Graduate and Professional Student Appreciation Week kicks off today at UT with a full slate of activities planned throughout the week, capped off by the Three-Minute Thesis Final Competition on Friday, April 7.
The week’s events include a Graduate School Open House; sessions about poster and presentation design, job search, and other campus career-related resources; free professional photos; a UT baseball game; and a talent show. Activities run through Saturday, April 8.
Find a full schedule of the week’s events on the Graduate School website.
One of the focal points of the week will be the Three-Minute Thesis Competition Finals at 1 p.m. on Friday in the Hollingsworth Auditorium of the Ellington Plant Sciences Building on the UTIA campus. The event is free and open to the public.
The competition challenges master’s and doctoral students to present a compelling talk on their thesis or dissertation to an audience unfamiliar with the topic. Students have only three minutes to explain their research and can use only one image or slide.
Semi final competitions took place earlier this month, narrowing down the competitors to 12 finalists. The finalists and their presentation titles:
- Arkadipta Bakshi—College of Arts and Sciences, doctoral candidate, “Abiotic Stress Tolerance in Arabidopsis thaliana: Ethylene Receptors to the Rescue!!”
- Tori Couture—College of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources, master’s candidate, “Making the Connections: Mastitis and Behavior”
- Jamie A. Greig—College of Communication and Information, doctoral candidate, “Connecting Rural Tennessee: An Exploration of Rural Broadband Expansion Models”
- Lindsey C. Herren—College of Social Work, master’s candidate, “Research and Advocacy for Tennessee Women’s Health Policy”
- Rachel Herwick—College of Veterinary Medicine, DVM candidate, “The Human-Animal Bond in Action”
- Amy Michael—College of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources, master’s candidate, “The Kudzu Bug: A Case Study in Sustainable Agriculture”
- Steven Panageotou—College of Arts and Sciences, doctoral candidate, “The Three Dimensions of Political Action”
- Kim Powell—College of Nursing, doctoral candidate, “Using the Portal to Engage Patients with Chronic Illness”
- Vincent Price—College of Education, Health, and Human Sciences, doctoral candidate, “Not only…but also: Blending the Binary Approaches of Teaching Black Literature”
- Matthew Paul Smith—College of Arts and Sciences, doctoral candidate, “Translating Chopin’s Parrot: Local Color Louisiana and the Limits of Literary Interpretation, 1865–1914”
- Elizabeth Thomas—College of Arts and Sciences, doctoral candidate, “Reactions to Traumatic Events”
- Kristen N. Wyckoff—Tickle College of Engineering, doctoral candidate, “Urban Nonpoint Source Stormwater Runoff: Bacteria, Contaminants, and Why We Should Care”