A brief conversation on recent events with MTSU President Sidney A. McPhee

Engineering Building latest improvement planned along with possible hotel and housing projects

These advancements represent the first of a three-phase, $100 million-plus plan to upgrade our athletics facilities. The three-story structure will house training, strength and conditioning, and equipment centers. The first stage of the project is expected to be completed before the start of the 2024 Blue Raider football season.

We also preserved and updated our iconic Murphy Center in 2022, a year in which the “Glass House” marked its 50th birthday. The arena is undergoing a makeover that began in 2022 with a new glass exterior.

Construction also started on our new on-campus tennis facility at the corner of Middle Tennessee Boulevard and Greenland Drive. The outdoor complex will include eight tennis courts, seating for 250 fans, new locker rooms, and new offices for coaches. Projected completion is fall 2023.

MTSU also received state funding for an Aerospace campus totaling $62.2 million, which includes $5 million in University matching funds.

What’s on the horizon as it relates to campus planning?

A proposed amendment to the MTSU 2016 Master Plan includes development of a future hotel to serve the MTSU community. The proposed hotel will provide a partnership with MTSU’s Tourism and Hospitality Management program that provides experiential-learning opportunities for students and will provide convenient lodging needed to support MTSU’s academics and athletics.

MTSU retained Brailsford and Dunlavey as a special consultant to assist with hotel program development. The consultant’s feasibility study concluded that current hotel offerings near MTSU are limited in number. It

concluded that the sites can support a 65+ key hotel. It also confirmed interest for hotel development in this location by hotel developers. The proposed amendment identifies two possible hotel development sites. The University’s preferred location is on the northwest corner of the MTSU campus along Greenland Drive. A second option is directly across Middle Tennessee Boulevard from MTSU.

A future agreement between MTSU and a hotel developer would take the form of a long-term ground lease agreement. All development costs and hotel management would be the responsibility of the hotel developer/ operator.

Importantly, for me, the proposed hotel development concept aligns with the MTSU Academic Master Plan by facilitating collaborations between students and the business sector and providing experiential learning opportunities.

After unanimous approval by the MTSU Board of Trustees, the Tennessee Higher Education Commission has recommended this Master Plan Amendment. We now are working on final approval by the state and a request for proposals from potential hotel partners.

In June, the MTSU Board of Trustees approved a capital disclosures list that includes a possible public-private partnership for new student housing on the site of the current Womack Lane Apartments to meet rising on-campus housing demand. University residence halls for fall 2023 are at capacity, thanks in part to increased enrollment. Thank you, Mr. President.

April

March 23

Comedian and CBS Sunday Morning commentator Nancy Giles as Women's History Month keynote

March 29

April 11

Baby chicks at ag education event

March 3

Cabaret

Buckin’ broncs at the Lone Star Rodeo at Tennessee Miller Coliseum

April

May

Feb. 24

“State of the African American Union” by Cornel West

Jan. 22

Peter Frampton comes alive at Tucker Theatre

26

Phoebe Bridgers rockin’ at student show

3

Recognizing graduating veterans at stole ceremony

Events Calendar

Mark your calendar for upcoming events around campus

Sept. 11

Tom Jackson Building

9-11 Remembrance

Sept. 23, 6 p.m.

Floyd Stadium

MT Football vs. Colorado State

(Homecoming)

Sept. 28, 7:30 p.m.

Jazz Artist Series

Hinton Music Hall, Wright Music Building

Oct. 5, 4:30 p.m.

MT Center, Ingram Building

Poets Francisco Aragón and Brenda Cárdenas at In Process: A Creative Writing Event Series

Nov. 2–5

Tucker Theatre Cinderella

Nov. 16–18

Tucker Theatre

Fall Dance Concert

Aug. 25–26

President’s Back to School Bash and Convocation

Speaker: Author Bruce Feiler (Life Is in the Transitions), 2 p.m. Saturday

Sept. 8–Nov. 17

Baldwin Photo Gallery

“Deep Roots: Evocations of the Mississippi Blues,” Bill Steber

Sept. 23–Oct. 13

Todd Art Gallery

“The Art of Haiti” exhibit from the Waterloo (Iowa) Center for the Arts

Sept. 30

Science Building/McWherter LRC

Tennessee Girls in STEM Conference

Oct. 5, 7:30 p.m.

MTSU Soprano/Alto Chorale and MTSU Tenor/Bass Chorale

Hinton Music Hall, Wright Music Building

Nov. 11, 2:30 p.m.

Floyd Stadium

MT vs. FIU (Salute to Veterans and Armed Forces Game)

Jan. 15

Student Union Ballroom

Martin Luther King Candlelight Vigil

Who’s your favorite professor?

We asked alumni what faculty (or staff) member they had fond memories of from MTSU and how their life was impacted.

Diane Hughes (’11)

Dr. John Vile. I had him for Constitutional Law. He was a very personable and knowledgeable professor, but there was one particular thing . . . . He announced to the class that anyone unable to be with family for Thanksgiving dinner was welcome at his table. . . . It demonstrated that he cared for students beyond just academics.

Vanessa Hook (’12)

Barry Buxkamper, IYKYK

Terryl Brown Williams (’95)

Dr. Patrick Doyle. Had his class as a freshman and he inspired me by his dedication to recycling!

Lesley Key (’90)

Dr. Ralph Hillman, who taught Voice and Diction in the speech department. For us mass comm majors his class was essential. Not only did he help us with pronunciation and speaking clearly, he helped us with our self-esteem as well. He helped this shy small-town girl overcome her anxiety about speaking in public (and over the air).

Terri Guess (’92, '94)

Dr. King Jamison was my Trigonometry professor in 1990. The VERY BEST memory I have was the time I had to leave class early to attend a funeral for a very special family friend. Dr. Jamison jokingly said as I exited, “Hey, Come back when you can stay longer.” . . . Before the next class, I stopped by his office & explained my reason for leaving early. He sincerely apologized & hated that he had joked not knowing what was happening in my life. In class, he started his lesson, stopped & said, “Before I go on, I must apologize” . . . He walked over in front of me & said, “Again, I apologize for joking when you were in a very sad time & still chose to come to half of my class. I ask for your forgiveness.” That man taught me so much more than numbers & angles that day.

Meredith Young (’06, '10, '21, '23)

Dr. Beth Emery! Huge impact! Even named our daughter, Emery! She was my advisor and was foundational in my advising career in higher edu!

Anthony Heisser (’93)

Dr. Fred Colvin was absolutely incredible . . . I took Western Civ at 7 am and never missed a class

Kelly Loudermilk (’10)

Dr. Clyde Willis aka Clyde. He was one of the coolest people I have ever met. He was a great human who had the ability to challenge his students to think in an unconventional manner. He wanted original thought and to truly think.

Jay Sanders (’88, '89, '94)

Dr. Joe Nunley, an Education Professor from Viola, Tennessee, was my favorite. Not only was his class helpful in my 36-year teaching career, his historical knowledge of MTSU was vast . . . He spoke candidly about MT during the war years . . . Not only was he an excellent teacher, he was an even better person.

Eve Morris Lane (’91)

Dr. Aaron Todd for

Mona Hedrick (’91)

Dr. Ron Aday, sociology professor, made me love gerontology and is one of the reasons why I chose to work in the field of long-term care.

physical science. I appreciate that he taught me how to study things that I didn't want to study.

Make plans to join the fun

Mark your calendars to celebrate your Blue Raiders! Join fellow alumni for a memorable Homecoming weekend

Sept. 22–23 Golden Raiders Reunion (Class of 1973) Alumni Awards Mixer on Middle Homecoming Parade

Alumni Tailgate MT Football vs Colorado State, 6 p.m.

Updated listings and RSVPs at mtalumni.com

Required Reading

To Make a Village Soviet: Jehovah’s Witnesses and the Transformation of a Postwar Ukrainian Borderland

Emily Baran, Professor, Department of History

HISTORY

Baran’s second book chronicles how, in June 1949, the Soviet state arrested seven farmers from the village of Bila Tserkva. Not wealthy or powerful, the men were unknown outside their community, and few had ever heard of their small, isolated village on the southwestern border of Soviet Ukraine. Nevertheless, the state decided they were dangerous traitors who threatened to undermine public order, and a regional court sentenced them to 25 years of imprisonment for treason. The arrested men belonged to a small and misunderstood religious minority, the Jehovah’s Witnesses, and both Witnesses and their neighbors challenged the government’s attempts to fully integrate the village into socialist society. Baran argues that what happened in Bila Tserkva demonstrates the sheer ambition of the state’s plans for the Sovietization of borderland communities.

Song of the Sea

Meredith Leigh Burton, B.A. in English and Theatre (’07)

YOUNG ADULT (YA)

FANTASY FICTION

After graduating from MTSU, Burton, who is blind, later received her teacher certification for grades 7–12. Today, she is a motivational speaker, singer, and author. Her YA books feature disabled protagonists and explore the themes of inner strength and the truth that people with disabilities are simply unique individuals whom Burton says God enables to make a difference in the world. “We have much to offer if given the chance,” said Burton, who lives in Lynchburg.

Getting About

Bill Meehan, Editor, Ph.D. in English (’96) BIBLIOGRAPHY

While a Ph.D. student at MTSU, Meehan contacted William F. Buckley Jr. to ask about interviewing him for his MTSU doctoral dissertation analyzing Buckley’s writing style in his novels. Buckley agreed to an interview, and eventually hired Meehan as his official bibliographer. Getting About, Buckley’s latest book edited by Meehan (and which features an introduction by Meehan), gathers more than 100 Buckley articles about journeys by boat, train, or plane, representing a lifetime of adventure around the world.

Star-Tent: A Triptych

Amie Whittemore, Lecturer, Department of English POETRY

Whittemore, director of MTSU

Write and the 2020 poet laureate for Murfreesboro, will in 2023 publish Star-Tent: A Triptych, a speculative poetry collection that asks, through rich lyricism and formal experimentation, how what lies beyond the Earth can shape how we reside on this planet. Through intergalactic encounters, the poems examine what it means to be human and what it means to contemplate one’s own humanity through the lens of extreme otherness.

Collage: A Journal of Creative Expression is a biannual publication of MTSU’s Honors College. Each semester a student-led committee receives entries of creative work, such as art, photography, short stories, essays, short plays, song lyrics, poetry, audio, and video, from students and recent alumni. mtsu.edu/collage

Trastevere Photography Ross Sibley

Gateway

Aging Process

Autumn Ashes

by Ella Lancaster

The trees are finally tired and considering sleep. The air itself seems to quiet. I, myself, am seeping into sadness. The quiet has made known the appearance of a hushed whispering: a long held seasonal sound. It rouses in the coolness of a setting sun, finds likeness in the rushing of leaves. Unrest in this time of slumber.

I find I carry unease, discontentment, and dissatisfaction. Most of all, I face tangled frustration. Yet again, anger rises as red as the changing colors, hot as the wanting sun. I realized this is a familiar state that passes by each autumn. A fire slowly stoked, held at bay until the cold reveals its heat. It is powerful at first, overwhelming, until all that’s left is a yawning, collapsing, breathing being. It sits in my belly: a heavy weight of sorrowed ashes, let loose by the goodbyes of a summer eve.

