You never know where you’ll come across a fellow Buckeye. My big outdoor trip this summer was a visit to Yellowstone National Park with my son. We had a great time and did three great day hikes in the park in addition to visiting the major geological features. On our last day we were in the Mammoth area and did a day hike to the top of Bunsen Peak, a moderately challenging hike with some great views of the northern areas of the park that I’d highly recommend. This peak happened to have a hiker’s log that my son and I signed. A few minutes later a solo hiker bopped over to us and let us know she was from Columbus, too, having seen our entry in the log. I probed a bit further and I discover that Lindsay Civin is an undergraduate student studying Environmental Science in SENR. She was spending the summer working as a Conservation Fellow at the Montana Conservation Corps and she was day hiking during some free time. She spoke glowingly of her experience in SENR and shared how her coursework had prepared her for the conservation management activities she was doing this summer. It was great that this chance occurrence allowed us to share an amazing view. I hope you all had similar moments this summer and who knows, maybe I’ll cross paths with you next summer atop some peak.
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We are gearing up for classes this fall. We once again have a large class of incoming students and the total number of students served by our School is the largest it’s been in decades. While the recent news reports of the latest COVID surge are disconcerting, I am optimistic that we’ll manage safely as a very high percentage of folks on campus have been vaccinated and indoor masks are required.
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It’ll be great having many more students on campus compared to last year, with more residential instruction and student activities. I know many of our students are feeling a bit rusty regarding their study skills and their ability to perform well in a physical classroom (for some students, they’ve been entirely on-line since March of 2020), but our team is ready to help them succeed. We’ll also be offering full field and lab experiences at close to a “normal” quality of delivery. When I was talking to Lindsay atop that mountain in Wyoming, she was sharing how valuable trainings such as pesticide applicator certification and chainsaw safety are to her work. Last year, we were restricted from offering some of these trainings.
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I wish all of you a safe and healthy fall and look forward to sharing more of our progress during the coming year. Best wishes and Go Bucks!
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