Renetta Garrison Tull

Renetta Garrison Tull is an American electrical engineer, global policy strategist, and works to advance diversity and inclusion in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). Tull is the inaugural Vice Chancellor of Inclusive Excellence at University of California, Davis and a founding Director of the National Science Foundation funded program PROMISE: Alliances for Graduate Education and Professoriate, which aims to increase the number of underrepresented students in STEM. Tull previously served as Vice Provost for Strategic Initiatives at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC) and was also the Director of Graduate and Professional Pipeline Development for the University System of Maryland (USM) where she also served as the co-Principal Investigator and co-director of the Louis Stokes Alliance for Minority Participation. On a global scale, Tull was selected as the keynote speaker for the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) event on the Commission on the Status of Women in Engineering Fields, and was the only American and only female finalist for the Global Engineering Deans Council Airbus Diversity Award in 2015.

Early life and education Tull grew up in Plainfield, New Jersey and was interested in medicine and science from a young age. Her father inspired her to pursue passions in science, despite the obstacles Black people face in pursuing STEM careers, and he gave her confidence that she could succeed. She focused her degree in Signal Processing and graduated with her Bachelors of Science in Electrical Engineering in 1991.

Tull completed her PhD in 1999 and then pursued a short postdoctoral fellowship studying Vocal Physiology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1999 before becoming a Research Assistant and then Research Associate developing novel technologies to aid people with disabilities.

In 2003, Tull was adjunct faculty at the University of Maryland, College Park in the Department of Hearing and Speech Sciences while at the same time becoming the Founding Director of the National Science Foundation funded PROMISE: Maryland's Alliance for Graduate Education and Professoriate (AGEP) at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. She held the position of Director and Co-Principal Investigator of PROMISE until 2019. In 2007, Tull became the Assistant Dean for Graduate Student Development at University of Maryland Baltimore County.

In 2019, Tull was recruited to the University of California, Davis to become the Inaugural Vice Chancellor for Inclusive Excellence. As Vice Chancellor, Tull uses her expertise in recruiting and retaining a diverse student body by fostering the development of underrepresented students in STEM. She was recognized for her efforts in sustaining and developing this program by The Global Engineering Deans Council and The Airbus Group in 2015. This Bridge to Doctorate Fellows program provides fellowships and professional development workshops and resources to underrepresented students pursuing STEM careers and Tull was instrumental in bringing funding to the program and becoming a role model for students across North America. One of her students and mentees, the late Jessica Soto Perez of Puerto Rico, was killed by her husband and this prompted Tull to advocate for awareness of signs of domestic violence in women in STEM and to push the involvement of family and friends into the lives of students in her NSF funded diversity and recruitment programs. Tull coined the term the “Jessica Alert” which she first discussed with women in STEM at a conference in Puerto Rico to emphasize the need to maintain acute awareness of the wellbeing of young women in STEM and the reality of domestic violence in their mentees and colleagues. Tull continued to work with students in Puerto Rico and co-led the ADVANCE Hispanic Women in STEM was vice president of initiatives for the Latin and Caribbean Consortium for Engineering Institutions. She emphasized the reality that these acts of violence and racism are not new, recounting her own experiences being stopped by police for no reason while in the car with her father. Tull's call to action was featured in the Sacramento Magazine in June, 2020. 2017 Invited Keynote speaker at the UNESCO 61st Edition of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) 2016 Claire L. Felbinger Award for Diversity and Inclusion by the Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology 2015 The Global Engineering Deans Council (GEDC) Airbus Diversity Award Finalist - international award that recognizes initiatives aiming to increase diverse participation in engineering 2008 Library of Congress as the National GEM Consortium's University Member of the Year

Select media 2019 Featured in the Daily Democrat “New vice chancellor diversity and equity named at UC Davis” 2016 Featured in Medium Article by Sci Chic “Women in Science You Should Be Following On Social Media” 2008 Featured on the public radio show “The Best of Our Knowledge” discussing methods to increase the number of Black women earning Ph.D.’s in the sciences

Select publications W.Y. Carter, R.G. Tull, J.C. Rutledge and L.N. Joseph, “The Dissertation House Model: Doctoral Student Experiences Coping and Writing in a Shared Knowledge Community.” CBE: Life Sciences Education, 15:ar34, Fall 2016. Tull, R. G., Medina, H., Pearlman, J., & Goldberg, M. R. (2013). An Emerging Impact from an Engineering Education Outreach Collaborative “Bridge” Program: Graduate Student Participation in Wheelchair Mobility Research for Mexico. #RP207, Proceedings of the Eleventh LACCEI Latin American and Caribbean Conference for Engineering and Technology (LACCEI’2013) “Innovation in Engineering, Technology and Education for Competitiveness and Prosperity,” August 14 – 16, 2013, Cancun, Mexico. Carter-Johnson, F. D., Ordóñez Rozo, P., Tull, R. G., and Nino, M. (2013). Examining the Intersection of Graduate Student Funding, Mentoring, and Training as a Mechanism of Success for Peer Mentors and their Mentees, paper ID#7626. 120th Annual Conference of the American Association of Engineering Education, Atlanta: ASEE Tull, R. G. (2013, Spring) Optimize Your Summer Research Experience. SHPE – Magazine of the Society of Hispanic Professional Engineers. Vol. 15., No. 2. p. 20. Imler, C. and Tull, R. (2012, November 30). Stem Tide of Grad Student Losses. The Daily Record (Baltimore, Md.), p. 19. Tull, R. G., Rutledge, J.C., Warnick, J. W., and Carter, F. D. (2012). PROMISE: Maryland's Alliance for Graduate Education and the Professoriate Enhances Recruitment and Retention of Underrepresented Minority Graduate Students. Academic Medicine, 87(11), p. 1562-1569. Tull, R. G., and Tull, D. L. (2012, September). A Formula for Success. Optics and Photonic News. Tull, R. G., Nino, M. and Ramoutar, N. (2012). Preparing for Engineering and Other STEM Graduate/Post-Graduate Masters and Doctoral Programs. Proceedings of the Tenth LACCEI Latin American and Caribbean Conference (LACCEI 2012), Megaprojects: Building Infrastructure by fostering engineering collaboration, efficient and effective integration and innovative planning, July 23–27, 2012, Panama City, Panama. A. M. Reed and R. G. Tull (2012). Reducing the Bottleneck: Breaking the Bottle! Addressing the Recruitment of Postdocs through Best Practices of AGEP and ADVANCE Horizons Programs. Proceedings of WEPAN 2012, Columbus, OH. Rutledge, J.C., Carter-Veale, W.Y. & Tull, R. G. (2011). Successful PhD Pathways to Advanced STEM Careers for Black Women in Beyond Stock Stories and Folktales: African Americans‟ Paths to STEM Fields, Vol. 11., H. T. Frierson and W. F. Tate, Eds. United Kingdom: Emerald Group Publishing Ltd. Tull, R. G. (2009, Fall). The ‘Imposter Syndrome’ and How to Avoid it. SHPE Magazine – The Official Magazine of the Society of Hispanic Professional Engineers, Vol. 11, No. 3.