Serenity

Moon Talisman

Art

Allison Rethi

Video

Hunter Hoffman

Art Camryn Anderson

The

Photography

Elizabeth Kowalczyk

Old School

A look back at MTSU’s past from our photo archives—Opening as the New Classroom Building in 1968, Peck Hall has had nicknames such as the freshman maze and Bermuda Square due to students’ getting lost in its layout.

New School

Exploring, engaging, and enriching—Students now enjoy newer plaza seating, technology updates, and color-coded wayfinding at Peck Hall, brightened up by College of Liberal Arts branding.

Photo by Andy Heidt

TAKING STOCK

Top-funded faculty grab the gold for groundbreaking grant projects

As a publicly supported institution of higher learning, MTSU takes its role to serve the state of Tennessee very seriously. That includes conducting research and creative activities that produce knowledge, information, data, technologies, know-how, and other outcomes that are disseminated from MTSU to the whole state to help improve the economy, services, and quality of life for all Tennesseans.

In 2022, MTSU celebrated its advancement to an R2 high research activity doctoral university designation by the Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education. This elite status places the University among a select group of only 3% of institutions nationwide to earn the R2 designation. Each R2 university has a unique group of folks who, over their careers, bring a substantial amount of grant and contract dollars to the institution in support of their research, teaching, and service. These dollars help facilitate the university’s mission of research, teaching, and service, and they help the bottom line, adding to the traditional revenue streams of tuition and state funding. The following seven individuals have achieved the distinction of bringing more than $5 million in grants and contracts to MTSU over their careers at the University.

HEART OF GOLD

CENTER FOR HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES DIRECTOR CYNTHIA CHAFIN

TURNS PROJECT EXPERTISE INTO LIFE-CHANGING RESULTS

Aftergraduating from MTSU with her Business Administration degree, Cynthia Chafin (’88) spent the first five years out of college as an accountant.

“I did okay with it, but something was missing,” she said of her first professional experience. “I figured out I’ve always been personally passionate about any kind of health-related topic.”

She enrolled at Vanderbilt University and obtained a graduate degree in health promotion and education, then started working with the Tennessee Department of Health.

“I really felt like I was making a difference with people,” she said. “That was my motivation and continues to be my motivation.”

Chafin later had a chance meeting with Martha Jo Edwards, who then held the Adams Chair of Excellence in Health Care Services at MTSU. Edwards asked her to help administer a grant. It marked Chafin’s return to her alma mater, working in MTSU’s Center for Health and Human Services (CHHS) as a project director.

CHHS collaborates with agencies and nonprofits to improve the well-being of Tennesseans through training, research, communication, and education. The center’s reach is national, with activities currently in an 11-state area.

That first project Chafin worked on at MTSU was a tobacco cessation program focused on low-income women who

were pregnant, smoked, and used Health Department services.

In 2002, when CHHS launched Smart Mothers Are Resisting Tobacco (SMART Moms), Tennessee had the second-highest maternal smoking rate in the nation. More than 29% of the state’s pregnant recipients in the Women, Infants, and Children nutrition supplement program smoked.

Under Chafin’s guidance, SMART Moms became operational in public health agencies in all 95 counties in Tennessee.

In all, more than 13,000 pregnant women received one-onone counseling with a provider that Chafin’s team trained. The result? Of the enrollees, more than 24% stopped smoking, far exceeding both the 14% success rate of similar programs and the goal of 10%.

“Every health department in the state continues to offer pregnant women a special program to help them quit smoking,” Chafin said. “That is something we can be proud of at MTSU.”

Such early success in the field bolstered Chafin’s decision to use her administrative strengths and passion for health care to improve public health through large grant-funded projects.

For instance, CHHS and a nonprofit coalition recently partnered to address opioid misuse in Wilson County's rural communities thanks to a $1 million federal grant.

It’s just one of many recent projects CHHS has administered that are making a difference.

— Drew Ruble

About the only thing that rivals Cynthia Chafin’s passion for public health is her passion for animal health. "I'm a cat collector," she confessed.

Photo by James Cessna

SINGING PRAISES

CHORAL DIRECTOR RAPHAEL BUNDAGE POURS A LIFETIME OF EXPERIENCE INTO OPENING DOORS FOR YOUNG ARTISTS

ForRaphael Bundage, an MTSU professor in the School of Music, director of choral activities, and longtime director of the Tennessee Governor’s School for the Arts, music began as a family affair.

Bundage’s father, a Methodist (AME) minister (who also taught college chemistry), sang bass in a high school quartet. His mother, an English teacher, was a wonderful singer. One of his sisters sang opera. Another played violin. His brother played trumpet. Even his paternal grandmother played guitar.

Music, as the expression goes, was in his blood. His direction in life was clear. One visceral memory Bundage has of the family piano perhaps best exemplifies this passion.

“As a kid, I would gnaw at the keyboard,” Bundage said. “There were teeth marks on the piano. I so wanted to be close to the music.”

Bundage’s earliest taste of conducting came in high school when he conducted a vocal ensemble of 14 high school singers called the Songmates. Accepted to Texas Christian University’s School of Music, Bundage got to conduct choral ensembles, including the prestigious TCU A Cappella Choir.

While at TCU, Bundage also performed in the pep band for the Dallas Cowboys. Bundage played clarinet and tenor saxophone but wasn’t much of a football fan, admitting he brought a book to the games to read between songs.

Bundage later served as director of the Eastman Chamber Chorus and assistant director of the Eastman-Rochester Symphony Chorus while earning his master's and doctorate at the Eastman Conservatory of Music in New York.

Bundage’s professional career began as a supervisor of choral music in the Texas public school system. A few years later, in 1985, he came to MTSU as a professor in the School of Music. He became chorus master of the Nashville Opera Association and Nashville Symphony Chorus, conducting choruses for several seasons under the late maestro Kenneth Schermerhorn.

Bundage’s various MTSU choral ensembles have toured extensively throughout the U.S. and Europe, performing in such places as composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s home church, the Vatican, and Carnegie Hall.

Such a storied background made him the perfect fit to direct one of MTSU’s most prestigious—and lucrative— grant programs.

For more than a decade, from 2010 to 2021, Bundage served as the primary investigator on the nearly half-million-dollar annual Tennessee Governor’s School for the Arts grant—and served as the program’s director.

The pre-professional summer curriculum includes individual and group instruction designed to help rising 11th- and 12th-grade gifted students explore and develop talents in music, ballet, theater, filmmaking, or visual arts.

— Skip Anderson and Drew Ruble

It’s a long way from a preacher’s dwelling in Texas to the Vatican in Rome. Raphael Bundage’s lifelong love of choral music got him there.

Photo by J. Intintoli

WEAVING A WEB

MATH PROFESSOR MARY MARTIN HAS STITCHED TOGETHER A LASTING LEGACY AT HER ALMA MATER

Fewif any professors on the MTSU campus have the kind of True Blue ties that Mathematics Professor Mary Martin (’84) possesses.

Martin’s mother taught on the MTSU campus in the College of Education and for almost a decade was graduate school dean.

After graduating from MTSU, Martin went to graduate school at the University of North Carolina. After stints as a math professor at Colgate University in New York and Winthrop University in South Carolina, she eventually returned to her alma mater as a faculty member in 1998.

Martin has contributed to MTSU’s growth in profound ways as one of the most prolific grant writers on the faculty, penning (with her peers) proposals that have brought millions of dollars in funding to the MTSU campus. She also helped steer MTSU’s mathematics program to become the diverse and modern department it is today, with connections reaching into many of the most relevant degree programs on campus.

MTSU’s Mathematical Sciences Department now supports three Ph.D. programs—none of which qualifies as pure math. There’s computational math, which is applied math; math education—Martin’s grant-writing focus—which develops innovative teaching strategies; and data science, a new field and current darling of industry.

“The Ph.D. programs are aimed at new science,” Martin said. “The intersection of two or more fields. . . . That’s

where all the new science comes from. . . . It’s also where you get a lot of new results.”

According to Martin, the sign of a good, well-developed, modern math department is growth into these other areas, “which takes away from your primary visibility,” she said, “but not the strength of the structure nor the necessity for the structure.”

In support of such studies, Martin is the primary investigator behind millions in federal grants coming to MTSU to support math teacher training, preparation, and student support.

The earliest grants—used to make sure that teachers were up to speed on best practices—impacted more than 6,000 teachers across Tennessee. Figuring that each of those 6,000 teachers spent just five years in the field, and worked with a mere 100 students each, those grants impacted (minimally) tens of thousands of individual students.

“We were raising the intuition and perspective of the teachers, who could then teach and help students get over stumbling blocks,” Martin said.

An example of a recent grant Martin acquired is a $1.5 million federal Upward Bound grant, serving the needs of students in 10th grade through their transition to college.

With so much accomplished, what keeps Martin working so hard to secure new opportunities? Martin said math education is desperately needed, and she can’t fathom resting on her laurels.

— Drew Ruble

In her spare time, Mary Martin likes to work on 12 types of needlework in addition to crocheting, knitting, and macrame.

Photo by J. Intintoli

BUILT TO LAST

BUSINESS PROFESSOR PATRICK GEHO HELPS BUILD TENNESSEE'S ECONOMY

Duringthe nearly three decades Patrick Geho has worked with the statewide Tennessee Small Business Development Center (TSBDC) program, he has seen it help countless individuals start or expand their businesses. In his years of simultaneous service with the TSBDC office at MTSU, Geho has secured more than $40 million in state, federal, and in-kind funds under various economic development contracts.

Geho, a Department of Management professor, started at MTSU as a TSBDC service director in 1995 and has been lead center director since 2006.

It’s not just traditionally “small” businesses that the TSBDC has helped launch, grow, or just stay afloat. Contrary to what people might think, Geho said a small business is defined by the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) as a company with 500 or fewer employees.

The TSBDC also works with state, county, city, and quasigovernmental agencies on a wide range of economic and community development projects.

Created by Congress in 1980 and adopted by Tennessee in 1984, the Small Business Development Center program combines the resources of higher education, government, and the private sector to support small businesses.

The TSBDC network consists of 14 service centers (including at MTSU) and two affiliate offices across the

state. Each service center is staffed by consultants who provide no-cost business consulting, training, and resources to help businesses start, grow, and sustain.

Center staff can assist in business and financial planning, marketing and sales strategies, social media and website analysis, government contracting, international trade, cybersecurity, and numerous other areas. The centers also conduct market research as well as competitive and financial analyses at no cost to the client. And staff help companies with preparing to go before a lender and getting access to capital.

“We’re all about reaching out to small businesses,” Geho said. “Helping somebody grow a company from 30 employees to 100 employees may not sound like a big deal to some people, but if it’s happening in your community, 70 more jobs is very significant.”

Prior to coming to MTSU, Geho was founder and co-owner of Consolidated Investors Inc., which developed commercial and industrial properties. The company later ventured into manufacturing, incorporating as SCIC Inc., an automotive drivetrain component subassemblies metal coatings manufacturing plant serving Dana Corp., Chrysler, General Motors, Mercedes, Nissan, and Toyota.

As CEO, Geho grew the plant population to more than 130 employees. He clearly earned the expertise he freely offers to small business owners.

— Drew Ruble

When he’s not working, Patrick Geho likes spending time on his Smith County farm.

Photo by J. Intintoli

SPECIAL INTEREST

EDUCATION PROFESSOR ROBYN RIDGLEY HELPS FAMILIES AND THEIR CHILDREN FLOURISH

Decades

of research shows that children’s earliest experiences play a critical role in brain development.

