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Otterbein’s Equestrian Teams finished fifth nationally in both the Intercollegiate Dressage Association (IDA) and the Intercollegiate Horse Show Association (IHSA). The Dressage Team competed from April 22-24 at the National Equestrian Center in Lake St. Louis, MO. The Hunt Seat Team took to the national arena at the IHSA National Finals from May 1–3 at Tryon International in Mill Spring, NC.
Otterbein welcomed approximately 650 new first-year students on campus this fall! Bonus: Otterbein also welcomed 91 new transfer and adult students!
Incoming Class Overview
88% earned a 3.0 GPA or higher.
Most Popular Names Male: Jacob, Female: Grace & Olivia (tie!)
35% are student-athletes.
43% of the class is Pell Grant-eligible
34.5% self-identifies as students of color (an increase of 2.8%).
27 states represented, including Ohio.
Top 5 Academic Departments by declared major:
In a matchup of two teams receiving votes in the AVCA Top 25 Poll, the Otterbein University volleyball team picked up a gritty 3-2 victory over Wittenberg University. With the win, head coach Monica Wright earned her 400th career win — coming against her alma mater. The Cards are seeking their fifth straight OAC title this season.
As a new year of academic competition begins, the Cardinals have plenty to celebrate. Here’s a look back at the accomplishments that defined last year:
| 4 NCAA Tournament Team berths | 4 OAC Players of the Year |
| 6 NCAA Individual National Qualifiers | 4 OAC Freshmen of the Year |
| 2 OAC Regular Season Champions | 127 Academic All-OAC honorees |
| 4 OAC Tournament (or championship event) Champions | 89 All-OAC honorees |
| 8 OAC Individual Champions | 3 OAC Coaching Staffs of the Year |
| 45 CSC Academic All-District selections |
– Lenny Leibowitz, professor and chair of Theatre and Dance
After serving Otterbein behind the scenes for over 26 years, the spotlight was on Elizabeth Minnich Saltzgiver ’99, managing director of the Department of Theatre and Dance, when she received the 2026 Model Citizen Award in May.
“She serves as the heart and engine of our department and is widely admired for her compassionate leadership, dedication, and commitment to mentorship,” wrote Lenny Leibowitz, professor and chair of Theatre and Dance.
Thanks to Saltzgiver, the show went on after Cowan Hall experienced a flood crisis shortly before the spring musical was scheduled to run earlier this year. She coordinated extensive clean-up, drainage, and relocation of the costume shop.
“Her leadership ensured that students, colleagues, and collaborators felt supported and respected throughout the process. Thanks to her efforts, audiences attending Cinderella — a large-scale production with more than 100 handcrafted costumes and a cast of 35 — remained entirely unaware of the disruption behind the scenes,” wrote Leibowitz.
Saltzgiver manages more than 1,000 subscription orders annually and oversees outreach initiatives, including social media engagement, local media partnerships, talkbacks, school outreach, and Lifelong Learning programming. She mentors student employees in marketing, box office operations, front-of-house, management, and public relations — many of whom go on to successful careers at major venues nationwide, including on Broadway.
Otterbein University namesake Bishop Philip William Otterbein was born in Dillenburg, Germany, on June 3, 1726. He moved to Pennsylvania in 1752 and became one of the founding bishops of the Church of the United Brethren in Christ, a forebearer of the United Methodist Church, in 1767.
This fall, Otterbein began enrolling students in the only program for exotic animal veterinary technology in the country. Otterbein’s new Wildlife and Exotic Animal Veterinary Technology major combines Otterbein University’s Equine Science and Zoo and Conservation Science coursework with Columbus State Community College (CSCC) Veterinary Technology courses for a unique offering. Students in the program will graduate with both associate and bachelor’s degrees.
Wildlife and Exotic Animal Veterinary Technology graduates will be prepared to enter the workforce immediately after graduation in a variety of careers, including mixed-animal practices, small animal clinics with an exotic animal focus, wildlife rehabilitation centers, zoos, laboratories, and more.
Learn more about Wildlife and Exotic Animal Veterinary Technology >
Jimmy Lump ’11, Senior Vice President, Werth PR
Mike Hudoba, Associate Professor and Chair, Otterbein Department of Engineering, Computer Science, and Physics
Kristin Sutton ’09, Government Relations Manager, Columbus Metropolitan Library
Research consistently shows that even brief encounters with nature, such as five minutes outdoors, can lift mood, reduce stress, and restore attention. Inspired by those findings, Professor Sarah Bouchard, Department of Biology and Earth Science, used her sabbatical to develop Otterbein Outdoors, an initiative designed to encourage the Otterbein community to connect with nature. Central to the program is a web-based interactive map highlighting outdoor spaces and naturebased opportunities on and near campus.
