True livestock stewards

If you didn’t attend a graduation in the past couple of weekends, it might be because you simply chose not to. It has been graduation central throughout the Great Plains of America, from kindergarten to high school, community college to graduate school. We attended the ceremony at Oklahoma State University as my nephew Grayson Tedrow graduated with a degree in Animal Science. In the past 20 years, I have spent quite a bit of time on the OSU campus and have spoken in front of many students and groups in Stillwater. In the world of junior livestock exhibitors, OSU is the dream destination for so many kids. Today I thought I would dive into that a little more.

[

](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!ZozA!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ffb4ec750-aab6-4b69-b7f2-4eceff56bcd5_4096x3072.jpeg) As for our chosen profession, the current culture for students interested in livestock agriculture at OSU could not be more right. That jumps out at you as they are home to the most recently crowned National Champion Livestock Judging team. That honor has about the same recruiting momentum as having a national champion football team; all the highly skilled talent wants to be a part of the program. My observation is that the undergraduate culture at OSU is much deeper than simply a very competitive livestock judging team.

The culture of the Stillwater community feels very rural and not like a city that’s home to 50,000 plus. I have had good discussions through the years with folks about the size of the towns that are home to the Land Grant colleges and how it matters to the culture of the campus. Size matters but the folks that make up the administration and faculty are primarily responsible for creating and maintaining a culture that attracts or repels kids from their campus. These kids are likely less concerned about the “quality of education” because they want to be at a place that offers great experiences and builds lifetime industry relationships.

OSU continues to have farms where kids get hands on experience. Livestock produced at this college compete at events around the nation. On the first day in the area, I heard about a “fantastic York boar” that was raised on the farm. Yes, it is important for this segment of college students to get hands on as much as possible. Learning in the classroom is essential but learning by doing is not some outdated concept here.

I learned a couple of things this week that I did not know about OSU. It was founded in 1890 while Oklahoma was still a territory. It did not become a state until 1907. With the introduction of the Morrill Act of 1862, Oklahoma was able to create Oklahoma Agricultural and Mechanical College. From the OSU website, I found this very interesting:

OAMC’s first students assembled for class on December 14, 1891, even though there were no buildings, no books, and no curriculum. The college’s first students attended classes in the Stillwater Congregational Church. The original campus consisted of 200 acres of prairie that were donated by four local homesteaders. The college’s first six graduates received their diplomas in 1896.

By the 1950s the college had grown substantially and in 1957 Oklahoma A&M became The Oklahoma State University for Agriculture and Applied Science.

For the record, 1950 was the same year that Colorado switched from Colorado A&M to Colorado State University. They both site the same reason which was to add liberal arts programs and get away from being viewed only as an “AGGIE” school. I contend that maybe these schools would be better off today if they specialized in ag and left the liberal arts to other colleges.

I do have one criticism for something I witnessed at OSU last week. We attended the College of Agriculture graduation and only heard the word “agriculture” used once and that was in “Welcome to the College of Agriculture graduation.” I heard the word farm mentioned once by the Keynote Speaker who grew up on a farm. I never heard the word livestock or land mentioned once but I heard innovation, technology and AI (and they were not talking about artificial insemination.)

I mentioned this to several faculty after the ceremony and their response was “Yes, that is the current culture.” I contend that is the culture at all institutions of higher learning today and someone needs to address this. For quite some time we have witnessed Land Grant Colleges chasing cash instead of kids. That culture will catch up to all of them at some point but at least those still excited about the concept of “Go Pokes” have been able to rise above it all and maintain a welcoming culture for true livestock stewards.

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