Children with developmental delays or disabilities are particularly vulnerable if cognitive and language skills aren’t addressed early on. For them, high-quality early intervention services from seasoned education specialists boost their quality of life.

Robyn Ridgley, associate dean and professor in the MTSU College of Education, started her career as a special education teacher, working to manifest exactly those types of improved outcomes for such students.

Her first job out of college was in a rural elementary school in western Kentucky working primarily with children who had language delays.

Ridgley said she quickly learned that a good college program only prepares you so well for the obstacles you face on the job. She went back to school for her master’s, attending Vanderbilt University, which offered an inclusive early childhood program for families in the community.

Ridgley later added a doctorate from the University of Kentucky to her growing résumé. She joined the MTSU faculty in 2005 and soon found herself at the heart of an exciting new early childhood initiative.

In 2010, Lana Seivers, then dean of MTSU’s College of Education (and a former Tennessee commissioner of education), became aware that the state planned to rethink how it provided early intervention services. Seivers knew

the state was looking for new entities to apply for funding to provide such services to children and families in Tennessee.

“Because of her connections, we were made aware of it and got the opportunity to apply for that very first grant,” Ridgley said. “She was the principal investigator at first. However, I was heavily involved because my background was in that work.”

The result of the grant was the formation of the MTSU Home and Community-Based Early Intervention (HCBEI) Program, providing early intervention to children from birth to 3 years old who have been diagnosed with a developmental delay or disability and qualify for services under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). The program is free to those who qualify.

Through HCBEI, MTSU’s team of degreed and experienced early interventionists travels to homes or other sites in the community to work with infants and toddlers with special needs and their families, child care providers, and other therapists. This program provides developmental therapy services to children in Rutherford, Williamson, and Maury counties.

Ridgley fondly recalls the earliest days of the massive grant implementation, as she was responsible for all of the initial organization, preparation, planning, and hiring.

“It really connected me back to the work that attracted me to higher education to begin with,” she said. “This gave me that opportunity to create a program . . . and train people and support others.”

— Drew Ruble

“I’m a reader,” Robyn Ridgley said. “I read all the time. That’s what I choose to do if I’m not working or busy.”

Photo by Andy Heidt

BLAST FROM THE PAST

MTSU PROFESSOR AND STATE HISTORIAN CARROLL VAN WEST’S IMPACT ON HISTORIC PRESERVATION HAS BEEN PROFOUND

AnMTSU History professor since 1985, Carroll Van West has served as director of MTSU’s Center for Historic Preservation (CHP) since 2002. The center, MTSU’s first Center of Excellence and one of nine original centers at Tennessee Board of Regents universities, was established by the Tennessee General Assembly in the 1980s. West also serves as co-chair of the Tennessee Civil War Sesquicentennial Commission and as a Tennessee representative on the national board of advisors of the National Trust for Historic Preservation. He is a member of the National Historic Landmarks Commission of the National Park Advisory Board (appointed in 2019). In 2013, thenGov. Bill Haslam appointed West as state historian, a position he continues to hold under Gov. Bill Lee. West’s imprint on historic preservation in America is nothing short of profound. The work of the center is vast and continues to expand, administering millions in research dollars and saving history before it’s too late. Projects span not only across the South but throughout the Midwest and into the Southwest. The focus is primarily on properties associated with the Civil Rights Movement, the Civil War, rural areas, marginalized communities, and the Southern music industries.

Arguably the center’s biggest impact, though, has been on the communities of Tennessee—large and small, rural and urban—in developing and providing, at no charge in

most cases, historic preservation plans, historic structure reports, heritage tourism plans, Main Street program assistance, National Register and survey projects, and other related assistance. The CHP also provides administrative and planning aid to many of Tennessee’s heritage organizations.

“Our community-anchored work drives everything at the Center for Historic Preservation,” West said.

Asked to pinpoint one grant project that he believes had the most significant impact, West points to the work that began in 2001 when the CHP became the administrator of the Tennessee Civil War National Heritage Area (NHA), a private-public partnership with the National Park Service and the only NHA managed by a university.

During the past two decades, CHP staff and students tirelessly worked to enhance the effectiveness of statewide Civil War interpretation, preservation, education, and heritage tourism efforts, overseeing $8.2 million in funds.

Tennessee has clearly benefitted from the CHP, but the center’s geographic scope has significantly expanded in the 21st century. The center first entered the national arena when forming a longstanding relationship with the National Park Service, and they celebrated 20 years of working together in 2022.

— Patsy B. Weiler, Drew Ruble, and Allison Gorman

As a season ticket holder for the Titans, Predators, and Nashville SC, MTSU History Professor Carroll Van West is a bona fide sports junkie.

Photo by Andy Heidt

ENGINEERING NEW CURES

BIOLOGY RESEARCHER ANTHONY FARONE DRAWS ON INSPIRATION FROM FAMILY TO EFFECT CHANGE THROUGH SCIENCE

Inspired by Jacques Cousteau’s aquatic adventures and other PBS nature shows on the four TV channels he watched in childhood, Anthony “Tony” Farone wanted to become a wildlife or outdoor biologist one day. But, as his interest and knowledge in the subject advanced during high school and college in Pennsylvania, he noticed how much cancer was affecting the extended family of his parents, who grew up during the Depression era.

“I realized that there were a lot of these older folks in our family who were getting cancer and dying of cancer,” the MTSU Biology research professor said, “and it kind of switched my biology focus to where I am now with a more medically related emphasis.”

While most of his cousins worked at steel mills or in factories and wondered when he would get a real job—“they couldn’t get over that I was still in school”— Farone not only was one of the few in his family to attend college, but also continued on to grad school and a Ph.D.

“When I was in college at Penn State, my mother’s brother had pancreatic cancer and he was very sick, and he thought that I could find a cure for him by the time I finished graduate school. Whenever I would see him, he always would tell me to hurry up,” Farone recalled.

Farone spent three years of postdoctoral research at Harvard University after completing his master’s and

doctorate at Miami University in Ohio, where he and wife Mary, also an MTSU Biology professor, “met under a microscope.” “We’ve worked together pretty much ever since,” Farone said.

The couple had never heard of MTSU until he saw a faculty position open up, and they decided to move south with their baby in 1995. That baby later developed a sarcoma on her hand in high school, overcoming cancer while her scientist parents felt powerless.

Tony Farone’s career at MTSU, as well as his wife’s as she wended her own way, have followed the arc of the growth of the science and research programs—and certainly played a role in that trajectory as well.

Farone’s research, focusing on the interaction between the immune system and pathogens, now helps support Ph.D. students in the Molecular Biosciences program and is attached to MTSU’s Tennessee Center for Botanical Medicine Research. The interdisciplinary center works to develop drugs from botanicals and natural compounds that have anti-cancer, anti-viral, anti-parasitic, and antiinflammatory activity to help combat conditions such as cancer, diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis, and Crohn’s disease. Farone has received three patents in his quest to invent new immunotherapeutics. MTSU

— Carol Stuart

Anthony “Tony” Farone has a passion for model trains, a hobby he shared with his four kids and now a granddaughter.

Photo by Andy Heidt

by Allison Gorman

Recent alumni Farilyn Hurt, Connelly Pignocco, and John Paul Quiampang

Photo by J. Intintoli

Anew school year was fast approaching, and airplanes had been coming in so frequently that MTSU’s Wendy Beckman had lost track briefly last fall. Two new twin-engine planes were due for delivery then, bringing the number of Piper Seminoles to five when they arrived. The Aerospace Department also was expanding its Diamond fleet to 39 planes after adding eight more single-engine Diamond DA40s in early 2023.

“We’re probably going to need more if the enrollment continues,” said Beckman, professor of Aerospace and former department chair.

She was referring to enrollment in Professional Pilot, the department’s largest concentration by far. Pro Pilot had surged from around 450 to 900 students since 2015, propelling a similar surge in Aerospace majors overall— from 650 to over 1,200 in the same time frame. Whenever an academic major doubles that quickly, the logistics of meeting the increased demand are challenging.

“We’ve hired every year,” said Tyler Babb, who coordinates the Pro Pilot concentration. “I can’t think of a year since 2013 that I didn’t serve on or chair a search committee for a new faculty member.”

But in Pro Pilot, the logistics of exponential growth go far beyond hiring new faculty or increasing classroom size (although they’re doing that too).

“There’s so much infrastructure required for a Pro Pilot student, in terms of flight instructor and aircraft and all that,” Beckman explained. “It’s not like adding a section of a history class.”

By the time Pro Pilot students graduate from MTSU, they have around 200 hours of flight time, if not many more. That means access not just to airplanes and flight instructors, but to airport space—an increasingly scarce commodity at landlocked Murfreesboro Municipal Airport, where the University has trained pilots since 1952.

So over the next three years, with $62.2 million in new state funding generously provided by the Tennessee General Assembly in 2022, Aerospace will move pilot training to the Shelbyville airport, where there’s plenty of room to expand.

All this growth is a direct result of demand from an industry that’s soaring after years of financial upheaval—years when carriers were going bankrupt, planes were grounded, and pilots were retiring early. By contrast, these days there’s a critical need for new talent at airports and airlines, and MTSU is making historic investments to meet that need.

MTSU has always been an integral part of the aerospace industry pipeline, with one of the most respected programs

in the country. Veteran faculty members like Beckman and Babb, as well as Aerospace Chair Chaminda Prelis, who joined the University in 2021, have deep connections in the industry and broad experience navigating its ups and downs.

“As the Aerospace program marked its 80th anniversary in the past year, we are charting its future course,” Prelis said.

Achieving a Dream

MTSU’s Aerospace Department began as a campus-based flight-training detachment for the Army Air Corps during World War II. It moved to what is now Murfreesboro Municipal Airport, where it was briefly privately owned, then fell back into the purview of MTSU.

Over the following decades, MTSU Aerospace expanded its scope far beyond pilot training to include programs in Aviation Management, Flight Dispatch, Technology, Maintenance Management, and Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) Operations, as well as three Aeronautical Science master’s options.

Currently, MTSU has seven Aerospace concentrations accredited by the Aviation Accreditation Board International —more than any American university except Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University. But Pro Pilot has always been its largest concentration.

A big part of that is the romantic appeal of flying. For many people, like Drew Perhac, being a pilot is a lifelong dream.

A Pro Pilot alum (’19) and now a Delta Air Lines pilot, Perhac was taking flying lessons before he could drive.

“It was kind of funny because my girlfriend at the time—my wife now—is older than I am, so she’d have to drive me to the airport,” he said. “I would go fly the airplane, and then she’d drive me back.”

His fellow Blue Raider and Delta pilot Colton Gray (’17) is quick to admit that he didn’t choose the career for the paycheck.

“It’s not something I do for the money—it’s something I’ve wanted to do since I was a little kid,” he said. “Don’t tell my employer, but I’ll almost do it for free.”

Not long ago, working for next to nothing was a rite of passage for new pilots, Beckman said. They’d survive on low wages and poor sleep while putting in time with a regional airline—the prerequisite for getting hired by a major carrier and finally making a comfortable income.