As part of Bouchard’s sabbatical work, Otterbein also became a member of Campus Nature Rx, a global coalition of more than 110 colleges and universities committed to improving health, academic success, and sustainability through nature engagement.
The project was a collaborative effort involving Psychology Professor Michele Acker, Dean of Student Engagement Melissa Gilbert, and the student organizations Birderbein, Pollinators, and Plan-It Earth. Additional mapping data was provided by the Westerville Parks and Recreation Department, Columbus and Franklin County Metro Parks, and the Ohio Department of Natural Resources.
Bouchard’s sabbatical project was supported by the Mark ’78 and Deborah ’77 Thresher Fellowship Fund.
Chris Jansing ’78 thought she’d already made it big before she even left Westerville.
Thanks to a kind endorsement from a professor, The Westerville News and Public Opinion — the town’s newspaper at the time — had hired her as a reporter while she was still a student at Otterbein. She covered a city council meeting for her first assignment, diligently taking notes in a room filled with cigarette smoke as decisions that impacted the school she was attending and the community where she lived were made right in front of her. She wrote her story, then went home to her sorority house. The assignment paid $10.
“I will never forget the feeling when I got that newspaper, and my story was on the front page,” Jansing said. “I thought, ‘Well, if it ends here, I’ve done something.’”
But it didn’t end there. Jansing is well into her fifth decade in journalism, now serving as the anchor of her own show five days a week at 12 p.m. on MS NOW (formerly MSNBC). She has reported live from the scene of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, Nelson Mandela’s final days in South Africa, and several Olympic Games, among countless other historical events. She’s won two Emmy Awards, and in 2016, she was inducted into the New York State Broadcasters Association Hall of Fame.
She has a resume that would be incomprehensible to the version of her that first set foot on Otterbein’s campus more than 50 years ago. A native of the tiny lakeside village of Fairport Harbor, OH, Jansing remembers being amazed simply meeting international students for the first time at Otterbein and hearing them speak in different languages about lives very different from her own. She chose Political Science for her major at first but had “no idea” what career goals she wanted to pursue.
She knew she wanted to learn, though. And for a young student with obvious talent and a deep well of curiosity, Otterbein was the perfect place for her to thrive.
“It’s remarkable to think that going to Otterbein opened up so many worlds to me that I didn’t even know existed, so many opportunities that I didn’t know were out there, and so many professors who saw enough in me to take time with me,” Jansing said. “I think that’s the brilliance of a liberal arts education.”
The tools Jansing acquired during her time at Otterbein — including work with The Tan and Cardinal, or “T&C,” and WOBN — not only helped her get noticed early in her career for radio and television jobs in New York, but has also sustained her for decades in a journalism industry that has changed drastically in the time she’s been working.
Jansing returned to campus in 2016 to talk to a Senior Year Experience class, High Stakes Politics: The 2016 Presidential Election.
“The formula for real truth-telling is not complicated,” Jansing said. “Work hard. Develop sources. Know how to tell a story, how to write. All those things that I learned way back in 1977, ’78 still hold true for me today.”
Building her career around those principles has made Jansing feel a powerful connection to the generation of journalists she came of age admiring — figures like Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, whose reporting on Watergate was portrayed in the film All The President’s Men while Jansing was still in college, and who have since appeared as guests on Jansing’s show.
Just as meaningfully to her, though, the persistence of those principles helps her feel connected to younger generations today. Jansing is no stranger to Otterbein’s campus, having returned at least four times in official capacities since she landed her first national broadcasting role in 1998. She was the Commencement Speaker for the Class of 2011 and visited a classroom of Otterbein students to hold a wide-ranging discussion about the impending presidential election in 2016.
When she speaks to college students today, she hopes to instill in them a desire to know what’s happening in their community, and the ways they can be active in it. Jansing’s biggest goal on college campuses, though, is no different than it was 50 years ago — to learn.
“Young people have often been catalysts for change,” Jansing said. “I get so much back from them in learning what their real interest are, what motivates them, and what frustrates them … I’m lucky that I’ve had the chance to go back to Otterbein, and be invited to other college campuses, and learn something, and hopefully give back a little bit.”
