Hands-On with Hogs: The Ohio State University Students Tackle Swine Production in Immersive Internship
By Kara Flaherty, in January 2025.
Throughout summer and fall of 2024, five Ohio State undergraduate students took part in Swine Bootcamp, an immersive field internship experience designed to give the interested students a more in-depth view into the swine industry. Swine Bootcamp is part of Pork Prospect, a National Pork Board funded extension project designed to provide undergraduate Animal Sciences students with hands-on learning experiences to explore the dynamic swine industry. As the industry continues to struggle with labor shortages, Pork Prospect aims to boost students’ knowledge of swine production and share the plethora of career opportunities available post-graduation. The project experience for students began with Swine Discovery Day, a one-day event featuring industry speakers and a hands-on tour of Ohio State’s research and teaching pig farm.
When organizing Swine Bootcamp, Pork Prospect project leader, Dr. Talita Resende, worked to offer students a unique short-term experience on commercial pig farms. The project team saw advantages to providing internship experiences during university breaks so that the students with busy schedules could attend.
The first student to accomplish the Swine Bootcamp dedicated two of his summer semester weeks to joining an Ohio commercial production system and learning the routine activities of the farms from the veterinarians and other professionals.
“The short internship was a great experience. I got to see a lot of swine industry in a short amount of time, got to talk in depth about the industry with professionals, and got a better idea of how the industry works as a whole.” - Swine Bootcamp participant.
For the second student the Swine Bootcamp activities were based on a field day with a swine producer. During this time, the student had the opportunity to have one-on-one conversation with the producer, addressing her concerns and curiosities about animal welfare in the perspective of a finishing pig barn. After a morning full of learning and enthusiastic conversation, the student was taken to the barn, where she could, for the first time, enter a commercial herd and observe how pigs are raised. To complement this student experience, we also paired her up with a swine disease research lab, where she could see and learn how biological samples are prepared for disease diagnostic tests such as PCR.
“I enjoyed getting to know industry professionals, especially [the swine producer] and learning about his personal career path. I enjoyed how unique his perspective was as he had worked in lots of different positions within the swine industry. [He] had a diverse background which made the finisher farm visit extra informative!” - said this Swine Bootcamp Participant.
Lastly, in December 2024, three students traveled to Richmond/IN and surrounding areas to participate in Undergraduate Swine Exploration Week, an immersive internship hosted by the Country View Family Farms team as part of Pork Prospect. The week-long field experience provided students with a unique opportunity to experience the swine industry through all stages of commercial production. Country View Family Farms is a vast network of more than 300 family-owned farms located throughout several states. Countless CVFF staff members worked with the Pork Prospect team to develop the week-long internship, which took place from December 16th to December 20th, 2024. Three Ohio State students and one Pork Prospect staff member traveled to six different hog farms and CVFF’s Feed Mill located across Indiana and Ohio. Throughout the week, students were exposed to all stages of commercial swine production, including time spent in breeding, gestation, farrowing, nursery, and finishing. The three students participated in numerous hands-on experiences to better understand pig care, facility design, and health and medicine. Experiences such as animal feeding, pregnancy checking via ultrasounds, and collecting disease diagnostic samples allowed the students to understand the breadth of day-to-day operations.
"I personally loved being able to experience a commercial swine farm. I think the best part was the amount of hands-on experience that we were able to gain. I loved being able to be around swine vets and learn from them as well as the other workers present. My favorite activity was farrowing. I am really glad I was able to go on this trip and make connections.” - confided a participant of Swine Bootcamp - Undergraduate Swine Exploration Week at CVFF.
Pork Prospect continues to explore opportunities for student engagement with swine production. The team is working to analyze student perceptions of the greater swine industry and related career opportunities to best assist the changing field in the future. Looking forward, Pork Prospect will host another Swine Discovery event for Ohio State students this upcoming spring.