“[Pro Pilot graduates] would come out and make $20,000 to $22,000 a year for their first couple of years at a regional

These days there’s

airline. So students would hear that—we’re pretty honest in our Intro to Aero class—and they’d switch into other concentrations,” she said. “They’d decide that being a dispatcher or controller might make a lot more sense financially than going through this whole painful period for five, six, seven years as a regional airline pilot.” The picture began to change when the airlines finally emerged from prolonged economic turbulence that started after 9/11. Pilots were able to leverage the increased demand for their services into better pay and working conditions, even at the regional level. Since then, Aerospace has been flooded with Pro Pilot majors who knew they could fly and make a living doing it.

A Flying Start

A major sign that the clouds were lifting came in 2017, when Delta sought out partnerships with eight of the country’s top aerospace programs, including MTSU’s, to identify and develop good pilots. Its new mentorship and training program, Delta Propel, would put participants from partner universities on a fast track to a career with the airline.

new talent at

“I was the chair when they first approached,” Beckman said. “We thought, ‘Oh my gosh, this is amazing—we’re actually talking to Delta Airlines?’ We thought this would never happen.”

Just this spring, MTSU’s Department of Aerospace additionally partnered with Southwest Airlines and its Destination 225° program, which also offers pathways for aspiring pilots. Destination 225° recruits and develops students from university aviation programs to serve as first officers for Southwest (see related article on page 31)

Delta pilot Eric Wesley graduated from MTSU in 2004. He was a Pro Pilot major during some of the industry’s roughest years.

“There was no hiring,” he said. “There was stagnation. A lot of the U.S. carriers, big and small, were facing potential ruin because of 9/11 and the economic aftermath.

Yet given the rich history of the Aerospace Department, Wesley said, he’s not surprised that it was on Delta’s radar once the winds finally shifted.

Wesley’s path from graduation to major airline wasn’t unusual for the time. He spent two years as a flight instructor, then nine years flying for regional carrier Air Wisconsin before joining the major airline in 2014.

a critical need for

airports and airlines, and MTSU is making historic investments to meet that need.

MTSU now boasts a fleet of 45 training aircraft.

FLIGHT PATH

Commercial airlines are increasingly partnering with universities on entry-level career programs in an effort to attract ready-to-work talent into their fold.

As one of the top aviation programs in America, MTSU has collaborated on two such partnerships—first with Delta Air Lines and more recently with Southwest.

In April, MTSU’s top-flight Department of Aerospace joined the Southwest Airlines Destination 225° program as one of the newest partners—and one of only 12 nationally. Similar to Delta Propel, Destination 225° builds pathways for aspiring pilots from university aviation programs across the country to first officer roles at Southwest Airlines.

“Adding a career pathway like Southwest’s Destination 225° program

provides a tremendous opportunity for our qualifying Aerospace students to become professional pilots for a major carrier,” MTSU President Sidney A. McPhee said. “With Southwest’s robust presence at Nashville International Airport, the partnership seems a natural fit for both parties.”

On a compass rose, 225° is the southwest heading. Destination 225° provides several pathways designed to meet future aviators at their current experience level and create opportunities to take them to the right seat in a Southwest cockpit, assisting the captain with flight navigation and operation.

“MTSU students will have the opportunity to pursue a career as a Southwest first officer with guidance, training, and mentorship as they complete their college education,” said Lee Kinnebrew, vice president

of flight operations at Southwest Airlines.

Delta Air Lines and MTSU are now entering their fifth year as partners of Delta’s Propel pilot program, which has partnerships with 17 aviation schools. MTSU was among the first universities to enter the partnership, encouraging Pro Pilot majors to pursue a path to earn their flight certifications, build experience, and become a Delta pilot in 42 months or less.

Delta’s Kelvin Mason, who works with pilot outreach and development, said the airline “intends to hire thousands of aviation professionals in the next several years—in addition to pilots— and we’re highly interested in MTSU’s ‘industry-ready’ graduates. . . . MTSU is one of the elite programs in collegiate aviation.”

—Randy Weiler

Diamond fleet expanded to 39 with eight new singleengine planes in 2023

Propel cut that period to 42 months—an “unheard of” timeline when the program launched in July 2018, Wesley said.

After serving as Propel’s liaison with MTSU from July 2018 through July 2022—and lead college liaison that last year— Wesley now serves as Propel’s lead mentor. The mentorship aspect of the program is mutually beneficial, he said: Delta develops a personal relationship with pilots before they’re hired, and the pilots are familiar with the Delta culture when they come on board as first officers. During the 42 months, pilots can opt to fly private aircraft for Delta’s partner Wheels Up, fly for the military, or fly for a regional carrier. Gray and Perhac were among the first participants to make it through the Propel program. Both chose the regional route, and both have been Delta first officers since summer 2022.

“Once you get to Delta, life usually becomes drastically better,” Perhac said. “Better pay, better quality of life, better work rules, so it’s been nice making that step.”

For the Pro Pilot student, Propel has “taken a lot of guesswork and uncertainty out of the career path,” Beckman said. “It’s amazing that somebody in college could eye their ultimate dream job, and there’s a clear path to that. . . . You don’t see that in any industry, right?”

That said, Propel is highly competitive. Beckman estimated that 16 to 18 of every 100 applicants from MTSU are chosen to participate. Propel’s proprietary selection process is based on metrics, not quotas, Wesley said, but of the 17 current Propel partners, MTSU is routinely among the top three or four for representation.

“MTSU is holding its own against large [aerospace] universities like North Dakota and Embry-Riddle,” he said.

First in Flight

In reality, MTSU’s Aerospace Department has been holding its own for years, especially when it comes to flight training. For instance, Pro Pilot majors start flying almost immediately— either their first or second semester, depending on whether they come into the program with transfer credits. Babb, who used to recruit students from other universities, said that’s unusual.

“I used to hear all the time, ‘I’ve been here two years, and I haven’t touched an airplane yet,’ ” he said.

MTSU also stands out for its highly intensive first flight lab. “Students have to fly four times a week,” Babb said. “It’s pretty fast, but we understand that, as with any training, it’s better to do it really often and finish in a shorter time window than to drag it out and fly once a week for six months.”

During the third flight lab, students work toward their commercial pilot certification, awarded when a student meets FAA Industry Training Standards (FITS) rather than a certain number of flight hours. Paul Craig, an architect of MTSU’s flight-training program, adopted the FITS model around 2005, Babb said. Other universities have followed suit in recent years.

The FITS model is more cost-effective, Babb noted; good students can save more money by earning commercial certification in fewer hours. Most students are certified by the end of their sophomore year and work as part-time flight

MTSU's two new Piper multi-engine aircraft, bringing the total to five

THE RIGHT STUFF

It’s no surprise that veterans gravitate to MTSU.

The 3,200-square-foot Charlie and Hazel Daniels Veterans and Military Family Center—the largest such space at any higher education campus in Tennessee—speaks to the University’s tradition of serving those who’ve served.

And it shouldn’t be a surprise that a lot of veterans land in Aerospace’s Pro Pilot program, which has the highest concentration of former military members on campus. They tend to have what it takes to succeed there.

Colton Gray (’17) came to Pro Pilot in 2014, having served six years in the U.S. Army, including two in Afghanistan. A friend had encouraged him to “check out this little school”

called Middle Tennessee State University.

What Gray found was a top-tier flight-training program at a major public university with a personal feel, complemented by the one-on-one support he received as a veteran.

“Gen. Keith Huber—he’s the military liaison—helped me navigate the VA and everything else,” Gray said. With that minor assist, Gray took off. He was the first person in the country to make it through the highly selective Delta Propel program, which puts professional pilot grads on a fast track to a career with the legacy airline.

Aerospace’s newest concentration, Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) Operations, also has become popular with student veterans.

In fact, UAS made its remote pilot certificate requirement optional to accommodate the needs of veterans with certain disabilities, said Kevin Corns, who directs the concentration. It’s a worthwhile adjustment given what someone with military training brings to the table.

Corns said he recently placed two “very sharp veterans” as interns with an engineering company just getting into UAS. In no time they were writing the company’s flight operations manual, had been retained part time, and had project manager jobs waiting for them after graduation.

Whether it’s skill set or mindset, veterans clearly have the right stuff for Aerospace.

Airlines and airports are looking for new talent across the board.

instructors at MTSU during their junior and senior years to get more flight hours. They can choose to go full time, and keep building hours, after graduation. Once they’ve hit 1,000 hours—usually within a year after graduation—they can apply for restricted certification to fly for a regional airline. Certification to fly for a major carrier requires 1,500 hours. Students with a commercial pilot license also can build flight hours other ways, like crop dusting, skydiving, or banner towing. In fact, that’s where some students hope to land a career, Beckman said. The traditional “round-dial” planes with pneumatic gauges are still used for low-tech commercial applications.

But as Pro Pilot continues to grow, and with most students planning to go into transport, Aerospace has been steadily refurbishing and expanding its fleet of “glass-cockpit” aircraft like the Diamond Stars, which have integrated navigation and instrumentation systems.

The department is also investing in human capital, Prelis said. In addition to attracting new faculty from academia and industry, it just expanded its base of flight instructors from 80 to 100 and increased their pay. There are similar pay raises in the works for faculty and staff.

Babb said the program has been in a continuous state of expansion since he joined the faculty 10 years ago.

“The scale at which we’re operating is completely different— the number of flights going out in a given day,” he said. “A certain class that I used to teach always had 30 people in it, and [now] it’s got over 100.”

The new Aerospace complex at Shelbyville Municipal Airport, in nearby Bedford County, will accommodate growth in every direction, with an 83,000-square-foot academic building, three hangars, car parking, and an aircraft apron and taxiway.

Prelis hopes to make those operations as environmentally sustainable as possible. His plans include a free shuttle between MTSU and the Shelbyville airport, a half-hour away. “There’s really nothing much around that airport; it’s mostly farmland,” Prelis said. “And so not only will we have the capacity to establish what we currently need, but we’ll also have the space to continue growing.”

The state’s robust investment in the Shelbyville project is “a huge endorsement of what we do and of our program,” he said.

Sky’s No Limit

MTSU Aerospace attracts plenty of private investment too—from monetary contributions to hands-on help from alumni who teach as adjuncts. That continued support, public and private, allows Aerospace to respond quickly to an ever-shifting landscape.

“We engage with the industry,” Prelis said. “We ask them what types of skills they anticipate needing from our students, and we evolve our program to meet those needs.”

The increased demand for pilots is just part of it, he added. Airlines and airports are looking for new talent across the board.

Beckman said it’s time to start direct-recruiting high school students to those lucrative, lesser-known concentrations.

“There may be people who don’t want to be a pilot but would love the idea of running an airport—if they knew there was such a thing as aviation management,” she said.

Right now, conditions are perfect to be in aerospace, she said. Choose your destination.

FURTHER AFIELD

When Aerospace launched its newest concentration in 2015, its top business application seemed clear.

The devices that hobbyists were calling drones—known in the industry as unmanned aircraft systems (UAS)— would allow farmers to monitor and assess their crops remotely, driving the next wave in precision agriculture. No doubt drones are making farming more efficient. That’s why UAS is an integral part of the Tennessee Digital Agriculture Center being established at MTSU.

Song Cui, an associate professor of Agriculture, won a three-year, $750,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the National Institute of Food and Agriculture to launch the center. He leads a multidisciplinary team—including UAS Director Kevin Corns—whose goal is to give young people in middle Tennessee, especially those from underrepresented groups,

a tantalizing taste of cutting-edge farming. That includes using drones to capture data.

