TNECD and Tennessee Tech are growing rural Tennessee’s next generation of economic developers through Rural Fellowship
The program places recent graduates in rural local governments, chambers of commerce and city offices for two years — strengthening communities while building Tennessee's economic development workforce pipeline.
Rural Tennessee communities often have access to grant money, technical resources and state programs. What they don’t always have is the staff capacity to actually put those resources to work. That’s the gap the Tennessee Rural Fellowship Program is designed to fill.
The program, a partnership between the Tennessee Department of Economic and Community Development (TNECD) and Tennessee Tech University’s Center for Rural Innovation, places recent graduates directly into rural local governments for two years. Fellows earn a promising salary and benefits, and are expected to relocate to the community they serve within 90 days of placement.
“At TNECD, we realized that communities, especially rural communities, were having trouble taking advantage of all the resources available to them due to capacity. These fellows increase capacity with a focus on economic development activities, but that could be a wide range of things from housing and tourism to infrastructure and job creation. It’s a really innovative model,” said Kirby Lewis-Gill, rural fellowship director at TNECD.
A natural pairing with Tennessee Tech
Why have this program housed with Tennessee Tech? The brains behind the program said it just made sense.
“The Center for Rural Innovation started almost 10 years ago, with the idea that we wanted to help rural Tennessee, Maybe local businesses needed a website, product photography, branding, design, things of that nature,” said Director of the Center for Rural Innovation Michael Aikens. “That went really well, and then as we grew over the years, we recognized that if we added tourism to this scope, economic impact analyses or location intelligence work, the impact would only be greater. Not only are we helping our rural communities move the economic needle, we’re getting students involved and career-ready.”
Lewis-Gill knew how active Tennessee Tech was already in the space, and didn’t want to duplicate efforts. By joining hands, TNECD found a way to “fit into something that was already working.”
The second cohort has already hit the ground running
TNECD selected five fellows for the program’s second cohort — Julia Briggs (Cocke County), Faith Cook (Lake County), Tierney Macon (Lauderdale County), Noah Morrison (Carter County) and Kylee Scarbrough (Unicoi County) — chosen from 42 applicants who went through virtual and in-person interviews, plus a matching event between communities and candidates.
This matching process is meant to make sure fellows fit the culture of the communities they’re moving into so that there’s a higher chance of retaining this talent in the long run.
All three fellows from the program’s first cohort have stayed in economic development — one now works in North Carolina, one joined TNECD’s regional business development team, and one remains in the rural community where she completed her fellowship.
TNECD plans to begin recruiting for a third cohort in spring 2027, working college and job fairs to reach the next round of early-career candidates.
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