Overview
ORAU is a nonprofit federal contractor and university consortium that mobilizes expertise from its 150+ member universities to advance science, health, and education. It manages the Oak Ridge Institute for Science and Education (ORISE) for the DOE, running internships, fellowships, and research programs to grow the STEM workforce. Its teams deliver scientific assessment, health and environmental services, emergency preparedness, epidemiology, and grants management under government contracts and partner collaborations. Its goal is to expand national science capacity and public-sector capabilities by connecting universities, labs, and government programs through practical, collaboratively funded solutions.
About ORAU
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Industries
Company Size
501-1,000
Company Stage
N/A
Total Funding
N/A
Headquarters
Oak Ridge, Tennessee
Founded
1946
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ORAU Rural Health Research Innovation Cluster Workshop aims to bridge the rural health gap. For many Americans, access to quality health care depends on something as simple and as significant as geography. A hospital may be hours away. A specialist may only visit a community a few days each month. A shortage of health care workers can mean longer wait times, fewer services and difficult choices for families already facing challenges. But across rural communities, researchers, health care leaders, policymakers and innovators are working to change that reality. To help find solutions to the challenges affecting rural communities across the United States, ORAU convened its first-ever Rural Health Research Innovation Cluster (RIC) Workshop on Aug. 6, 2026. Cluster is an interesting word, right? In this case, think of a cluster as a grouping of like-minded people and educational institutions coalescing around a specific topic or idea. The workshop was designed around a simple idea: solving rural health challenges requires collaboration. It provided a space where more than 100 people-representatives from 30 member institutions of ORAU's University Consortium-shared ideas, sparked collaborations, began building partnerships and explored solutions that have the potential to improve health outcomes. Discussion and interactive sessions centered on four strategic priority areas: workforce development and retention, women's health, access to care, and preparedness and resilience. Workshop participants spent the morning individually identifying what they think are important issues and potential solutions, then worked in small groups during the afternoon to find areas of common interest and consensus around the idea of what could be accomplished a one-million-dollar grant. By bringing together experts from different disciplines and connecting researchers with communities, the RIC has the potential to identify new approaches to some of the most complex health issues facing rural America. It's important to note that the workshop is the very first step in the work of ORAU's Rural Health RIC, said Casey Thomas, ORAU strategic partnerships and engagement manager. Because ORAU boasts an extensive and engaged University Consortium, it was important to begin the process with members of our elite network of academic institutions. "Academic institutions play an important role in rural health innovation by serving as research partners, workforce development pipelines, innovation hubs, sources of technical expertise, and connectors between communities and resources," Thomas said. Universities can help identify emerging challenges, evaluate interventions and train the next generation of health professionals. Still, Thomas said there was an incredible outpouring of interest from community organizations, health care providers, industry partners and other stakeholders who want to get involved in the RIC's work. Thomas said, based on the input and data collected during the workshop, next steps could include additional workshops and the development of workgroups and project teams. "Stay tuned," she said. "There is so much more to come." Connecting the people closest to the challenges. One in five Americans lives in a rural community, and rural communities often face overlapping issues, including shortages of health care professionals, limited access to specialty services, geographic isolation, transportation challenges, aging infrastructure, economic barriers, and increasing demand for chronic disease management and preventive care. "These challenges are shaped by the unique needs of individual communities," said Brenda Blunt, ORAU senior director of public health solutions. "Rural health challenges are interconnected and cannot be addressed through a single intervention, which means there is no one-size-fits-all solution to these challenges." The complexity of rural health requires collaboration across disciplines, but experts working on rural health challenges often feel a sense of isolation because they don't know anyone else working on these issues. Such was the case of Bonnie Spring, Ph.D., Krafft Professor of Behavioral and Social Medicine and director of the Blue Cross Center for Rural Health Research and Policy at Florida State University. Spring said she has spent much of her career studying chronic disease risk behaviors in urban settings. Since taking on the role as director of the Blue Cross Center at FSU, Spring said she has been fascinated by and drawn to the unique challenges of rural health, particularly because of the lack of research and funding focused on these challenges. However, Spring felt like an island to herself. "I am completely isolated, I don't know other people who do work in that area, so this (the Rural Health RIC workshop) was a chance to find a community and learn what other people are doing, she said. Rather than working in isolation, RIC participants created connections between educational institutions that may approach rural health from different perspectives but share the same goal. The result is a stronger network focused on turning research into action. Networking and finding opportunities to collaborate was a critical takeaway from the workshop for Megan Undeberg, Ph.D., professor and assistant dean of Rural Health in the Department of Pharmacotherapy at Washington State University. "The best part of the day was seeing that lots of like-minded people exist across the United States," said Undeberg, who was in a breakout group on workforce recruitment and retention. "There were 17 or 18 people, and we all are thinking along the same lines and all having common goals. Now there's this group of people who can put our heads together to find funding, find shared opportunities and find ways to grow recruitment and retention of our rural health providers." Preparing for the future of rural health. The future of rural health will require creativity, partnership and a willingness to rethink traditional approaches. The Rural Health RIC Workshop represents an important first step toward building that future by creating a network where ideas can grow, partnerships can develop and research can move beyond the page and into communities. At its core, ORAU's Rural Health RIC is about connection - researchers with communities, ideas with opportunities, innovation with impact. Improving rural health is not just about addressing today's challenges, it's about building a stronger, more connected health care future for generations to come.
