Ohio State University - Student Life

Student Life

The Office of Student Life is responsible for many of the outside-the-classroom aspects of student life at Ohio State. Among these are student housing; food service; health, wellness and counseling; activities, organizations and leadership development; recreation and intramurals. The Office of Student Life also operates the Schottenstein Center, the Fawcett Center, the Blackwell Inn, the Ohio Union, the Drake Events Center, and the Wilce Student Health Center, named for football coach and university physician John Wilce.

Ohio State has several student managed publications and media outlets. The Makio is the official yearbook. The Makio’s sales plummeted by 60% during the early 1970s; the organization went bankrupt and stopped publication during the late 1970s. The book was revived from 1985 to 1994 and has since been revived again in 2000 thanks to several student organizations. The Lantern is the school's daily newspaper and has operated as a laboratory newspaper in the School of Communication (formerly the School of Journalism) since 1881. Mosaic is a literary magazine published by Ohio State, which features undergraduate fiction, poetry, and art. The Sundial is a student written and published humor magazine. Founded in 1911 it is one of the oldest humor magazines in the country, After a 17 year hiatus in which no magazine was published it has recently been revived. Ohio State has two improvisational comedy groups, The 8th Floor Improv and Fishbowl Improv, who regularly perform long and short-form improv around campus and across the U.S. There are two student-run radio stations on campus. OHIO.FM is the music station and Scarlet and Gray Sports Radio broadcasts eleven different Ohio State sports. Both stations broadcast on an Internet audio stream (no broadcast signals are available in Columbus). Students also operate a local cable TV channel known as Buckeye TV, which airs primarily on the campus closed cable system operated by the Office of the Chief Information Officer (OCIO).

The marching band is also a longstanding tradition at Ohio State. It is the largest all-brass and percussion band in the world. The traditional school songs from "Carmen Ohio" to "Hang on Sloopy" to "Fight the Team Across the Field", are arranged to fit this instrumentation. The band is famous for "Script Ohio", during which the band marches single-file through the curves of the word "Ohio", much like a pen writes the word, all the while playing the French march "Le Regiment de Sambre et Meuse." At the end of the performance, the "i" in "Ohio" is "dotted" by a high-stepping senior sousaphone player.

Notable among a number of songs commonly played and sung at various events such as commencement and convocation, and athletic games are: Across the Field, The Ohio State University fight song and "Buckeye Battle Cry".

The tradition of high quality bands is not limited to the football field. OSU's School of Music contains several high quality concert bands consisting of graduate and undergraduate music majors and non-music majors. The OSU Wind Symphony, frequently receives praise on the national level, recently having been selected to perform at the 2003 College Band Directors National Association (CBDNA) Convention and at the Ohio Music Educators Association Conference in 2001, 2004, 2006, and 2008; the OSU Symphonic Band performed in 2007. The OSU Wind Symphony has recently released its newest album, "Southern Harmony," the Naxos Label in 2009. The Ohio State Jazz Ensemble performed at the Montreux Jazz Festival in 1975, 1978,1986, 1996, and 2001. It has also appeared at the Mexico City International Jazz Festival in 1990 and the North Sea Jazz Festival in 1986, 1996, and 2001. In addition there is also an OSU Symphony Orchestra.

In addition to strong bands, the university is also recognized for outstanding choral performance. The Ohio State Men's Glee Club, formed in 1875. In 1990, led by Professor James Gallagher, the Men's Glee Club participated in the International Musical Eisteddfod in Llangolen, Wales and won the male chorus competition by an unprecedented 20 points before, in a unanimous decision of the judges, being named "Choir of the World"—the first American choir to win such an honor. The Glee Club is under the direction of Dr. Robert J. Ward. The Ohio State Women's Glee Club was established in 1903. In the group’s recent past, under the leadership of Dr. Hilary Apfelstadt, the Glee Club has been selected to sing for state and regional conferences of the Ohio Music Education Association and the American Choral Directors Association. Beginning its season under the direction of Dr. Richard Schnipke, the OSU Women’s Glee Club was honored to have the opportunity to sing for the Ohio Choral Directors Association annual conference in June 2010.

Ohio State's "Buckeye Bullet" electric car broke the world record for the fastest speed by an electric vehicle on October 3, 2004 with a speed of 271.737 mph (437.3 km/h) at the Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah. The vehicle also holds the US record for fastest electric vehicle with a speed of 314.958 mph (506.9 km/h), and peak timed mile speed of 321.834 mph (517.9 km/h). The vehicle was designed, built and managed by a team of engineering students at the university's "Center for Automotive Research-Intelligent Transportation" (CAR-IT). In 2007, Buckeye Bullet 2 was launched. This follow-up effort was a collaboration between Ohio State engineering students and engineers from the Ford Motor Company and will seek to break the landspeed record for hydrogen cell powered vehicles.

A unique aspect to Ohio State's multi billion dollar endowment is the Student Investment Management Program. Upperclass finance students taking Business Finance 724 are given the opportunity to manage a twenty million dollar investment fund. Returns from the student managed funds often outperform the S&P 500 and frequently even the university's own professional fund managers.

The Residence Hall Advisory Council (RHAC), which is a representative body of all students living in the University's residence halls, helps evaluate and improve the living conditions of the residence halls.

According to the Student Organization Office in the Ohio Union, Agricultural Education Society is the oldest student organization on campus. That claim is often disputed by Men's Glee Club, but after consultation with Ohio Union Staff, Agricultural Education Society was named as the university's oldest organization.

Jon Stewart hosted The Daily Show's "Battlefield Ohio: The Daily Show’s Midwest Midterm Midtacular" from Ohio State's Roy Bowen Theatre during the week of October 30 to November 2, 2006.