Tennessee STEM Education Center
Partner with TSEC
CAMPUS
PARTNERSHIPS
TSEC is fortunate to have formal partnerships with faculty across STEM education on campus. One of the ways we achieve these partnerships is through the Associate Director and Faculty Fellow programs. We welcome any permanent, full-time faculty member, from any academic unit, with a demonstrated commitment to the mission of the Center (i.e., to improve K-20 STEM education both locally and nationally by identifying and addressing critical issues that promote access, equity, innovation, and leadership).
JOIN OUR TEAM
The Tennessee STEM Education Center (TSEC) is excited to invite applications for Associate Directors and Faculty Fellows to serve one or two year terms. These faculty will be expected to initiate or develop potentially transformative partnerships, projects, or programs aimed at improving STEM education outctoomes at all educational levels alongside a collaborative team of faculty and staff.
LEADERSHIP
IN STEM
Mary Ellen Sloane serves as an Associate Director of the Tennessee STEM Education Center (TSEC) at Middle Tennessee State University, where she plays a key leadership role in advancing STEM education and workforce development through statewide collaborations. She also serves as Professor and Science Librarian at James E. Walker Library at MTSU, where she provides specialized support in scholarly communication, research assessment, and information literacy for STEM disciplines.
Her recent work at TSEC focuses on building collaborations among Tennessee colleges and universities to expand research computing, cyberinfrastructure planning, and STEM education. She is co-author of “Creating a Regional Computing Model for Research and Education in Tennessee: Challenges, Experiences, and Benefits Thus Far” and “A Collaborative Catalog for Research Computing and Data Professional Development.” She also serves as co-principal investigator on the IMLS-funded project “An Investigation of Virtual Reality Initiatives and Workforce Development Outcomes in Libraries.”
In addition, she is committed to enhancing global scholarly access. As a Fulbright U.S. Scholar in Rwanda (2022–2023) with the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund, she worked to improve scientific resource access and research assessment for conservation efforts. She continues this work as Chair of the Academic Alliance for Research4Life, where she leads efforts to build partnerships between academic librarians in higher- and lower-income countries.
Mary Ellen shares how TSEC has impacted her work:
“TSEC has provided exceptional leadership development opportunities and a supportive collegial cohort of collaborators, enabling me to strengthen statewide partnerships in research computing, cyberinfrastructure, and STEM education while advancing my contributions in scholarly communication and STEM librarianship.”
WHY JOIN?
QUESTIONS?
If you are interested in learning more about this program, please contact Greg Rushton for more information.