Advances Across Tennessee

Digital Agriculture Center For Youth

MTSU’s School of Agriculture developed the Tennessee Digital Agriculture Center—the first of its kind in the state—after landing a three-year, nearly $750,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture. The center features a series of student/non-formal educator projects and community outreach events to forge a strong digital agriculture/ data science education program focused on youth across Tennessee. In summer 2023, 16 high school students attended MTSU’s second Digital Agriculture Camp, building and flying their own drones and learning about data science and precision agriculture.

Rural School Counseling Support

The Tennessee Department of Education recently brought on Tiffany Wilson, coordinator of MTSU’s School Counseling program, as a consultant for a $14 million federal grant project to retain and recruit mental health professionals into high-needs, rural school districts. MTSU was also identified as one of three Tennessee universities that can help with recruitment and retention for Project RAISE (Rural Access to Interventions in School Environments), which will recruit future school counselors, psychologists, and social workers to serve as paid interns to increase the number of mental health personnel in 40 underserved Tennessee school districts.

Providing Physicians To Rural Areas

The first four participants in MTSU’s Medical School Early Acceptance Program— Pierce Creighton, Claire Ritter, Maria Hite, and Kirolos Michael—are finishing their second year at Meharry Medical College. The special partnership is designed to increase the number of primary care physicians serving medically underserved populations and help alleviate health care disparities in rural Tennessee. Adding a new cohort of up to 10 incoming freshmen annually, the state-funded program allows accepted students to attend MTSU tuition free for three years and pay medical school tuition for only two of four years.