Jacqueline Olich, PhD

About

Jacqueline M. Olich, PhD, is an administrator, educator, author, speaker and entrepreneur with experience building partnerships and developing innovative interdisciplinary projects. She leads RTI's University Collaboration Office (UCO), which serves as a catalyst and hub for outreach at the university level, developing and managing partnerships with leading regional, national and international academic institutions. Prior to joining RTI, she was a member of the Graduate Faculty, Director of Graduate Studies in Russian and East European Studies and Associate Director of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s Center for Slavic, Eurasian and East European Studies. Dr. Olich implemented and oversaw programs for a Duke-UNC Title VI U.S. Department of Education National Resource Center and administered more than $1.5 million in student fellowships.

She co-founded Diba Industries, Durham, NC, and Danbury, CT, helping to grow annual revenues to $12M (FY 2003), launching two locations and successfully selling the company in 2004 to the multinational Halma Technology Group.

Dr. Olich has presented at more than 60 conference sessions or workshops and published in academic publications, including the Journal of the History of Childhood and Youth, the Journal of Multimedia History and the Encyclopedia of Russian History. Dr. Olich has served as a reviewer for The University of North Carolina Press, Environmental History, The Journal of the History of Childhood and Youth, and Canadian Slavonic Papers/Revue canadienne des slavistes. Most recently, she co-authored “North Carolina State University and RTI International Game-Changing Research Incentive Program (GRIP),” in Good Practice Series 2017: Case Studies on University-Industry Engagement. Edited by Arno Meerman and Thorsten Kliewe. University Industry Innovation Network, 2017.

She is a member of the 2016-2017 class of Leadership North Carolina (LNC), which works with state luminaries to improve North Carolina’s quality of life. Dr. Olich is an adjunct associate professor in the UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health’s Public Health Leadership Program and serves on the Steering Committee for the North Carolina State University Institute for Emerging Issues ReCONNECT NC initiative. A historian by training, she served on the Duke University NEH Next Generation PhD Advisory Committee. She received the Triangle Business Journal 2017 Women in Business Award in recognition of her commitment to mentoring. Dr Olich is a graduate and former Advisory Board member of the BRIDGES Academic Leadership for Women Program. 

Honors and Awards

RTI President’s Award
2021, Forethought: The RTI $5M+ Research Collaboration Challenge

Founding Member
2021, Chief (Washington, D.C. Branch)

Women in Business Award
2017, Triangle Business Journal

International Partnership Award for Collaboration
2017, Society of Research Administrators

Innovative Practices in Higher Education for UNC-Chapel Hill Interdisciplinary Symposium on Sustainability and Innovation in Global Contexts (Honorable Mention)
2011, Arizona State’s University Design Consortium International Awards

Education