The Office of Academic & Research Services

The Office of Academic & Research Services is the systems-level research administration unit of The University of Tennessee. Its objective is to support the University's research mission by designing, implementing, and supporting information systems which are to:

Help the University better understand its strengths and weaknesses.
Recognize and promote the accomplishments of its researchers.
Assist in day-to-day operations of the research administration community.
Encourage and support faculty and staff in their grant-seeking efforts.
Encourage the use of innovative information technologies throughout higher education institutions within the State of Tennessee.

History

The Office of Academic & Research Services is five years old, having begun with a staff of one in July 1988. It has grown over the last four years and currently maintains a staff of seven full-time employees.

Customers

More than anything else, our office is shaped and motivated by its customers - the 6 campus units of The University of Tennessee System, 4 campuses of the Tennessee Board of Regeants System, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, and various other units within and outside of The University of Tennessee.

Tools

Since our work revolves around providing networked information delivery services, our primary tool is the computer. Most of our services are provided on "solar" - a Sun SPARCstation 10 purchased in July, 1994. A brief description of our technical environment is provided here.

Services

The principal systems and services with which the office works include:

Funding Opportunity System - an on- line system of over 13,000 opportunities for research, travel, graduate students, support, etc., available to all UT and Tennessee Board of Regents faculty and staff.
Sponsored Programs System - a data base for tracking all sponsored activities throughout The University of Tennessee System.
Intellectual Resources Information System (IRIS) - a data base listing over 2,000 "subscribing" faculty and staff who by indicating their research interests and areas of expertise through the system automatically receive notices of funding opportunities as they are added to the funding opportunities data base.
Faculty Information System - currently in development, this tool will be used to keep track in a consistent fashion of the awards, honors, and accomplishments of our faculty and research staff.
Global Meeting Lines Data Base - this is a new system just purchased by The University of Tennessee that contains over 20,000 descriptions of various meetings, symposia, conferences, etc., of potential interest to University faculty and staff.
Federal Register and Commerce Business Daily Publications - The University of Tennessee has purchased site licenses to both publications which permit faculty and staff throughout the UT and Tennessee Board of Regeants Systems to access these two publications on-line.
Academic & Research Services Gopher - Academic & Research Services has implemented a Gopher server by which faculty and staff can access many of the provided information services.
WAIS Server - for the various data bases with which the Research Services office folks have been indexed using the WAIS software and are available world wide via WAIS client software.
World Wide Web - this is the latest service offered by Research Services and is described by the document you are currently reading.
List Server - this is a new service by which several discipline-specific discussion groups can be maintained and to which any faculty or staff can subscribe or unsubscribe as they wish. It will primarily be used to facilitate communication faculty and staff working in specific research areas -- particularly those which require multi-disciplinary involvement.

For more information, please contact:

Tom Garritano, Director
Office of Academic and Research Services
The University of Tennessee
UT Conference Center, Suite 313
600 Henley Street
Knoxville, TN 37996-4137
Phone: (423) 974-2908
FAX: (423) 974-6508
Email: garritan@solar.rtd.utk.edu

Last updated October 30, 1995