ORAU receives two National Safety Council awards for its commitment to occupational safety. June 24, 2026 ORAU has been recognized with two awards for achievement in occupational safety from the National Safety Council (NSC): the Occupational Excellence Achievement Award and the Six Million Work Hours Award. The Occupational Excellence Achievement Award is given to companies that record exceptional safety numbers during the previous calendar year. To qualify for this award, ORAU experienced zero fatalities during the previous calendar year, and our lost-workday case incident rate was equal to or less than 50% of the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) rate for our industry, as classified by North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) Code. ORAU's lost-workday case incident rate is 0.00 compared to the BLS industry average rate of 1.2. All data submitted to the NSC is self-reported and verified. ORAU received the Six Million Work Hours Award for continued work without the occurrence of an occupational injury or illness involving days away from work for at least six million consecutive work hours. The six-million-hour record was recorded between June 28, 2022, and March 31, 2026. Eligibility is based on self-reported data submitted by the participating workplace in accordance with Occupational Safety and Health Administration standards. "We take great pride in our strong workplace safety record," said James Buckner, ORAU director of Environment, Safety and Health. "Being recognized with these awards serves as a testament to the outstanding teamwork, proactive communication, and commitment to safety that exists across every department in our company."
ORAU named winner of 2026 EPEAT Award. Global Electronics Council recognition highlights sustainable purchasing practices June 23, 2026 ORAU has been recognized as a 2026 EPEAT Sustainable Purchaser Award winner. The EPEAT (Electronic Product Environmental Assessment Tool) award celebrates leaders in sustainable electronics procurement. The award comes from the Global Electronics Council (GEC), the non-profit organization that manages the EPEAT ecolabel. ORAU has received EPEAT recognition every year since the award's inception in 2015. ORAU was among the organizations honored for their commitment to purchasing EPEAT-registered products in four categories: computers and displays, imaging equipment, mobile phones, and servers. The GEC awards one star for each category. The GEC works with manufacturers, procurement professionals, electronics recyclers, government entities, trade associations and environmental advocacy groups to evaluate and endorse environmentally responsible products. The EPEAT registry tool provides companies with a simplified way to purchase environmentally trustworthy electronics and to quantify their energy consumption reduction. "Receiving the EPEAT award reflects ORAU's ongoing commitment to sustainable business practices and purchasing processes, and the achievement of goals to reduce electrical consumption and minimize waste and toxic substances released into the environment," said Bridget Jones, ORAU procurement analyst. ORAU's Information Technology Services (ITS) Department is devoted to technology and electronic product support, Jones said, adding that the ITS team works diligently to research and develop IT purchasing standards where the products meet customer and business needs as well as support ORAU's energy efficiency and green purchasing goals. "ORAU is dedicated to establishing and maintaining the highest standards of sustainable purchasing across all functional areas, including ITS, Facilities, Procurement, and other business units, all working together to ensure compliance and support of purchasing EPEAT registered IT products and equipment," Jones said "As a contractor we continue to strive to be excellent stewards of government resources and purchasing dollars, and we are intentional in our sustainable electronics purchasing."
