UT Institute of Agriculture Presents Top Faculty and Staff Awards for 2022
KNOXVILLE, Tenn. – The University of Tennessee Institute of Agriculture recognized some of its top faculty, staff, researchers and Extension experts at UTIA’s annual Awards and Promotions luncheon on the UTIA campus in Knoxville August 16, 2022. Many of the awards are gifts made possible by faculty, alumni and friends of the Institute.
UT Institute of Agriculture Senior Vice Chancellor and Senior Vice President Carrie Castille hosted the award winners and celebrated their work. “I am so excited to recognize excellence as exemplified by the award-winning members of our UTIA faculty and staff,” Castille says. “Their continuing commitment to our land-grant mission ensures that the Institute develops and delivers real-life solutions to improve the health and economy of our state and beyond while also enhancing our environment.”
Meagen Brown, a UT Extension Agent in Family and Consumer Sciences, is the winner of the G. L. Carter Jr. Outstanding 4-H Youth Development Agent award. This award was established by the late G.L. Carter Jr., whose Extension career began in 1949 in Greene County where he served as a 4-H agent. He was also a Hamblen County 4-H member. Carter was the first in his family to graduate from college, later earning an M.S. and a Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin. His 44-year career included working as the youth editor of a farm and ranch magazine; serving as a state 4-H staff member in both Tennessee and North Carolina; and helping to create the Journal of Extension, a professional publication for Extension agents and specialists. Carter has provided the funding through an endowment to recognize an Outstanding 4-H Youth Development Agent.
“I am honored to receive this recognition,” says Brown. “4-H has been an integral part of my life since I began as a 4-H member in 4th grade in Rhea County. I have been blessed to spend my career in Meigs County with the organization and University I love.”
Brown has worked for UT Extension in Meigs County for 17 years, first in 4-H and currently as an Extension agent in Family and Consumer Sciences. She finds tremendous value in watching the 4-H youth she’s worked with grow and develop throughout their 4-H careers.
Brown has a bachelor’s degree in family resource management studies from the University of Tennessee, Chattanooga, and a master’s degree in agriculture from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville.
Through its land-grant mission of research, teaching and extension, the University of Tennessee Institute of Agriculture touches lives and provides Real. Life. Solutions. utia.tennessee.edu.