July 9, 2026
Looking Back and Looking Ahead: One of the greatest joys of serving as UTC’s Chancellor has been the opportunity to see firsthand the impact our people have on students every day and to help tell the story of a University defined by purpose, opportunity and momentum. Over the past year, I have also come to understand even more clearly how deeply UTC is connected to Chattanooga. This is not a University that simply resides in this city; it is a University woven into the life of this community through service, research, partnership and the shared work of preparing students for meaningful futures.
That understanding will continue to shape how I lead in year two. I will continue listening, leaning into and ensuring that UTC has a strong presence wherever important conversations and opportunities are taking shape. I also want our University to continue building on the momentum of our strategic plan, especially in enrollment, student experience and research. We have important work ahead as we continue to strengthen UTC’s impact in teaching, research and service.
Thank you to our faculty, staff, students, alumni, donors, partners and friends across Chattanooga and the region for making my first year at UTC so meaningful. Your support, dedication and belief in UTC have made all the difference, and I am grateful for all we have accomplished together. I look forward to what we will build in year two.
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Celebrating 140 Years: On Sept. 15, 1886, a university was founded in Chattanooga with a mission to transform lives through education. Nearly 140 years later, that institution has grown into the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga—a University that serves more than 12,000 students and strengthens our city, region and state through education, research, workforce development and community engagement.
As we prepare for Founder’s Day, I am excited to mark the beginning of a yearlong celebration of UTC’s 140th anniversary. This milestone is an opportunity to honor the people, traditions and achievements that have shaped UTC across generations. Community connection will be central to the year ahead, including initiatives such as the 1886 Challenge, which will encourage our campus community to collectively contribute 18,860 hours of service, and 140 Community Events for 140 Years, which will highlight the many ways UTC faculty, staff and students are engaged with the people and organizations we serve.
This anniversary year is also a chance for all of us to show our UTC pride in visible ways, including a new tradition of Gold Fridays throughout the academic year. Most importantly, our 140th year allows us to reflect on how far this University has come, celebrate the people who have built it and reaffirm our commitment to shaping the future. I look forward to celebrating this milestone with all of you.
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Let’s Make a Strong First Impression: As we prepare to welcome a new class of students to UTC, I want to encourage faculty and staff to consider volunteering for Operation Move In on Aug. 19-20. For many of our newest Mocs and their families, these two days will be their first close look at our campus community. The care, energy and teamwork they experience during move-in help shape that first impression in lasting ways.
What makes Operation Move In so meaningful is that it helps students feel supported and welcomed from the moment they arrive. As some of our colleagues have so thoughtfully reflected, volunteering during OMI offers a powerful reminder of who our students are, what they are carrying with them, and how important it is that they know from the start that they belong here.
I hope you will consider being part of this important effort and helping us welcome our newest Mocs with the warmth, care and sense of community that define our University.
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Welcome Back, Dr. Matt Matthews: I am grateful that Dr. Matt Matthews has rejoined UTC as interim provost. Dr. Matthews brings valuable experience from his role as associate vice president for academic affairs for the UT System, along with familiarity with our institution and our academic priorities.
For those of you new to UTC, Dr. Matthews previously spent 20 years on the UTC campus, having joined the University faculty in 2004 as an assistant professor of mathematics. He rose to department head in 2014; by 2016, he had become a full professor and had been appointed associate dean of the College of Arts and Sciences. In 2018, he assumed the role of interim vice provost, a position he officially held from 2020 to 2024.
I also want to once again thank Dr. Jerold Hale for his exceptional service to UTC. Over seven years at the University—and more than 40 years in higher education—Provost Hale led with integrity, wisdom and a deep commitment to student success and academic excellence. I remain especially grateful for his partnership and support during my first year as Chancellor, and I know his leadership has left a lasting impact on our students, faculty and campus community.
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Welcome, Honors College Dean Shawn Bingham: I am excited to officially welcome Dr. Shawn Bingham as dean of the UTC Honors College. Dr. Bingham began serving in this role on July 1, bringing more than 20 years of experience in higher education and a strong background in honors education, interdisciplinary programming and undergraduate research. His previous leadership at Colorado State University and other institutions reflects a clear commitment to high-impact learning and to helping students connect intellectual curiosity with meaningful engagement in the world.
The Honors College plays an important role in the life of our University, creating opportunities for students to connect academic excellence with research, leadership and community engagement. I am excited about the vision Dr. Bingham brings to this work and look forward to the ways he will build on the strong foundation already in place.
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Expanding Biomechatronics in Healthcare: The UTC Research Institute has launched the Biomechatronics in Healthcare Initiative, a new cross-campus research effort designed to strengthen collaboration in engineering, computer science and healthcare. The initiative brings together faculty, staff and students from the College of Engineering and Computer Science, the College of Health, Education and Professional Studies, the College of Nursing, and the Gary W. Rollins College of Business. It creates a more formal structure for collaborative work already taking shape across our campus while opening the door for new projects and partnerships in areas such as wearable robotics, rehabilitation systems, artificial intelligence, digital health, biosignal monitoring and smart prosthetics.
This initiative reflects the kind of interdisciplinary work that will continue to shape the future of healthcare and research at our University. By connecting technical expertise with clinical, operational and human-performance perspectives, UTC is building stronger pathways for faculty collaboration, student research and external funding in a rapidly growing field.
I am grateful to the initiative’s leader, Dr. Erkan Kaplanoglu—Department Head and Professor of Engineering Management and Technology—and the many faculty members involved for helping position UTC to advance innovation in healthcare technology while responding to needs in our community and beyond.
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Advancing Community-Driven Health Research: One of the most important ways UTC serves our region is by supporting research that helps us better understand the factors shaping health in our communities. The new Journey Health Foundation Research Center REACH Fund, housed in the Gary W. Rollins College of Business’ Department of Data Analytics, is an important example of that work, creating support for research focused on the social determinants of health across the Chattanooga region.
In its first year, the REACH Fund is already supporting 10 projects of up to $25,000 each, with faculty from six departments across our campus engaged in this work. These projects reflect an impressive range of interdisciplinary research, including studies focused on emergency response equity, preventive pediatric care, falls among older adults, chronic disease, behavioral health, environmental health, opioid policy and transportation access.
The REACH Fund awards help faculty and community partners study those challenges in ways that can lead to meaningful improvement. Together, they show how the University can bring expertise from across disciplines to better understand and improve the factors that influence health in our community.
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Recognizing Research Excellence: Congratulations to Menekse Adar, a May graduate from our master’s degree program in engineering management and technology, on being selected for a competitive NSF-supported student award for the IISE Annual Conference—one of the largest and most prestigious gatherings in the field of industrial engineering. Her recognition shows both the quality of her research and the strength of graduate scholarship taking place at UTC.
Menekse’s work, which focused on unsupervised EEG-based identification of emotional engagement states during Canvas course interaction, displays the kind of innovative research helping shape the future of learning and technology, and we’re proud of her achievement.
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Excelling in Competition and in the Classroom: Congratulations to political science and public service major Camden Braidech on being named the NCAA Elite Scholar-Athlete at last month’s NCAA men’s golf championship in Carlsbad, California. This prestigious recognition is awarded to the student-athlete with the highest cumulative GPA at each NCAA championship finals site, and Camden earned the honor with a perfect 4.0 GPA.
This award reflects the very best of the student-athlete experience at UTC: excellence in competition, excellence in the classroom and a commitment to making the most of every opportunity. We are proud of Camden for this outstanding achievement and for representing the University so well on the national stage.
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