Ohio State University President Michael V. Drake and students visited Northwest
Ohio for this year's state tour. Their first stop? The Red Pig Inn in Ottawa
where President Drake surprised students alumni and supporters from Putnam County
students on the Buckeye bus were grateful for the experience
So the state tour, our specific part of it it's called the Buckeye bus it is with the Office of Student Life so
we follow President Drake state tour around Ohio and our goal is just to
interact with the state really spread Buckeye love because we're so focused on
Columbus and everything we do on our campus so state tour is really an
opportunity to go out into the communities go to local businesses do
service projects and reach out with alumni to really show that we appreciate
them and all they do for Ohio State and really see what makes up the state of Ohio.
What you're going to see is we deal with a lot of raw vegetables raw ingredients
coming right out of the fields of Ohio
The next stop was the Campbell Soup Supply Company plant in Napolean Ohio which is the
company's largest US manufacturing location. From there they got a
behind-the-scenes look at what goes on at Ohio State's
Agricultural Research & Development Center in Fremont .
And our goal here is to test to see if this mycorrhizal fungus will make that plant even heartier and healthier.
It's been honestly very eye-opening I'm not originally from Ohio so I came straight
from home straight to Columbus and I haven't seen what the rest of Ohio looks
like but to really interact with the communities around me it's been totally
life-changing I think I had a severe lack of appreciation for how much they
really do for us and especially going to like the Agricultural Research Station
and going to the various companies that do sponsor us I think it was really cool
to like figure out what goes on behind the scenes and like what makes us who we truly are.
We are beginning the celebration of our sesquicentennial
something that we've been thinking about for about a hundred and forty nine and a
half years and and now here we are so quick.
President Drake kicked off
Ohio State's sesquicentennial at the Rutherford B Hayes Presidential Library
and Museum he reminded the audience of the
importance of the university's land-grant mission.
We've stayed true to that mission of being able to be a place where the sons and daughters of
the people of our community could be educated in ways that would allow us to
advance the community forward.
The trip also included a service project at Mercy
Health Hospital in Seneca County.
I think it's an amazing opportunity for students
not only to interact with students outside of your typical groups your
clubs and your majors then you get to interact with other Ohio State faculty
from agronomists in Northwest Ohio to the president's you know employees and then
you also get to you know meet so many amazing Ohio State alumni which is great
but then also you get to meet people of the communities of Ohio and you get to
make connections that you probably would never you know you would never make if
you didn't go on this bus.
First of all, you probably don't know but we have today 350 employees from Ohio State here at our campus.
24 miles away from Mercy Health the group along with Brutus were able to make more
connections with those at the corporate headquarters of Marathon Petroleum.
Headquartered in Findlay Ohio, Marathon Petroleum Corporation is one of the
largest petroleum product refiners marketers and distributors in the United States.
Last but certainly not least they stopped for a sweet treat at Jersey
drive-in ice cream shop .
Aubrey Watkins a current member of the Ohio State
University Marching Band is an employee of Jersey and says the
tour was a cool experience.
For any student that is given this opportunity I
say take it take it and be extremely open-minded about it because you're
gonna walk away with so many different learning experiences especially myself I
came in here thinking you know I don't really know what's going on I kind of
just got invited on this bus tour I get to meet President Drake like it's gonna
be a cool experience but now I've met some of the coolest people I've met
students from the spear squad I've met I got to meet like the drum major I get to
meet students they're doing all sorts of neat things and we all exist in the same
space but we don't even really know of each other.
The next state tour is in
August and maybe just maybe we'll be coming to your city I'm Ben Johnson for
Ohio State news