On January 26, 2006, Governor Phil Bredesen announced plans to establish a highly competitive, free, residential math and science high school for Tennessee high school juniors and seniors under the leadership of UT, with cooperation from the Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Initial plans were for the academy to be housed on the campus of the UT Space Institute in Tullahoma, but bringing dormitories up to codes applicable to high school residential facilities made that impractical. The decision was then made to use two cottages on the grounds of the Tennessee School for the Deaf for the initial 24 students and to expand on available land on that campus.
The initial class (2007) was limited to high school juniors, with a curriculum designed around an academic calendar of four-to-seven week periods known as “modules.” Each module focused on an essential question that could range from fundamental physics to an examination of science in a larger context. A full-time residential staff member, a principal, recruiters, and teachers worked under the administration of the academy’s executive director.
Following a three-year pilot of TGA, the Governor’s Office and State Department of Education concluded that the program costs associated with a residential school were too great. In January 2010 the announcement was made that the program would transition from a residential to a nonresidential model. The academy remained open through May 2011 to allow the students currently enrolled to complete their courses of study and internships at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. With the Knox County Schools establishing a special academy in the former L&N Railroad Station, UT partnered to enhance that entity in lieu of continuing a separate program.