By Gail Hairston, Weston Loyd

(April 22, 2016) — The University of Kentucky Graduate School has adopted an online service, Versatile PhD, that will benefit students, faculty and alumni seeking careers in the humanities and social sciences.

“A growing number of graduate students are drawn to careers outside of traditional academic paths. In a survey of UK graduate students conducted earlier this year, 82 percent of the respondents indicated they are planning or considering alternate-academic or non-academic careers,” Morris A. Grubbs, assistant dean in the Graduate School and director of graduate

By Jenny Wells

(April 22, 2016) — Female students are less likely than their male counterparts to pursue careers in the fields of science, technology, engineering and math (also known as STEM), but a group of women at the University of Kentucky are trying to change that.

In partnership with the American Association of University Women (AAUW) Kentucky branch, a group of UK students, faculty and staff have launched the #IAmAWomanInSTEM initiative this semester, bringing together over 160 female student ambassadors to encourage the study of STEM and health care among women at UK and empower them to persist in those fields.

“Time and time again we hear and read about the challenges and barriers women in STEM have overcome to get where they are today,” said Margaret

By Whitney Hale

This year's selection of a dozen UK students and alumni for NSF Graduate Research Fellowships is believed to be the largest in the school's history and is four times the number of selections for 2015. To put more of emphasis on the fellowship

By Gail Hairston

(April 19, 2016) — Manuel Gonzales stepped away from the restraints of traditional literary genre to create a story that twists not only the plot, but the characters as well. In so doing, “The Regional Office Is Under Attack!”, the first novel published by the University of Kentucky assistant professor of English and creative writing, has sparked the imagination of one reviewer after another.

Kelly Braffet of The New York Times Book Review is one of the most recent writers to review 

By Gail Hairston

(April 18, 2016) — In an NPR interview two years ago — a conversation occasioned by the release of her fifth novel, “Boy, Snow, Bird” — Helen Oyeyemi explained why she had lived in half a dozen European cities before the age of 30.

“I feel a need to choose a city or have a feeling that it chooses me," Oyeyemi said.

Whether Lexington chose her or she chose Lexington, is debatable and irrelevant. University of Kentucky students and English professors are simply glad that this Oyeyemi story had a happy ending for UK.

After all, being a believer in magical, malevolent forces, Oyeyemi gleefully writes stories with unhappily-ever-after endings. For which, she is completely unapologetic.

"I would be that kind of psychologist who says 'You're absolutely right — there are monsters

 By Whitney Harder

(April 15, 2016) — A STEM-focused teaching enhancement workshop and scholarly forum will allow faculty members across the University of Kentucky campus to network, develop collaborations and augment STEM teaching skills. The workshop and forum will be held from 8:15 a.m. to 3 p.m. Friday, April 29, at the Hilary J. Boone Center.

The event will focus on course-based undergraduate research experiences to engage undergraduate students in authentic research and maintain their interest in STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) majors. 

Inspired by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI)-funded STEMCats Living Learning Program, the workshop will also offer

By Whitney Hale

(April 14, 2015) — A University of Kentucky senior and recent graduate have been selected for fellowships from the Princeton in Asia program. As part of the program, biochemistry senior Calvin Hong and 2015 arts administration and Spanish graduate Brittney Woodrum will teach in Hong Kong and Myanmar respectively.

Princeton in Asia (PiA) sponsors more than 150 fellowships and internships in 20 countries and is the oldest and largest organization of its kind, unique in its scope, size, century-long

By Rebecca Stratton

(April 12, 2016) — Want to get to know the people behind some of the biggest student leadership positions on campus? We did, too! That's why we're excited to introduce "see blue." #selfie — a brand new series on UKNow that lets student leaders from across campus tell us a little bit more about themselves and their organizations. This week, the 2016 president of the Black Student Union, Jeremiah Pickett.

Jeremiah Pickett, a junior political science major from the south suburbs of Chicago, is this year's Black Student Union (BSU) president at the University of Kentucky. Pickett strives to take on the task of nurturing others during their time at UK. He's always open to helping out where he can, catching a good movie at his favorite theater in Lexington and building community by investing in his friends and

By Dara Vance

The University of Kentucky’s Department of Political Science is serious about research collaboration. According to Associate Professor Clayton Thyne, “the department has invested heavily in promoting professor-student collaborations over the past several years, and we have seen this investment pay off with a number of co-authored working papers, conference presentations, and published articles.”  He adds, “a major goal of the program is to develop students who have excellent research skills and have solid foundation when they enter the job market.”

 An example of professor and student collaboration is a project recently published in International Studies Quarterly (2015). Dr. Thyne and UK Political Science Ph.D. candidate Anup Phayal both study civil war and peace building. Thyne helped guide Phayal and co-author Prabin Khadka in their research

By Ashley Cox

(April 8, 2016) — Peter Fallon, poet and founder and director of Gallery Press, Ireland's preeminent publisher of poetry and drama, will explore the tradition of Irish literary publishing as part of the 2016 International Hammer Book Arts Biennale Lecture presented April 12. As part of his visit Fallon will also deliver a poetry reading on campus April 13. Both events are free and open to the public.

Fallon's Hammer Biennale Lecture, “The Purpose of Praise: Extending the Tradition of Irish Literary Publishing,” is the seventh in the history of the lectureship. The lecture will begin 7 p.m. Tuesday, April 12, in the Great Hall, on the second floor of the 

By Andrea Gils

The forum, which will promote academic conversations and explore research collaborations, will be co-chaired by Zixue Tai and Kevin Real, associate professors in the UK College of Communication and Information (UK CI); hosted by Dan O’Hair, dean of UK CI; and organized by Tai.