Corns, who has worked with Cui on various projects, joined MTSU in 2016, just as unmanned aircraft were cleared to fly in the national airspace system.

“Photography, roof inspections, surveying have all been the early adopters, and the ag sector is now getting into unmanned aircraft,” he said.

That’s what Corns is seeing in his students. Many minor in UAS to complement majors like Video and Film Production or Concrete Industry Management.

“We are a discipline that can support many other disciplines to achieve their research and application goals,” he said.

UAS is highly experiential. Students spend increasingly more time in lab and then in the field—in this case MTSU’s 450-acre farm. Eventually

it’s all fieldwork, with students flying different models of drones and practicing skills like search and rescue, surveillance, and mapping and 3D missions.

For their capstone projects, students can go farther afield—anywhere in or even out of state, Corns said. Last April, a six-student team captured imagery in Cummins Falls State Park in Jackson County to support a search-and-recovery mission that had baffled authorities for over a year.

“We’ve mapped south of Shelbyville, railroad tracks and railroad bridges. We’ve been on Murfreesboro Airport and mapped roofs. We’ve done video—we’ve supported the production truck and broadcast video for ESPN+.”

Staying down on the farm has its appeal too.

Fuel for Flight

Study shows airport relocation will bring jobs and revenue to the region

The MTSU Aerospace campus at the Shelbyville Municipal Airport in Bedford County promises to generate tens of millions of dollars in revenue and hundreds of jobs for that community over the next three years, according to a recent economic impact study.

With more than $60 million in state funds for the project approved, MTSU is relocating its flight training program to the Shelbyville airport to provide a state-of-the-art training experience for students in its exploding Pro Pilot program, which is outgrowing its allocated footprint at Murfreesboro Municipal Airport.

The report by the Business and Economic Research Center (BERC), completed in March, evaluated the financial benefits that the project would bring to Shelbyville and Bedford County. Results of the study show:

• Jobs during construction: The construction phase will be responsible, directly and indirectly, for 164 jobs and more than $91 million in business revenue over three years. Land acquisition, site improvement, and construction spending will total $22.5 million over three years.

• Jobs during operation: The relocation of Aerospace operations will be responsible, directly and indirectly, for 257 jobs and nearly $14 million in business revenue annually.

• Additional tax revenue: MTSU Aerospace’s operation in Bedford County will generate nearly $140,000 in property tax and $536,989 in sales tax annually.

“Benefits cited in the report are the tip of iceberg: Relocating a training program, which is in the top 10 in the nation, will rebrand the county as one of the major centers for aviation training,” said Murat Arik, director of BERC. The center, part of the Jennings A. Jones College of Business, has been conducting business and economic research for public and private clients since the early 1970s.

The airport relocation study also showed that in the estimated three years required to prepare the airport site and begin construction, and as MTSU begins to ramp up operations, the activity would generate personal income of $37.8 million—direct, indirect, and induced.

“This research . . . gives us a preview of the transformational impacts of this partnership and gives clarity to the vision of the state, city, and county leaders who pursued this opportunity as a game-changer for our region.”

—Randy Weiler

Relocation

164 jobs

$91M business revenue

$22.5M construction spending

$37.8M personal income

Operation

257 jobs

$14M business revenue

$676K property and sales tax revenue

SPACE TO GROW

As the product of the University of North Dakota, Chaminda Prelis recognized the qualities of a top aerospace school.

When offered the position of MTSU Aerospace chair in 2021, he saw lots of reasons to accept: faculty like Wendy Beckman and Paul Craig involved with industry and research; success of the program’s students; and MTSU’s innovation in aerospace education—“where we have the greatest potential to leave our mark on the industry.”

Now Prelis (pictured above) is developing a 10-year plan to help the rapidly growing Aerospace Department meet the future needs of students and a constantly evolving industry.

In addition to significant human and capital investments, he and his veteran faculty are considering nonmonetary changes like expanding the curriculum—“making it more relevant for more people”—and offering more virtual classes, particularly in Aviation Management.

“Let’s say you’re a pilot or you’re an airport manager, and you’re already out there in industry, you wouldn’t have to come to MTSU to get that degree,” he said.

The Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) concentration, which is eight years old and still growing, also will gain a new lab in the former Air Traffic Control simulator space, since that certification program has been phased out and a smaller simulator is being added for a Flight Dispatch course.

Prelis also hopes to launch a doctorate program in education or

leadership within the next five years. That would make MTSU one of a select few American universities to offer an aerospace Ph.D., he said.

And even as Aerospace expands its geographic footprint 21 miles to Shelbyville soon, Prelis is looking another 60 miles down the road to Huntsville, Alabama, potential site of the U.S. Air Force Space Command.

“At some point I would like to have conversations with the space side of things, as well,” he said. “I think between Huntsville and Nashville there’s plans for an aerospace and space corridor.”

When you’re plotting the course for Aerospace—an 80-year-old department that’s doubled its enrollment in the past eight years— it makes sense to take the long view.

A look at recent awards, events, and accomplishments at MTSU

compiled by Gina E. Fann, Jimmy Hart, Gina K. Logue, Drew Ruble, Stephanie Wagner, and Randy Weiler

Backing the True Blue

MTSU’s spring 2023 graduation ceremonies celebrated an estimated 2,656 new alumni as they received their degrees, a figure that included 2,256 undergraduates, 345 master’s degree recipients, 36 education-specialist degree recipients, and 19 doctoral recipients, along with 20 graduate students who received certificates for their advanced study. The University also honored five Metro Nashville Police officers at an MTSU Commencement ceremony on May 5 for their “precision, duty, and selflessness” in response to the recent deadly Covenant School shootings. Detective Ryan Cagle, detective Zachary Plese, Sgt. Jeffrey Mathes, detective Michael Collazo (pictured l–r), and officer Rex Engelbert were named honorary professors of Public Safety during the second of MTSU’s four spring Commencement ceremonies. MTSU has now awarded more than 180,700 degrees, including associate, bachelor’s, master’s, educational specialist, and doctoral degrees, since its 1911 founding.

Taking the Lead

Sophomore Michai Mosby is MTSU’s next Student Government Association president—one of the youngest SGA presidents ever elected on the Blue Raider campus. Mosby, who is pursuing a degree in Public Relations and Political Science, took the reins at the annual SGA Awards Banquet on April 24. A Memphis native, Mosby said he began his journey in student leadership at Southwind High School in Memphis, where he served as class president.

In Uniform

The Nashville Sounds baseball club hosted an online auction in May of game-used Military Appreciation Jerseys to benefit the Charlie and Hazel Daniels Veterans and Military Family Center at MTSU—the largest and most comprehensive veterans center on any public higher education campus in the state.

A Capitol Affair

For 10 MTSU undergraduate students and researchers, Feb. 15 marked not just another opportunity to present their STEM-based research projects, but also a chance to show off their work to state officials and peers and rub elbows with Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee at the annual Posters at the Capitol event. The MTSU cohort joined 41 other undergraduates from public universities across the state at the Cordell Hull Building to participate in the event, put on by MTSU’s Tennessee STEM Education Center, that also included personal meetings with state representatives, lunch, and a short address from the governor. Photo by Theresa Montgomery/Office of Gov. Bill Lee

Good as Gold

MTSU Honors student Elizabeth Kowalczyk was named a 2023 Goldwater Scholar. She is one of only eight students from Tennessee institutions to receive the award this year. The prestigious Goldwater Scholarship is the premier undergraduate scholarship in mathematics, natural sciences, and engineering in the U.S. A Forensic Science major, Kowalczyk was among more than 400 college students selected from more than 5,000 applicants to receive the Barry M. Goldwater Scholarship this year. The award provides funding for up to $7,500 per year to cover the cost of tuition after other scholarships.

The Bright Side

MTSU is home to yet another Fulbright Scholar. Political Science major Victoria Grigsby received one of the most competitive overseas fellowships in the country—the Fulbright Summer Institute in Wales, in the United Kingdom. Grigsby, who is from Taft, received the honor as a freshman. The purpose of the Fulbright is to increase mutual understanding between U.S. citizens and those from other countries through the exchange of people, knowledge, and skills.

Murphy Magic

The MTSU community came together last fall to host “The Judds: Love Is Alive—The Final Concert” featuring Wynonna Judd. More recently, the Blue Raider community was able to watch the finished product of its hard work and collaboration with the release of the concert TV special April 29 on CMT. The live made-for-TV event at MTSU’s historic Murphy Center last Nov. 3 involved faculty, alumni, and more than 50 student workers from the College of Media and Entertainment as well as a group of 45 choral students from the College of Liberal Arts who accompanied Wynonna for the concert finale. Media and Entertainment students worked on everything from production and preparation to media coverage and performance for the live red-carpet broadcast, concert, and CMT TV special.

Roots Revival

MTSU and the State Collaborative on Reforming Education (SCORE) joined forces for an innovative program to recruit prospective teachers from school districts within high-needs, rural areas of the state, train them at MTSU’s College of Education, and return them to teach in their local communities. MTSU and SCORE officials signed an agreement May 8 to help launch the Tennessee Teach Back Initiative (TTBI), with SCORE initially committing to over $90,000 the first year, with subsequent awards upon successful outcomes over a three-year period. Tracy Frist, educator, writer, and wife of former U.S. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, is among the inaugural nine-member TTBI Advisory Council and serves as chair.

Taking the Helms

Neporcha Cone (l) is the new dean of MTSU’s College of Education and Joyce Heames (r) is the new dean of the Jennings A. Jones College of Business following national searches. Originally from Miami, Cone takes the helm of the college that represents the University’s founding as a teacher training institution. Having begun her career as a middle school science teacher, she comes to MTSU from Kennesaw State University in Georgia, where she was a professor of Science Education. Heames, a Management professor, was most recently dean of the Campbell School of Business at Berry College, a small private liberal arts institution near Rome, Georgia. Prior to that, Heames was an associate dean of innovation, outreach, and engagement at West Virginia University, a large public university with a student population similar to MTSU’s.

Dancin’ Again

Not Horsing Around

MTSU’s equestrian team took home the 2023 Western National Championship trophy at the 2023 Intercollegiate Horse Shows Association event in Lexington, Kentucky. In a down-to-the-wire finish, MTSU won by a single point after MTSU’s Jordan Martin placed second overall in Team Open Horsemanship. Martin also took top honors in Back on Track Reserve Highpoint Western Ride, and Sadio Barnes was national champion in Team Beginner Western Horsemanship.

The MTSU women’s basketball team reached the NCAA Tournament for the second time in three seasons, dominating the Conference USA field for both the 2023 regular-season and tournament championships. Marking their 20th appearance in the NCAA’s “Big Dance,” the Lady Raiders (28-5) ended the season ranked No. 21 nationally in the AP poll. Coach Rick Insell’s team defeated longtime rival Western Kentucky 82-70 to claim its 17th conference tournament title before falling to Colorado in the NCAA first round at Duke University’s legendary Cameron Indoor Stadium.

A Distinguished Visit

One of the Army Reserve’s newest commanding generals, Maj. Gen. Bob D. Harter, picked MTSU for his first visit to a higher education institution since assuming his new duties. Harter, commanding general of the 81st Readiness Division at Fort Jackson, South Carolina, toured MTSU’s Army ROTC detachment and the Charlie and Hazel Daniels Veterans and Military Family Center on Feb. 15. He also shared mentoring advice with MTSU ROTC cadets.

