Matthew Barnicki joined the UT Tree Improvement Program as a freshman and eventually became the Undergraduate Student Foreman. He trained and supervised undergraduate students new to the program and assisted with tasks including data collection, plant propagation and maintenance, seed and scion collection, and species surveys across the Tennessee landscape to locate trees of selected species for inclusion in seed orchards. In summer 2020, he did an internship with UT-TIP locating scion/cutting source trees for six species in southern Middle Tennessee, which has resulted in grafted seed orchards located at the Jack Daniel Distillery and UT Southern’s East Campus. Other projects with UT-TIP have included locating hemlocks in northeastern Tennessee and propagating them as rooted cuttings. Using historic records, Matthew inventoried a 1940s TVA tree crop planting on Norris Reservation as part of an undergraduate research project.

Other college experiences have included work at the East Tennessee State Nursery, wildland firefighting in Idaho, measuring trees in Guatemala for a carbon-storage estimation project with the organization ICC, and measuring experimental chestnut plantings.

Matthew graduated in December 2023, double majoring in Forest Resources Management and Soil Science. He remains employed by UT-TIP, assisting with species surveys and procuring cuttings for clonal propagation. Matthew hopes to use his career to keep forest and agricultural land undeveloped by helping landowners profit from the values of their land. He is also helping his family develop fruit and nut orchards on their land.