David Keim

Director, Communications and Community Engagement

David Keim leads the Communications and Community Engagement Directorate and serves as Chief Communications Officer of Oak Ridge National Laboratory. His responsibilities include media and community relations, internal communications, creative services, protocol visits, Lab events, and the corporate giving of Lab operator UT-Battelle, LLC. His staff provides strategic support for Lab leadership and ensures the quality of science writing, technical editing, design, photography, and videography across ORNL’s diverse research portfolio.

In 2017 and 2018, Keim led a design team from across the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge Reservation to create a new home for the American Museum Science of Energy, earning the Secretary of Energy’s Achievement Award.

Before joining ORNL in 2012, Keim was director of Public and Governmental Affairs at the Y-12 National Security Complex. He previously was an editor and reporter for the Knoxville (Tennessee) News Sentinel, where he created the Greater Knoxville Business Journal (now Knox.biz), launched its annual Book of Lists, and received local, state, and national awards for his writing and reporting.

Keim is a board member of the Oak Ridge Foundation, the American Museum of Science and Energy Foundation, and Second Harvest Food Bank of East Tennessee. He previously chaired the Distinguished Professionals Education Institute, which recruited professionals to public school classrooms in Knoxville and Nashville before transitioning its mission to the Knox Education Foundation in 2023.

He is a graduate of the Leadership Knoxville class of 2006 and the University of Tennessee Chancellor’s Associates class of 2010. He earned a bachelor’s degree in journalism from the Honors Tutorial College at Ohio University.