This story was adapted from this UTC News Story by Chuck Wasserstrom.
Dr. Michael Thompson has been selected to the 2022-2023 All-Southern Conference Faculty and Staff Team.
Thompson joined representatives selected from each of the 10 member schools in the conference. While selections at the individual Southern Conference schools are left to each institution’s discretion, all recipients share the common characteristics of demonstrated service to the institution through vital contributions to teaching, research, service and campus life.
Award recipients will receive an engraved plaque presented by Southern Conference Commissioner Jim Schaus at a home men’s basketball game Feb. 22 vs. Samford.
Thompson, a member of the UTC faculty since 2009, is a UC Foundation associate professor of American History and head of the Department of History. He is a scholar and teacher of the American South and slavery and the early national and antebellum United States.
Thompson’s first book was an award-winning study of waterfront labor and laborers in Charleston, South Carolina, between the American Revolution and the Civil War. He is now working on a book that examines the historical relationship of essential labor, racial presumptions and disease in urban environments—as well as a history of enslavement in and around Chattanooga and Hamilton County, Tennessee.
As the history department’s internship coordinator from 2015 to 2022, he cultivated approximately 25 partnerships through which more than 90 student interns served the community for more than 12,000 hours.
“I am honored and humbled to be selected for this year’s All-Southern Conference Faculty and Staff Team,” Thompson said. “I also am grateful for an amazing group of colleagues who work alongside me every day to serve our students, the UTC campus and the Chattanooga community.”
Thompson trained and ran with the Ann Arbor Track Club during his freshman year at the University of Michigan, where he majored in history “and developed a commitment to servant leadership.” He made the Michigan track team during his sophomore year as a walk-on half-miler, but an injury prevented him from competing.
“My limited time and experience as a college athlete instilled a deep appreciation for student-athletes at UTC and across the Southern Conference,” Thompson said. “It’s such an honor to be associated through this award with so many hard-working and dedicated college students who also are playing competitive sports.”