[MUSIC]
>> My name is Gage Carling Duffin,
I am from the small farm town of Shelley,
Idaho, born and raised in Idaho.
I'm very proud of it.
Political Science and English Major.
I think this is technically my junior year.
I order chicken strips at just
about every restaurant I can.
I like trivia. I've watched every season of Jeopardy.
I like tattoos.
[LAUGHTER]
>> It was Spring break my freshman year
and everybody had already had
plans to go out, and do stuff, and leave.
It was my first semester of college and I was broke.
And on a Tuesday morning,
I just woke up at
eight o'clock and just walked
around campus into every building because I figured,
when am I ever going to have campus alone to myself?
I was like, I wonder if you can
get up into the bell tower,
and every door I found was locked, and I was annoyed.
I just tweeted about it,
and then the school responded.
Ryan Jensen was the Head of Social Media at that time,
and he just responded with some information saying,
"It was just unsafe",
which I accepted as an answer for a while,
but then over the Summer I just started
posting about it more regularly.
That was mostly just jokes
about me getting into the bell tower,
different memes, sometimes a video.
Like there's a video of a man getting arrested,
and so I tweeted it and said "It was
the USU Police detaining me after I broke in",
which I did not do.
I never broke the law in regards to the bell tower.
The start of that fall semester in 2019,
they offer me this internship and
I would just come in for meetings and
talk to them about what
the university could do better on social media,
what interactions could be better,
content and they'd like to see
maybe some stuff for the campus store.
Then when the pandemic hit, that kind of ended,
Matt Gerrish, who now runs the social media,
he contacted me and was just like, "Hey, you know,
we're going to let you in the bell tower,
right?" I was just like, "Huh?"
Then it evolved into this idea of like me taking students
digitally throughout campus and stuff
like that, and I just really took off from there.
It's a really unique opportunity
that not a lot of students have.
I am really grateful for it because I mean, one,
nobody gets to go on the bell tower, which is awesome,
and just touring other places on campus that
people might not know a ton about
or might not think a lot about.
The barn is really cool just
because who gets to go on there.
It's a lot of the exclusive stuff
that makes my heart happy.
Making a chocolate bar.
I know they give tours,
but I don't know if they let people do
that. It's awesome.
I remember before we started,
they were asking what other places we'd like to visit,
and I gave a list of demands,
not really, but places I would love to go.
I think the first one is the farm or dairy,
I'm not totally certain.
I'd love to visit the Spectrum, the Mav.
A lot of people really want me to go to the tunnels,
which I'm really nervous about.
Dark and scary places, not always fun.
There's a botanical garden in Kaysville.
I would love to go there.
I've always wanted to go there.
A lot of people don't know,
when I was 16, I was diagnosed
with a major depressive disorder.
I seem pretty humorous
when we're filming and things like that.
For me now, to manage my MDD,
one thing my mom helped me do is get into better routines,
growing up and taking care of myself physically.
My room has to stay clean so I can stay focused.
So I try to spend as much time with my roommates.
When I'm going through fun, I visit home
sometimes because that's a nice reset.
Some days I'm just sad,
and you can't really deal with
that in any other way than just feeling it.
Life is already hard enough as it is,
and I understand people have lots of different mindsets
and ways of coping with things that go on,
but humor has helped a lot.
I just like to joke.
I think for me a lot of things that bring
me happiness is just making people laugh,
even if it's a dumb small joke.
It's a lot of the reasons why I tweet
the stupid stuff I do,
just because I like making people happy,
laughing at dumb things, watching a funny,
weird YouTube video that
my roommate send me the weirdest
Pokemon memes, it's awesome.
Watch the Lego Movie,
one of the best comedies of all time.
I don't think people realize that.
Basically any movie featuring Seth Rogen,
but at the end of the day,
you need support of others.
[MUSIC]