What it means to be a Buckeye
[electronic music playing Carmen Ohio] MALE: You don't have to be here very long
to know that this Buckeye thing is amazing.
It doesn't matter if you think you don't have spirit, you will...because it's everywhere
and it's contagious.
FEMALE: It's really hard to put your finger on it, but it's just a feeling that you don't
get until you realize that you are a student or faculty member at one of the greatest universities
in the world.
FEMALE: I love Ohio State University.
I think it is a grand institution.
ARCHIE GRIFFIN: There is a spirit about Buckeyes that I think resonates throughout the world.
MALE: It just hits you when you walk on this campus, the feeling that people have and carry
with them for generations - that's what the tradition does.
MALE: I tell students, whether they are medical students or undergraduate students coming
here, Ohio State University is a way of life and that it will impact them professionally
and personally for the rest of their lives.
JAVAUNE ADAMS-GASTON: Students coming to OSU get to grow and things come at them and that
allows them to see themselves in a totally new light where they can see themselves in
the world, and what they will be able to accomplish.
CATHY LANNING: Everyone puts students first.
It's the support structure that's at Ohio State and it's there, it's deliberate and
you'll find it like that.
[snapping fingers] BERNIE SAVARESE: It's this living, breathing
place - it is there to provide all these opportunities and all these challenges for us to really
help us become the best that we can be, and I think we deliver on that promise everyday.
ROSA AILABOUNI: People really take the time to make a difference in your life and having
had that, I really want to make a difference in other people's lives.
[guitar strumming quietly] LINN VAN WOERKOM: Everything's here.
If you want an expert in physics, they're here.
If you are a physics major and you want to know something about politics, we have experts
in political science.
You can go across campus and you're talking with them, they're your teachers.
And then you get a degree and you go off and do policy work.
There's amazing things that happen here because we have got world leaders.
DR.
DAVID E. SCHULLER: This is the big leagues.
We've been able to recruit people from universities all around the country because they are drawn
to the immensity of the expertise that exists on this campus.
MARIA MONICA GIUSTI: I have had the chance to live on the west coast, in the east coast.
I have to say that I love Columbus the most.
There is something about the culture and the people.
KAREN BELL: On Thursday night you can go to the symphony that's on The Oval, on Friday
night you can go to the Wexner center.
On Saturday night go downtown to the Gallery Hop.
There's just always something to do.
ALEXA ODOM: They tell you join one of the 950 organizations we have because they know
that the classroom is important but so is everything else that you can learn through
being in an organization, through doing a club sport, through doing inter murals.
Ohio State, I loved, because of the opportunities they put in front of me and said, "Jump in!
Do what you can!
Dream big!
And use this university to make those dreams come true."
BRENDAN ADAMS: I knew that here at Ohio State I was going to have the best of the best when
it came to facilities.
We have the Recreation Physical Activity Center, the new Thompson Library, the Ohio Union - it
is our Student Union and you can tell that, you know, its very personal to us here at
Ohio State.
[xylophone plays Carmen Ohio] KEVIN BOYLE: It's really the whole set of
traditions - its the buildings, it's the campus, with the football tradition - the O-H-I-O
tradition all of that stuff does is it makes people feel this intimate connection with
each other.
[CROWD: O-H] It's the feeling that the students are part of something bigger than themselves.
[CROWD: I-O!]
ARCHIE GRIFFIN: Woody Hayes talked to us as football players about paying it forward.
Well, I think that's caught on with Ohio State because people do pay forward.
They like doing things to help others.
DANNY TRAN: This is definitely The University if you want to make a difference in the world
- and that's wonderful to be a part of.
ROB BONACCI: To know that I have all the tools going out into the world is a big credit to
Ohio State and I really think it's going to help me in being able to achieve those goals
in medicine and being able to affect a greater change.
LAURA KRAUS: This place has in its essence the ability to take somebody who doesn't come
in with a lot and give them a lot - experiences that no one else can match.
It changes lives.
JOEY CLARK: You can come from nothing and walk away with everything, and I think that's
something Ohio State truly exemplifies - giving opportunities to anyone from any walk of life
and letting them know that they can be successful.
MALE: I've seen kids come here and be completely changed by their experiences here and when
they walk out of here, they are going to do something really extraordinarily valuable
with themselves and with their lives - and they've done that, I haven't done that, they've
done that.
ADAM WAGNER: Ohio State can give you so much.
All you have to do is be able to accept it.
The rewards will be so great and you will grow as a person and it's something to behold.
[electronic music]