Discussions at the forum will surround topics like journalism and mass

By Ashley Cox

(April 11, 2016) — The University of Kentucky Department of Physics and Astronomy is hosting Kentucky native and NASA civil servant Pamela Marcum April 14-15 for a Sky Talk titled "NASA’s SOFIA Observatory: Exploring the Universe from 42,000 Feet” and a meet-and-greet.

Marcum’s Sky Talk is open to the public and will take place 8 p.m. Thursday, April 14, in the Chemistry-Physics Building room 155. Her meet-and-greet will take place from 12-1:30 p.m. Friday, April 15, at the UK Appalachian Center, located at 624 Maxwelton Ct.

By Whitney Hale

(April 11, 2016) — When is Parmigiano Reggiano cheese not Parmesan cheese? When it’s not made in a small area in northern Italy. Explore this question and other issues related to regional brands and regional identities in the food industry with Agricultural Economics Professor David Freshwater 1:30 p.m. Tuesday, April 12, in the Alumni Gallery of the William T. Young Library. The lecture is free and open to the public.

In support of the “Year of

By Natalie Riney

(April 6, 2016) — A recording-breaking 88 University of Kentucky undergraduates have been selected to present their research projects at the 2016 National Conference on Undergraduate Research (NCUR) this week.

Celebrating its 30th anniversary, this year’s conference will bring young researchers from around the world to the University of North Carolina Asheville April 7-9 where the students will share their research findings through poster and oral presentations. Each student will be given the opportunity to discuss their display and share their research results, illuminating how their work will have an impact on future research development.

“NCUR 2016 will be the second largest conference attended since its beginning in 1968,” said Bessie Guerrant,

By Whitney Harder

(April 6, 2016) — Often containing more than a billion times the mass than our Sun, supermassive black holes have perplexed humans for decades. But new research by University of Kentucky astrophysicist Isaac Shlosman and collaborators will help to understand the physical processes at the edge of time and space, providing the details of how supermassive black holes formed 13 billion years ago.

Shlosman, as well as Jun-Hwan Choi at the University of Texas at Austin, Mitchell Begelman at the University of Colorado Boulder, and Kentaro Nagamine at Osaka University (Japan), ran simulations where supermassive black holes are seeded by clouds of gas falling into potential wells of dark matter — the invisible matter that astronomers believe makes up 85

Janie-Rice Brother, an architectural historian of the Kentucky Archaeological Survey recently received the UK Department of Writing, Rhetoric and Digital Studies' Campus and Community Excellence in Writing award for her blog titled Architecture and Landscapes from the Bluegrass and Beyond.

Brother has over 15 years of cultural resource experience in the Ohio River Valley, the Mid-Atlantic, and southeast. Prior to coming to UK, Brother spent four years at the Kentucky Heritage Council, the State Historic Preservation Office (SHPO), where she was responsible for review of the above-ground Section 106 projects in the state. While at the SHPO, she oversaw a county-wide survey that culminated in the documentation of over 800 rural and urban resources and numerous public presentations.

Brother studies the landscape of Kentucky and blogs about its vanishing heritage.

By Gail Hairston

(April 4, 2016) — Students in Stephen Voss’ "PS 476: Legislative Process" course helped craft a watchdog class project to follow legislation through the Kentucky State Legislature.

Voss, University of Kentucky associate professor of political science and a frequent media analyst and commentator on state and national politics, proposed “Frankfort Focus” to engage his students in the day-in, day-out workings of a state government.

The "PS 476" course enrolls a mixture of students. About two-thirds of them major in either political science or related fields. The rest are part of the UK Department of Political Science Kentucky Legislative Internship

By Whitney Harder

(April 4, 2016) — Crystal Wilkinson, award-winning author and current writer-in-residence at Berea College, will give a talk titled "Black Women and Mental Health in Appalachia" at the University of Kentucky on Tuesday, April 5.

The talk, free and open to the public, will be held from 3-4:30 p.m., in the UK Athletics Auditorium in the William T. Young Library.

Hosted by the UK Appalachian Center and UK African American and Africana Studies Program, the event will also include a reading by Wilkinson of her newest novel, 

By Gail Hairston

(March 31, 2016) — Teachers, parents and schoolchildren in Kentucky and around the world have a new online resource to learn about the history of Lexington’s extraordinary Davis Bottom neighborhood, the “Teaching Through Documentary Art: Lessons for Elementary and Middle School Social Studies Teachers” series.

Inspired by two stunning murals featured in the award-winning documentary “Davis Bottom, Rare History, Valuable Lives,” the innovative lesson plans were developed by archaeologists and educators with the Kentucky Archaeological Survey (KAS), jointly administered by the University of Kentucky’s Department of Anthropology and the Kentucky Heritage Council, and the Davis Bottom History

By Ashely Cox

(March 31, 2016) — The tumultuous tone of the 2016 presidential race has focused renewed attention on the role of polling — and pollsters — in the political process. Traditionally, polls were internal documents used to shape campaign strategies, fundraising appeals and voter turnout. Today, however, polling has become a very public event — who's ahead, who's behind — supplanting issues, positions and personalities in driving campaign media coverage.

For many years, the standards of measurement used in polling became more accurate over time and usually had a high degree of accuracy. Lately, however, several recent polls, both nationally and in the last two Kentucky statewide elections, have differed considerably from actual election day results. So why are a growing