FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. – University of Arkansas faculty and student innovators are traveling to Atlanta next week to participate in the Southeastern Conference’s annual showcase of academic excellence.

The third-annual Southeastern Conference Symposium will be held Sunday through Tuesday in Atlanta. Titled “Creativity, Innovation & Entrepreneurship: Driving a 21st Century Economy,” the symposium will feature presentations from faculty and administrators from each of the 14 SEC institutions.

The symposium offers opportunities for U of A faculty and students to learn from and share their expertise with SEC peers and colleagues. The goal of the 2015 SEC Symposium is to explore higher education’s role in preparing individuals to be creative, innovative and entrepreneurial thinkers and to evaluate the ways in which universities serve as drivers of economic development. 

Ralph Henry, a Distinguished Professor of biological sciences at the U of A, is a symposium presenter. Henry is the W.M. Keck Professor in the J. William Fulbright College of Arts and Sciences. The centerpieces of the endowed professorship are to enhance scholarly interdisciplinary research and create new businesses.

Henry will present the work of a U of A experimental program for graduate students in the science, technology, engineering and mathematics fields. The program, called IGNITE: Industry Generating New Ideas and Technology through Education, recognizes that the majority of STEM graduate students will find employment in the private sector working for a technology-based business.

“The research training STEM graduates receive is frequently oriented toward success in an academic setting and a career in academic research, rather than providing skills needed to be successful in the private sector,” Henry said. “In that context, IGNITE, which is part of the university’s Office of Entrepreneurship, is focused on bringing Arkansas industry into the classroom so students can learn skills that will better prepare them for jobs in industry throughout the state. By engaging students to work on real problems that cost real money to our companies in order to create real solutions, it’s a win-win-win scenario for our students, our faculty and the companies in Arkansas.”

Three faculty members will represent the university as symposium panelists:

• David Fredrick, associate professor of classics in Fulbright College who directs the college’s interdisciplinary humanities program.
• Peter MacKeith, dean and professor, Fay Jones School of Architecture and Design. He was previously a professor of architecture at the Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts at Washington University in St. Louis.
• Carol Reeves, associate vice provost for entrepreneurship for the university. A professor of management, she is the Cecil & Gwendolyn Cupp Applied Professor in Entrepreneurship in the Sam M. Walton College of Business. She was the recipient of the university’s 2014 SEC Faculty Achievement Award.

Jon Johnson was selected as a symposium moderator. Johnson, who holds the Walton College Professorship in Sustainability, is the academic director of global organization The Sustainability Consortium and executive director of the Applied Sustainability Center at the University of Arkansas.

U of A students who will participate in the symposium include Shervon Thomas, a senior in Walton College, who is one of 14 students from SEC institutions who will serve as University Ambassadors.

Thomas, an international student, is from the island nation of Saint Lucia in the southeast Caribbean Sea. He is an honors student majoring in information systems with a minor in supply chain management, and he is also seeking a certificate in enterprise resource planning. A Walton College Student Ambassador, Thomas is also active in the Leadership Walton program, a member of Walton College’s dean’s student advisory board and a member of the U of A’s International Cultural Team.

“It is a privilege to be the U of A’s student ambassador for the SEC Symposium,” Thomas said. “This is an amazing opportunity. I have a passion for meeting and interacting with individuals from cultures from around the world, and I am also a proud Razorback.”

Seth Shumate, a recent microelectronics-photonics graduate of the U of A, and Matthew Young, a doctoral student of electrical engineering, will compete for the university in the symposium’s entrepreneurial pitch competition, in which teams will present their innovative ideas to a panel of high-profile, SEC alumni judges. The U of A alumnus judge is Brian Henley, an industrial engineering graduate who is executive vice president of corporate development and mergers at Magnitude Software in Austin, Texas.

The symposium will also feature student exhibitions in the visual arts and applied arts.

Ashley Byers, a master of fine arts student in Fulbright College, will present a piece – based on historical events tied to the post-Civil War vigilante group called the Baldknobbers – that focuses on false dichotomies such as good and evil, corruption and fidelity and hunters and the hunted.

In the applied arts exhibition, a team consisting of two recent graduates of the Fay Jones School and two current architecture students will present renderings and a movie showing the urban design proposal for the revitalization of a downtown block of Texarkana, Texas, consisting of four key components: a farmer’s market, band shell, amphitheater, and art walk.

The Faay Jones School graduates are Austin Magruder and Jay Williams; the current students are Jonathan Martinez and Robert McElvain.

Finally, Matthew Beach, a junior music major, will play trombone in a jazz ensemble that will perform during a reception for the SEC presidents, chancellors and provosts.

The final round of the student entrepreneurial pitch competition will be streamed live as an SEC Network + event on WatchESPN and SECNetwork.com, available to SEC Network subscribers on smartphones, tablets and desktop applications as well as Amazon Fire TV and Fire TV Stick, Apple TV, Chromecast, Roku, Xbox 360 and Xbox One.

About the SEC Symposium: The primary goal of the SEC Symposium is to address a significant scholarly issue by utilizing the range of disciplinary strengths of all SEC universities in a manner that expands opportunities for collaboration among SEC faculty and administrators. This event is also intended to display the research and innovation of SEC institutions for an audience of academicians, government officials and other stakeholders. Other objectives include annually drawing national attention and participation to the southeast region.

About the SECU: The SECU is the academic initiative of the Southeastern Conference. Through SECU, the conference sponsors, supports and promotes collaborative higher education programs and activities involving administrators, faculty and students at its 14 member universities.