Stories of technology, innovation, & entrepreneurship in the Southeast. Nuclear in Oak Ridge, quantum in Chattanooga: Tennessee's two-front pitch at the TVC Summit. The Tennessee Valley Corridor was organized in 1995 with a vision to link the "Oak Ridge Corridor" to the Department of Energy, Tennessee Valley Authority and the University of Tennessee to showcase the wealth of brainpower in the mid-East Tennessee region. For a conference that attracts representatives from a footprint of 13 congressional districts in Tennessee, Alabama, Kentucky, Virginia, and North Carolina, the 2026 Tennessee Valley Corridor (TVC) Summit focused largely on two arenas where Tennessee is becoming a heavy hitter: advanced energy, anchored by nuclear work in Oak Ridge, and advanced computing, anchored by quantum work in Chattanooga. A sit-down with the U.S. Deputy Secretary of Energy. To lead the conversation around Tennessee's role in the national energy strategy, U.S. Deputy Secretary of Energy James P. Danly attended the conference's first day. Teknovation sat down with the Deputy Secretary to learn how the Department of Energy (DOE) is executing its Genesis Mission, and how Oak Ridge is playing a core role in it. He was effusive about Tennessee, ORNL, and the public support for DOE's missions in East Tennessee, and his comments bore that out. "Oak Ridge National Laboratory is one of the jewels of the national lab system. It has some of the fastest computing power in the DOE footprint, it has an extraordinary wealth of human capital, physicists, and engineers, and it also has an extremely appreciative population who loves Oak Ridge and is proud of the legacy for the United States," Danly said. The Genesis Mission was first announced in November 2025 at the Tennessee Advanced Energy Business Council (TAEBC) Opportunities in Energy event by the DOE Chief of Staff, Carl Coe. It was presented as a plan to connect and leverage the assets of all 17 U.S. National Labs to build one unified scientific platform for accelerated discovery. The mission, as detailed by the DOE, also aims to connect academia and private industry to help meet that strategic vision. "We're trying to include as many people as possible, so that we can achieve our goals as quickly as we can," Danly said. It's only been a few months since the rollout of that national objective; however, Danly said early data and collaborations have given him hope for the ambitious project. To build a unified platform, the DOE will need new data centers, more nuclear power and advanced energy to power them, and a more robust onshore supply chain. Tennessee is focused on the nuclear pipeline. "We have been trying not just to get prototypes like small modular reactors (SMRs) to market, but also ensure that the entire ecosystem, from fuel fabrication and processing all the way to ultimate disposition, is made available. It requires different steps in the supply chain, all of which we're trying to support simultaneously," he explained. "We can't do this without private enterprise and academia being part of it." Academia on the research side, yes. But also on the talent and workforce pipeline side of the equation. The DOE is trusting that universities can produce viable candidates to fill the highly technical roles of the future. At the TVC Summit, Randy Boyd, president of the University of Tennessee System, participated in a workforce panel alongside university leaders from Oak Ridge Associated Universities, Chattanooga State Community College, The University of Alabama in Huntsville, Vanderbilt University, and Tennessee Tech University to discuss how nuclear workforce development is a shared, multi-state priority. And on the private sector side, the TVC hosted a panel conversation with representatives from BWXT, TRISO-X, and Bechtel, all companies that are building the nuclear technologies of the future. Quantum conversations. Another field whose capabilities aren't fully realized is quantum computing. Chattanooga has leaned into its emerging identity as a quantum hub through organizations like the Chattanooga Quantum Collaborative (CQC), led by Charlie Brock. Between the work at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga's Quantum Center and the quantum network run by EPB, Chattanooga's municipal utility, which the company bills as the first industry-led, commercially available quantum network in the U.S., the summit framed quantum as another field where the Southeast, and Tennessee specifically, can compete. In addition to nuclear and quantum, the summit also featured conversations about national security and space. The TVC, founded in 1995 and headquartered in Knoxville, positions itself as a coalition linking the Tennessee Valley's federal laboratories, universities, utilities, and the private sector. Its summit has become one of the more substantive gatherings for anyone tracking the intersection of federal R&D investment, energy policy, and regional economic development in the South. Like what you've read?
Lexi Sinnott named director of ORAU Facilities and Transportation Department. April 8, 2026 ORAU named Alexia (Lexi) Sinnott as its new director of the ORAU Facilities and Transportation Department (FTD). Sinnott's background includes 20 years of property/logistics experience with the last 11 years in FTD, where she has served as interim director for the past couple months in addition to being in various FTD leadership positions for years, including logistics manager; Records, Property & Relocation Services manager; and Property Management team lead. She also served as a U.S. Department of Energy innovative reasoning contractor for property for three years and a logistical specialist while in the U.S. Army for six years. She earned her Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Maryland and holds her project management certification along with several other certifications. "Lexi's extensive experience, proven leadership and dedication to excellence make her the ideal choice to lead ORAU's Facilities and Transportation Department," said ORAU Chief Financial and Business Operations Officer Phil Andrews. "Her deep understanding of logistics and property management, combined with her commitment to innovation, will undoubtedly drive continued success in this vital role."
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About ORAU
We're working on gathering enough insights on this company, check back soon!
Industries
Company Size
501-1,000
Company Stage
N/A
Total Funding
N/A
Headquarters
Oak Ridge, Tennessee
Founded
1946
ORAU is Hiring for 35 Jobs on Simplify!
Find jobs on Simplify and start your career today