A High Honor

Grammy U

MTSU returned to the Grammy Awards in February, with a contingent from the College of Media and Entertainment traveling to Los Angeles for a long weekend of gathering with area alumni and attending backstage and pre-show events. President Sidney A. McPhee joined students and faculty on the red carpet at the exclusive MusiCares event honoring Motown founder Berry Gordy and Grammy-winning musical giant Smokey Robinson on Friday, Feb. 3. Students worked behind the scenes at the Los Angeles Convention Center at the event, the Grammy’s black-tie fundraiser for its charity that provides health and human services for music professionals. Later Friday evening, McPhee and Provost Mark Byrnes hosted a reception in Santa Monica for MTSU’s Southern California alumni. MTSU also hosted an event in Los Angeles on Saturday, Feb. 4, for its Grammy nominees. Five former MTSU students were nominated in the 65th annual Grammy Awards, and two won. MTSU alumni, former or current students, and faculty from across the University have been a part of more than 134 Grammy Award nominations in the last two decades. The number of MTSU-connected Grammy winners since 2001 currently stands at 15 people with a total of 39 Grammys, including 10 repeat recipients, in categories from classical to pop to rock to country to gospel.

Chandra Russell Story, a Health and Human Performance professor, a licensed minister at First Baptist Church, and an accomplished scholar in the field of public health, was honored for her years of teaching, research, and service as the 2023 recipient of the John Pleas Faculty Recognition Award. Named in honor of acclaimed Psychology Professor Emeritus John Pleas, the award is the highest honor for Black faculty on the MTSU campus and for the first time this year included $3,000 cash award. Story, who is the 2022–23 MTSU Provost’s Fellow for Faculty Development, is also a member of MTSU’s University Honors College faculty and the Women’s and Gender Studies program faculty.

United We Stand

Hosted by the MTSU Office of Intercultural and Diversity Affairs, the 2023 Unity Luncheon featured special award presentations to the following honorees and their respective categories as chosen by the University’s Black History Month Committee: Vanessa Alderson (Contribution to Black Arts); recently retired MTSU professor Marva Lucas (Education); Michael McDonald (Advocate of Civility); Joe and Sybil Rich (Community Service); Stacy Windrow (Excellence in Sports); and Christopher Rochelle (Unsung Staff Award).

Tip of the Cap

With a theme this year of “Make a Difference,” MTSU’s 2022–23 Employee Charitable Giving Campaign did just that, with a record-setting amount of almost $145,000 pledged, beating the $142,500 campaign goal. The 830 faculty and staff members who participated pledged a total of $144,906. MTSU’s annual Charitable Giving Campaign is led by a committee of faculty and staff volunteers to rally financial support for worthy causes. The campaign is fueled largely by monthly payroll deductions from employees over the next year, but also allows one-time, lump-sum gifts at the donors’ discretion. Meanwhile, in what has become a tradition, the Jennings A. Jones College of Business extended its streak to 10 straight years of winning the Provost’s Cup, a friendly competition between academic units that is awarded to the college with the highest percentage of employee participation.

Leveling Up

MTSU faculty members Helen Binkley and Kristi Phillips were committed to transitioning their high-quality undergraduate program in Athletic Training to a master’s when new industry accreditation requirements loomed. To make the transition happen, Binkley, who is program director, wrote a program proposal and worked with Sonya Sanderson, then-chair in the Department of Health and Human Performance, to get approval from the University administration and file paperwork with the state and athletic training education accrediting body for the University’s new Master of Science in Athletic Training.

true true BLUE BLUE Thank you Thank you

2023

Thank you to those who gave generously in the 6th Annual true Blue Give!

Thanks to 855 True Blue supporters, we raised $679,560 in gifts—far surpassing the $650,000 goal. Scholarships, student emergency funds, athletics, academic departments, and countless other campus activities and programs received support that will empower students’ success.

You make MTSU a finer institution day after day, year after year.

Sidney A. McPhee, President

1970s

Fred Allen (’76), Little Rock, Arkansas, was inducted into the Arkansas Sports Hall of Fame in April. He played basketball with the Blue Raiders (1974–76).

Walter Chitwood (’78), Murfreesboro, was awarded the title of Fellow of the Academy for Sports Dentistry—the first dentist to have this designation in Tennessee. Chitwood has been very involved with MTSU athletics since 1985, providing dental services to studentathletes in all sports. He is currently involved at MTSU with a 10-year mouthguard study, evaluating effects of concussion prevention, airway improvement, and balance enhancement.

Keel Hunt (’71), Nashville, had his fourth book, a biography of the late U.S. 6th Circuit Judge Gilbert S. Merritt of Nashville, published in January. The title is A Sense of Justice: Judge Gilbert S. Merritt and His Times

1980s

Alan S. Frazier (’82), Grand Forks, North Dakota, returned to his roots as a public safety medevac pilot with Altru Care Flight after 30 years in law enforcement, 11 years as an associate professor at

the University of North Dakota, and two years as a senior fellow at Georgetown University.

Paul Ladd (’87), Nashville, was a three-time winner at the 2022 Music City Gold Pen Awards, sponsored by the Nashville chapter of the International Association of Business Communicators. He also received the IABC Nashville Hall of Fame award, the chapter’s highest individual honor for individual and professional achievement, earlier in the year. Ladd is senior correspondent for World Christian Broadcasting and has been with WCB since 2005.

1990s

Jeffrey Ballard (’93), Brentwood, was promoted to president of Delta Dental of Tennessee. He joined Delta Dental as chief financial officer in 2015.

Brian Byrd (’91, ’96), Milton, was named CEO of Roscoe Brown Inc. heating, cooling, and plumbing company. Byrd has extensive financial, accounting, and managerial experience with several significant middle Tennessee employers, including a 13-year tenure with Gaylord Entertainment Company.

The University of North Carolina Board of Governors named Crabtree (’72), a veteran broadcast journalist, as CEO of PBS North Carolina, serving the third-largest public media market in the United States. Crabtree previously enjoyed a distinguished career at WRAL from 1994 to 2022. An anchor and reporter, he received numerous awards, including 16 Emmy Awards, an Edward R. Murrow Regional Award, and the duPont and Gabriel awards.

David Crabtree

Kip Crowder (’93), Glasgow, Kentucky, band director for Barren County High School in Kentucky, was selected for induction into the MTSU Band of Blue Hall of Fame.

Kevin Eady (’95, ’09), Columbia, was named principal of Mount Pleasant Middle School of the Visual and Performing Arts. Formerly he served as principal at Columbia Central High School.

Martina Suttle Harris (’92), Chattanooga, was appointed dean of the Nursing and Allied Health Division at Chattanooga State Community College. She has more than 21 years of higher education experience in both the classroom and the clinical setting. Prior to this appointment, she served as the assistant dean of the Nursing and Allied Health Division.

David Keylon (’95), Cleveland, is the mechatronics instructor at the Partnerships in Industry and Education (PIE) Innovation Center. PIE is a regional educational facility addressing the growing need to better prepare students for postsecondary careers and workforce opportunities.

Scott Langford (’95), Goodlettsville, was named director of schools by the Sumner County Board of Education. A Sumner County native, Langford has steadily worked his way up in the Sumner County school district since 2009, when he was hired to teach

Beth Geer

Geer (’87) serves on the board of the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA). Geer previously worked as chief of staff to former Vice President Al Gore. She has extensive policy experience in climate change and environmental justice, having previously served in roles in the Clinton-Gore White House, the U.S. Department of Labor, and the U.S. Senate. Her TVA term extends to 2026.

Andre Dyer

Dyer (’91), Atlanta, was named managing director, talent acquisition diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) strategy and programs leader at Deloitte Services LP, where he now leads the DEI talent strategy in the U.S. Dyer boasts more than 20 years of experience in human resources, talent acquisition, and DEI. During his time at MTSU, Dyer was a part of the 1989 OVC championship football team.

English at White House

High School.

Tracy Graham-McGlocklin (’91) , Columbia, was promoted to general manager of The Mulehouse, a 55,500-square-foot, state-of-the-art music and specialty event venue in Columbia. McGlocklin joined The Mulehouse

in 2021 as the head of business development. Prior to that, she was vice president of sales and marketing for Advent, where she oversaw projects for the Kansas City Chiefs, Dallas Cowboys, University of Minnesota, and University of Pittsburgh. In 2001 she started Mission

Management, and for the next 13 years represented some of Nashville’s best music artists, such as Little Big Town, Marty Stuart, Darryl Worley, Shelly Fairchild, and Danny Gokey. The previous decade she honed her music industry chops in Sony Music Nashville’s sales and marketing division.

Karen Petersen

Petersen (’98) was named the 13th president of Hendrix College in Conway, Arkansas. A native of northwest Arkansas, Petersen previously served as dean of the Henry Kendall College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Tulsa. Before that, Petersen worked at MTSU for nearly 16 years, culminating with her tenure as dean of the College of Liberal Arts.

Matt Jernigan

Ascend Federal Credit Union, the largest credit union in middle Tennessee, announced Jernigan (’01) will assume CEO duties. Ascend has more than $3.8 billion in assets, 27 branches, and more than 255,000 members. Jernigan has been a key part of the Ascend executive leadership team since he was hired in 2005.

Marcus Brandon

Brandon (’07) has a recurring role on the hit series Mayor of Kingstown as Dedrick, the intimidating, deadly leader of the Bloods and rival to lead character Bunny. The show is from Academy Award nominee Taylor Sheridan, co-creator of Yellowstone. The series airs Sundays on Paramount Plus. Brandon earned his bachelor's at MTSU with a focus on computer engineering technology and played linebacker on the football team. He resides in Brooklyn and has upcoming roles in Poker Face on Peacock, Three Women on Showtime, and an indie film project that will be shooting in the Philippines.

Sam Powers (’93), Nashville, was promoted to the position of partner at Nashville-based business and consulting firm O’Neil Hagaman. Powers, who previously served as a principal at the company, will continue as co-head of O’Neil Hagaman’s intellectual property (IP) group. He oversees all aspects of the company’s IP operations, including the purchase and sale of publishing, overseeing the administration of active artist-owned labels, related contract review, and consulting with music entrepreneurs.

Lacy Privette (’97), Arrington, was appointed Southeast regional sales manager for Casio America, responsible for promoting and directing sales efforts for the company’s award-winning electrical musical instruments in the Southeast. Privette began his career as a manager of the Keyboard/Technology Department at Sam’s Music in Brentwood and joined Yamaha in 2000 as a district manager for the company’s Pro Audio and Combo Division. In 2012, he was named Eastern U.S. sales manager for Yamaha subsidiary Steinberg North America, where he climbed the ranks to become national sales manager, director of recording, and ultimately national sales manager, recording/Steinberg/pro audio in 2017.

2000

Jason Alexander (’04), Franklin, was promoted to senior vice president of agricultural lending for Tennessee at Farm Credit Mid-America.

Julie Basler (’01), Lone Tree, Colorado, president of the School of Nursing at Pratt College, was chosen as one of the “Top 20 People Changing Career Education” in December 2022 by the Career Education Review. Basler champions mental health and well-being efforts for students, faculty and staff, and campus leaders.

