The NCAA has approved Otterbein’s request to create an NCAA athletics consortium between Otterbein University and Antioch University-Yellow Springs. The request was endorsed by the Ohio Athletic Conference. Through the consortium, students enrolled in online graduate programs offered through Antioch University who have NCAA eligibility can compete on Otterbein’s teams, whether they attended Otterbein as an undergraduate or not. The consortium agreement will be reviewed and renewed every four years. The NCAA is also reviewing old legislation to address similar situations within the changing landscape of higher education.

Starting in fall 2025, all Otterbein students will shift their class and lab studies to an entire day dedicated to their professional preparation.

Student Success and Career Development is looking for alumni volunteers, sponsors, and donors. Email ready@otterbein.edu, call 614-823-1624, or visit www.otterbein.edu/READY.

Student voters have earned Otterbein another recognition from the ALL IN Campus Democracy Challenge, this time as a 2024 Most Engaged Campus for College Student Voting.

Otterbein is one of 471 colleges and universities recognized for outstanding efforts to increase nonpartisan student voter participation in the 2024 election. The results were released Nov. 16, 2024, and are based on statistics gathered from the 2020 election by the National Study of Learning, Voting, and Engagement. In 2020, Otterbein’s student body had a 74% voting rate compared to the national average of 66% for college students.

The Coalition for the Common Good named Diane White, Ph.D., as the founding dean of the Antioch Graduate School of Nursing and Health Professions. The creation of this school represents an important step forward in the collaborative efforts of the Coalition for the Common Good. It will be the future home of Antioch’s graduate Family Nurse Practitioner and Psychiatric Mental Health Nurse Practitioner programs, as well as the Master of Science in Athletic Training, all of which will be transferring from Otterbein University. The Master of Science in Allied Health, which already transitioned from Otterbein, is enrolling students now. A new Nurse Anesthetist Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) degree and a Master of Science in Nutrition and Dietetics are currently under development.

Otterbein’s Office of Social Justice and Activism collaborated with WeRISE for Greater Westerville and the Westerville Queer Collective to bring Westerville’s Juneteenth celebration to campus this year.

Otterbein students Zach Brinson, Racheal Idowu, and Joshua Goshay attended the event on June 24 at The Point at Otterbein.

Otterbein has earned the Highly Established Action Plan Seal from the ALL IN Campus Democracy Challenge for its nonpartisan democratic engagement action. Otterbein is one of 192 campuses that has earned this recognition so far for the 2024 election cycle. The seal recognizes higher education institutions with strong action plans to increase nonpartisan democratic engagement by promoting civic learning, political engagement, and college student voter participation.

At Otterbein, the plan is an institution-wide effort supported from the top down.
“It is the role of higher education institutions like Otterbein to encourage thoughtful civic and political engagement to model how to engage on these matters respectfully, and, hopefully, to listen, learn, and grow as a person from these experiences,” said President John Comerford. “The student leaders and administrators at Otterbein have always led by example, and this plan not only formalizes that behavior, but turns it into action.”

For his role as a champion of democracy, President Comerford was invited to join the College Presidents for Civic Preparedness, a unique consortium convened by the Institute for Citizens & Scholars. He joins 91 participating presidents who are dedicated to preparing the next generation of well-informed, productively engaged, and committed citizens; defending free expression, civil discourse, and critical inquiry as essential civic norms; and increasing thoughtful engagement and better understanding by students for the effective functioning of our democracy. The consortium was established in August 2023 with 15 members.

The participating presidents represent diverse institutions from across the country, but they all share the perspective that it is the responsibility of higher education to equip students with the critical civic skills to participate effectively in a democracy, engage in civil discourse, and express themselves responsibly.