Big Orange signs soon to cover campus >>See page 3
DDHR concentration trains anthropology students to tackle the “tough stuff” Hannah Marley Staff Writer
Strap in for the ride — this is tough stuff. For a dedicated group of anthropology majors and professors, the Disasters, Displacement and Human Rights (DDHR) concentration is just that — a interdisciplinary study that analyzes the consequences of disasters and human rights violations. Tricia Hepner, professor in UT’s anthropology department and concentration head, said the concentration is intended to give students the skills they need to consider any crisis in an informed and analytical way. Hepner emphasized, however, that the program is not intended to train humanitarian work or human rights as a “dogma” for managing disaster scenarios. See DDHR on Page 2
Volume 130 Issue 15
German film explores holocaust, marital drama >>See page 5
Football not for every student or marmoset >>See page 7
This mobile fashion truck allows customers to rent clothes. • Photo Courtesy of Brandi King
UT grad’s small business meeting early success Connor Barnhill Contributor
Next time you see a pink truck parked somewhere around Knoxville, you might want to stop and do a little shopping — as long as you don’t mind rentals. Many may have seen the pink-colored fashion truck in the past week, but most may not know that the creator of the company and the idea is none other than Brandi King, a former UT student with a masters in human resource management and a collateral in entrepreneurship. “I got the idea a while ago,” says King, relating the source of her inspiration for the company, “A few of my friends were going through all of my clothes and asked if they could borrow some. I told them, ‘I should start charging you for it,’ and that was my ‘aha!’ moment.”
From that point, King says, the company remained in the idea stages for about two years. “For all that time, I just thought of it in the brick and mortar sense and the financial risk of renting out a building was just too much for me,” King said. “I had already accumulated a lot of debt from my schooling so taking another leap like opening up a business was a scary prospect for me.” King graduated from Mississippi State and then came to the University of Tennessee to continue with her graduate studies. At UT, she said she got her biggest help in kick-starting the business now known as Rentique through the entrepreneurship classes the school has to offer. “What [the classes] are geared towards is helping students who want to become entrepreneurs acquiring the skills, ideas and tools necessary to make their dream a reality,” explains David Williams, assistant professor in
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the department of management in the Haslam College of Business. Williams was one of the professors whom King credits with helping her to realize her business plan and model the most during her time at UT. During one of those entrepreneurship classes is where King got the idea to use a truck rather than a standard building. “Once she got the idea of the fashion truck,” said Williams, “she brought the idea to my attention and to the attention of many of the other professors and staff to work out the kinks, point out anything she may have missed or not thought about, and finalize the plan.” From there, King continued on to her higher level entrepreneurship courses, and solidified her business plan with the help of other professors at the College of Business like Tom Graves, a lecturer for the Department of Management. See RENTIQUE on Page 4
Wednesday, September 9, 2015