Lauren Branson (’05), Franklin, joined River House Artists as vice president of publicity, following eight

Johnny Zvolensky

Zvolensky (’00), who works at Digital Audio Post studio in the audio post-production arena, mixed “The Judds: Love Is Alive—The Final Concert” television special that aired April 29 on CMT. The MTSU community came together last fall to host the made-for-TV event featuring Wynonna Judd at Murphy Center. Zvolensky also continues to work as a freelance audio engineer and previously served as a music producer and songwriter.

years at BMI as the senior director of media relations.

Brittany Cannon (’00), Cleveland, assumed the role of director of the Partnerships in Industry and Education (PIE) Innovation Center, a regional educational facility addressing the growing need to better prepare students for postsecondary careers and workforce opportunities.

Chip Carlton (’09), Riverview, Florida, joined Westcor Land Title Insurance as an agency representative in the Tampa Bay area. Brandi Crowell (’09, ’11), Unionville, transitioned from controller to chief financial

officer for Roscoe Brown Inc. heating, cooling, and plumbing company. She previously served as a certified public accountant at Dempsey Vantrease and Follis for five years.

Eric Crump (’05), Bartow, Florida, was named the new executive director of the Aerospace Center for Excellence (ACE), a 14-building aerospace STEM facility anchored by the Florida Air Museum and the Central Florida Aerospace Academy, a Polk County Public Schools Career Academy. Crump is credited with opening the Polk State College Aerospace program in 2012 and served as director since its launch.

Josh Kendall (’01), Leba non, was appointed chief operating officer of Unemployment Trackers, a full-service unemployment cost control provider.

Bryce Phillips (’05), Germantown, joined the United States Attorney’s Office for the Western District of Tennessee, assigned to the office’s Organized Crime and Narcotics Unit. He formerly served the office from the Shelby County District Attorney General’s Office, where he worked as a prosecutor for more than a decade.

Anna Powers (’08), Murfreesboro, was recently promoted to vice president of clinicals at HealthRev

Andy and Jan (Crouch) Marshall

When Jones College of Business graduates Andy (’84) and Jan (Crouch) Marshall (’84) bought a little 1950s-era grocery in Leiper’s Fork in 1998, they inherited its 12-inch griddle and early-morning regulars: farmers and truckers and travelers craving a quick sausage biscuit to start the day. When they added a lunch menu, your basic meat-and-three, the couple had pushed the griddle to its limits. Convinced that a smoker in the parking lot where local folks could see and smell chicken, ribs, or pork cooking would change the game, they took the $8,000 plunge. Turns out they were right about the smoker. As they expanded Puckett’s menu to include breakfast, lunch, and dinner—and later added a stage and live music—they created more than just a restaurant and venue. They created community. The couple eventually chose nearby Franklin for a second location—and later expanded to downtown Nashville. There are now six Puckett’s in middle and east Tennessee, including one in downtown Murfreesboro. The success of the franchise has financed the launch of more A. Marshall Hospitality restaurant brands in Nashville and Franklin—Scout’s Pub, Deacon’s New South, Americana Taphouse, and Burger Dandy—as well as a food truck, Puckett’s Trolley. The holding company now has more than 400 employees.

Abigail Kwarteng

Recent master’s graduate Kwarteng (’23) has her sights set on her next dream—to represent her native Ghana in the high jump in next year’s Summer Olympics in Paris. Kwarteng, who was awarded her Master of Public Health degree at MTSU’s Spring 2023 Commencement in Murphy Center, ended last year as the No. 2 NCAA Division I high jumper and the 26th-ranked high jumper in the world. Kwarteng, whose parents are farmers, is the first person in her family to achieve a college degree.

Partners, headquartered in Ozark, Missouri. Powers has more than a decade of experience serving local communities in the field of home health leadership. In her current executive role, she oversees a team of industry experts with a focus on revenue cycle management, as well as Medicare compliance and documentation accuracy to improve home care operations and ultimately the lives of the patients they serve.

Mat Leffler-Schulman (’00), Baltimore, is a mastering engineer for Mobtown Studios. He has been working with clients like Jon Batiste, Beach House, Blondie, Future Islands, Jackson Dean, Ice Cube, Lower Dens, Dan Deacon,

Will.i.am, and the National Symphony Orchestra.

Kevin Spann (’05), Knoxville, is co-owner, aircraft maintenance manager, mechanic, and pilot for Flight Choice, Knoxville’s only aircraft charter service. He also advises individuals and companies when purchasing airplanes. Additionally, Spann is a pilot for Functional Pathways.

2010s

Jake Anderson (’13), Paris, is offensive coordinator for the Henry County High School football team.

Sarah-Taylor Argo Anderson (’13), Paris, teaches seventh grade math and is cheerleading coach at Inman Middle School. She is also director

LEAVE A LEGACY AT MTSU

Honoring MTSU’s founding year, the 1911 Society celebrates those individuals and families who, through their estate plans, have created planned gifts benefiting the University.

of the Miss Paris Tennessee Volunteer system.

Evan Braswell (’16), Cordova, joined the Overton Park Shell staff as operation manager. Before coming on board with the Shell, he was conference center coordinator for the Butler Snow law firm.

Joshua Bugg (’13), Murfreesboro, was named head coach of the Riverdale High School girls basketball team. He spent the past season as an assistant at Tullahoma and was an assistant at Hillsboro in 2021–22 after being the coach at Columbia during 2017–21. Prior to that he was an assistant coach at Independence.

Zach Campbell (’10), Lebanon, joined Cempa

Community Care as a nurse practitioner.

Michael Cottone (’10), Fairview, was elected as a partner with Waller Lansden Dortch & Davis LLP. Cottone assists clients across industries with a variety of litigation, state and local tax, and unclaimed property matters. Prior to joining Waller, he served as a law clerk for 6th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals Judge Eugene E. Siler and for U.S. District Court Judge J. Daniel Breen of Tennessee’s Western District.

Darrius Dixon (’17), Knoxville, joined Lewis Thomason as an associate attorney in the firm’s Knoxville office.

New 1911 Society Members for 2023

Dr. Janet Belsky

Dr. Scott H. Colclough

Fulton Cook

Dr. Donald Gabard

Brian Gruber

Rebecca A. Harrison

Paula L. Martens

Linda G. Nave

Carolyn and John Neighbors

President McPhee presents 1911 Society new inductees

Elaine and Rick Warwick with a print of Kirksey Old Main.

Joseph A. Olmstead and Teresa Santiago

Dr. Shirley Powell

Carol Rhea

Daniel J. Smith

Kenneth Steverson

Peggy Tomlinson

Elaine and Rick Warwick

Michael W. White

Marshall Ellson (’14), Owens Cross Roads, Alabama, director of learning services at Westminster Christian Academy, was named one of 12 nationwide recipients of the Herzog Foundation Christian Teacher of the Year award for embodying excellence in Christian education.

Amy Galloway (’15), Surgoinsville, joined Holston Medical Group as a family nurse practitioner at the Sleep Centers in Kingsport and Bristol. Galloway previously provided care at HMG Urgent Care centers since 2015.

Zane Gibson (’14, ’16), Chattanooga, was named head men’s basketball coach at the University of Arkansas–Fort Smith. Gibson returns to UAFS after five seasons at the University of Texas–Permian Basin and Western New Mexico.

Heather Mathis McClarty (’11), Old Hickory, is the new co-host/producer of Talk of the Town. Mathis has been a meteorologist for NewsChannel 5 for the past five years.

Colton McGee (’10), Brentwood, joined Concord Label Group as senior vice president of business and legal affairs for Concord’s recorded music division, supporting the continued growth of the Concord Label Group and Craft Recordings through new artist signings, acquisitions,

Marcus Byrd

A former MTSU golf standout , Byrd (non-degreed alum) played in several PGA tournaments earlier this year, most notably the 2023 Genesis Invitational in February at Riviera Country Club. That PGA Tour event’s host (and Byrd’s hero) Tiger Woods invited Byrd—as the Charlie Sifford Memorial Exemption—to play in the event. The exemption honors golfing great Charlie Sifford and reflects the progress made toward promoting diversity in golf. Byrd made his PGA Tour debut at the 2022 Corales Puntacana Championship. He led the Blue Raiders to back-to-back conference championships in 2018 and 2019 and was named the 2019 Conference USA Golfer of the Year.

Carlos Lopez

Lopez (’13), a native Venezuelan, former football kicker at MTSU, and current Spanish teacher at Alcoa High School, started doing play-by-play calls in Spanish for the Tennessee Vols football team on Twitter. Calling himself Juan Ward (after legendary UT announcer John Ward), Lopez has attracted national notoriety. Power Five schools are now calling and asking him to do voiceover highlights in Spanish. Lopez previously played professional football in the Arena Football League for the Tampa Bay Storm.

Stephen B. Smith

Stephen B. Smith (’11), chair of the MTSU Board of Trustees, former Blue Raiders pitcher, and championship walking horse rider and breeder, was elected to the Tennessee Sports Hall of Fame as part of the 2023 class. Smith spent time as a scout with the St. Louis Cardinals, was an original partner and board member of the Nashville Sounds, and is a board member of Music City Baseball, an organization dedicated to bringing major league baseball to Nashville. Smith led the effort to construct the first lighted college baseball stadium in Tennessee—the current 3,000seat MTSU stadium—and MTSU’s new baseball clubhouse, which is named in his honor.

Logan Kilgore

The Denver Broncos hired Kilgore (’12, ’13), a former Blue Raider quarterback, as a quality control coach. Kilgore most recently worked as prep phenom Arch Manning’s offensive coordinator at the Isidore Newman School in New Orleans. Kilgore previously spent time with the New Orleans Saints in 2014, then played four seasons in the Canadian Football League.

Tyler Ballengee, Aaron Bedenbaugh, and Brian Vigouroux

These three College of Media and Entertainment graduates now work together at ESPN. Pictured from left to right are Ballengee (’22), audio operator I; Bedenbaugh (’97), lead technical director; and Vigouroux (’18), audio operator I.

and management of historical rights. McGee previously spent 13 years at BBR Music Group in Nashville and was central in BBR’s acquisition by BMG in 2017. Following that transaction, McGee handled business and legal affairs for both BBR Music Group and BMG.

Mike Spence (’10), Chattanooga, an Army veteran with combat tour experience (2014–15), has worked as a software engineer at Dell Technologies since 2015.

Kristy Yentes (’12), Estero, Florida, joined Physicians’ Primary Care of Southwest Florida as a family nurse practitioner.

2020s

Millicent Rooker (’22), Columbia, recently joined Maury Regional Medical Group Primary Care in Spring Hill.

Jaren Watts (’22), Viola, joined the Nashville Predators as a sales associate.

MTSUNEWS.COM

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Stay up to date all year round

Showcasing Success

MTSU and alumna Tracey Rogers, WKRN vice president/general manager, announced a partnership for Nashville’s ABC affiliate to showcase the success of students and graduates from MTSU Online programs and the College of Education. In May and June, Local on 2 interviewed students who reached their educational goals through MTSU Online. This fall, the College of Education will join the station’s “Take a Titan 2 School” feature.

mtsunews.com/wkrn-news-2partnership-2023

Building a Résumé

Computer Science and Data Science students were not only creating games and dabbling with virtual reality and artificial intelligence at this year’s HackMT, but also networking and establishing relationships with (hopefully) potential employers. Joined by industry representatives, students on 10 teams spent 36 nonstop hours creating apps and more during the January event. HackMT receives support from industry partners, led by Asurion and Amazon.

mtsunews.com/mtsu-hackmtwrapup-2023

A Scholar’s Scholar

A my Aldridge Sanford, vice provost for academic programs, is the recipient of the Jack Kay Award for Community Engagement and Applied Communication Scholarship—a major regional honor from the 13-state Central States Communication Association. The award recognizes communication scholars who have achieved notable success in applying their work to confront issues of social injustice, inequality, intolerance, and prejudice.

mtsunews.com/scholar-activist-earnsregional-honor

Tech Titan

Sam Zaza, assistant professor in the Department of Information Systems and Analytics of MTSU’s Jones College of Business, recently received a prestigious Greater Nashville Technology Council Award as Diversity and Inclusion Advocate of the Year. Zaza said she emphasizes the importance of attracting underrepresented populations early toward pursuing degrees in technology fields.

mtsunews.com/zaza-ntc-award-diversity-inclusion-advocacy

Research Behind Bars

The highest quality research on prison education and workforce programs shows a positive impact on recidivism rates, earnings, and employment opportunities for participants, according to a report by MTSU professors

Steven Sprick Schuster and Ben Stickle (working with MTSU’s Political Economy Research Institute). The Mackinac Center for Public Policy released a summary of this journal-accepted research—the largest meta-analysis on the topic to date.

mtsunews.com/sprick-schusterstickle-prison-education-research

Expert in Her Field

Marie Patterson, director of MTSU’s Physician Assistant Studies program, which launched in 2022, was named Physician Assistant of the Year by the Tennessee Academy of Physician Assistants. Patterson, a former clinician who for many years staffed MTSU’s student health center, moved into academia in 2017, helping establish Lipscomb University’s PA program. The MTSU program leads to an M.S. in Physician Assistant Studies.

mtsunews.com/patterson-namedphysician-assistant-of-the-year

1940s

Oma Wilson McNabb (’45, ’62, ’75)

1950s

Ann Stribling Alley (’57, ’58)

Frank Bale (’57)

Hutton Smith Brandon (’55)

Ernest Brothers Jr. (’59)

James Bruce (’59)

Betty Brown Tipps Crabtree (’50)

Luckett Davis (’55)

Craig Fox (’55)

Ulric Henegar (’55)

Angie “Lorene” Craddock Hill (’57, ’63)

Randall Kennedy (’58)

George Lahde (’59)

Howard “Glenn” Lawson (’52)

Dorothy Leavitt (’52)

Jeanene Merrell (’51)

Marian Penuel Penrod (’52)

Robert Tipps Sr. (’52)

John Todd (’51)

Robert “Bobby” Vance (’54)

Hershel Wall (’57)

Jerry Wauford (’59)

1960s

Susan Biggs (’69, ’86)

Karl Bren (’67)

Jerry Wayne “Coach” Broadbent (’66, ’68)

Geneva Brookman (’62, ’72)

Mavis Cameron (’65)

William Coleman (’68)

Harold Duff (’60, ’65)

Margaret Eakin (’60)

Carl Fussell (’62)

John Lawton Hager (’69)

Allen Hall (’63)

David Kirk (’66)

Dorris Taylor Lentz (’69)

Gaylon Parton (’68)

John Perry (’68)

Webster Pickard Jr. (’61)

Walter Ragsdale II (’69)

Patsy Tucker Reeder (’67)

Ronald Rowlett (’68)

Richard Saad (’65)

J. Tom Sawyer Sr. (’60)

Yvonne “Bonnie” Slatton (’60)

Lynwood Smith (’64)

Christine Strong (’60, ’81)

Dixie Jackson Waggoner (’67)

1970s

Frank Adkins (’70)

Donald Alderson Jr. (’71)

John W. Alexander (’71)

Edward Balinger (’76)

Clifton Beckwith (’74)

Jimmie Bell (’70)

Olivia “Libby” McClain Benderman (’74, ’79)

Linda Bogle (’72)

John Bramblett (’71, ’74, ’77)

Barbara Cobble (’76)

Sherry Corbin (’73)

Stephen Duke (’71)

Brenda Gibson (’71, ’78)

Edward Greenwood (’76)

Billy Groce (’71)

Charles Hartmann II (’76)

Elizabeth Hicks (’77)

Henry Isenberg Jr. (’78)

James Murry Johnson (’78)

James Jones (’73, ’82)

Gary Loyd (’72)

Patricia Sparkman Martin (’73, ’76)

James “Jim Ed” McKnight (’74)

Glenda Mitchell (’78)

Jimmy Moss (’78)

Susan Gardner Mullinax (’77)

Johnie Payton (’71)

Mimi Pollock (’75)

Gregory Polman (’78)

Orville “Buddy” Reed Jr. (’72)

Marcus Rinks (’74)

Kenneth Roark (’73)

Diana Blackwell Robinson (’78)

Richard Rose (’72)

Patrick Sanders (’71)

Kelly Matthew Sharbel Jr. (’70)

Willie “Hawk” Shaw (’75)

Barbara Sisk Shelton (’70)

Stephen Stewart (’73)

Linda Wallheiser Thompson (’73)

Danny Todd (’77)

Robert “Bob” Turman (’74)

Barry Wagner (’76)

Lenita Wilson (’76)

Constance Jordan Wilson (’73)

1980s

Tara Cannon (’88)

Barry Chandler (’87)

Thomas Gad (’88, ’90)

Paula Holt Gardner (’84)

Dana Garrard (’87)

Dorothy Curry Grimmitt (’89)

Gregory Lane (’89)

Jody Rivers (’85)

Charles “Chuck” Stinson (’85)

Gwendolyn Hale White (’88)

Harry “Hal” Williams Jr. (’83)

Candace Farmer Wilson (’87, ’93)

1990s

Robert Beverly (’98)

Donald Geddes (’99, ’01)

Angela Cairo Ford (’93)

Alex Jenkins Jr. (’92)

James Mitchell Jr. (’98)

James Parker (’94)

David Phillips (’90)

Carla Richards (’95, ’97)

Stephen Williams (’99, ’01, ’02)

2000s

Carey Bush (’00)

Joel Johnson (’00)

Derrick Waggoner (’06)

2010s

Emily Hardin (’18)

Victor Huey (’12)

Anita Plumley (’10)

Preonda Simpson (’14)

2020s

Brandon Mayo (’20)

Joey Jacobs

Joey Jacobs (’75), who served as a founding member of MTSU’s Board of Trustees and chaired its Finance and Personnel Committee, died Jan. 14 at age 69. He was a nationally recognized business leader with a career that spanned almost 50 years in the health care industry. He was among the leaders of the Build Blue campaign, an ambitious effort announced in late 2021 to improve and modernize the University’s athletics facilities. Jacobs was honored in 2013 with MTSU’s Jennings A. Jones Champion of Free Enterprise Award in recognition of his tenure as chairman and CEO of the nationally traded Psychiatric Solutions Inc. He also served in various executive roles at HCA Healthcare, Quorum Health Corp., and Cumberland Pharmaceuticals. Additionally, Jacobs established the Joey A. Jacobs Chair of Excellence in Accounting in Jones College, which provides a national and international presence for MTSU in the field of accounting.

D. Madison “Matt” Riley

Former Blue Raider offensive lineman D. Madison “Matt” Riley (’88), who spent nearly 40 years as a studentathlete and athletic department staff member at MTSU, died June 1 at age 58. A member of the football team in 1984 and ’85, Riley played for Coach Boots Donnelly’s 11-0 Ohio Valley Conference championship squad in 1985. The Strawberry Plains native served as MTSU assistant strength coach in 1988, returned in 1993 as a strength coach, and was elevated to associate athletic director of strength and conditioning in 2007. After 11 years in that role, Riley transitioned to a position in the MT Varsity Club and Blue Raiders Hall of Fame. Memorials may be made to MTSU Foundation c/o Matt Riley Memorial Foundation, MTSU Box 109, Murfreesboro, TN 37132, or to the Jefferson County High School Sideline Club.

01 Milani Amira Sarai Harris

born July 26, 2022

to Monet Antoinette Henderson (’22) and Ca’Mari Akiva Harris (’25) of Murfreesboro

02 Preston Allen Ford

born Aug. 21, 2022

to Ryan (’13) and Katie Ramsey Ford (’13) of Knoxville

03 Vivian Jean Robbins

born Aug. 21, 2022

to Joshua Michael (’08) and Amanda Consiglio Robbins (’08, ’10) of Mount Juliet

04 Lincoln Atlas Wilburn

born Oct. 24, 2022

to Ethan (’13) and Lindsay Williams Wilburn (’11) of Shelbyville

05 Mitchell “Mitch” Alexander Tracy

born Oct. 25, 2022

to Connor (’13) and Gracie Reynolds Tracy of Knoxville

06 Theo Justin Anderson

born Dec. 13, 2022

to Michael (’09) and Alyse Avery Anderson (’13) of Chattanooga

07 Aspen Anne Tucker

born Jan. 5, 2023

to Gary (’10) and Melissa Weiland Tucker (’06, ’14) of Rockvale

08 John Canongate “Canon” Waterman

born Jan. 19, 2023

to Doug and Jessica Campbell Waterman (’03) of Franklin

09 Laurel Claire Hardy

born Feb. 8, 2023

to Chad (’11) and Heather Hardy of Brownsville

Built Blue

Titans star Kevin Byard gives back to next generation of Blue Raiders

Pro football player Kevin Byard has made an impact on and off the field as an MTSU alumnus. Now he’s paying it forward even further by investing in the future of Blue Raider student-athletes.

Byard, a Pro Bowl and All-Pro safety after being drafted by the neighboring Tennessee Titans in 2016, made a significant gift to the Build Blue campaign earlier this year. The gift, along with his accomplishments, gives him naming rights to the strength and conditioning center in the new Student-Athlete Performance Center.

“I am super excited about the future of MTSU athletics and the impact that this new facility will have for not only recruiting, but the development of the student-athletes," Byard said. “I am proud to be an alumnus of this great institution.”

Construction began on the $66 million performance center in April as part of more than $100 million in transformational changes coming to the MTSU athletic facilities landscape. Over 300 individuals and families so far have contributed to the $18 million-plus already secured for the Build Blue campaign. MTSU last fall expanded the goal to $20 million.

“I can’t thank Kevin enough for what he has done and is doing for Middle Tennessee football," Coach Rick Stockstill said. “Kevin will always have a special place in my heart.”

The three-story, 85,500-square-foot center will provide all MTSU student-athletes with new facilities for weight training, nutrition, and sports medicine. It will also be the new home for Blue Raider football, allowing MTSU to relocate its football operations from Murphy Center.

MTSU retired Byard’s No. 20 last fall, only the second football number retired in school history. Last year, during the Titans’ second straight injury-riddled season, Coach Mike Vrabel cited Byard as one of his players who had never suffered a soft-tissue injury, implying his workout ethic was top-notch. Byard and his nonprofit foundation also have been active in the Nashville community.

“During his time at MTSU, Kevin embodied what a student-athlete is all about in the leadership and high character he displayed in all facets of his life,” said Chris Massaro, MTSU’s director of athletics. “This generous gift is another demonstration of his leadership, and we are extremely grateful for all that Kevin has done and continues to do for his university.

“KB was one of the hardest working student-athletes we have ever had, and we are proud to carry that legacy for generations to come.”

Contact Build Blue: 615-898-2210; braa@mtsu.edu