Ohio continues to shine in the political spotlight. This time in the form of hosting the 4th Democratic presidential debate! The debate is less than one month away, and all eyes will be on Otterbein University.
Otterbein is happily preparing their campus to host such an important and major event. The debate is set to take place at the Rike Center located on campus and students are elated and ready!
“The fact they’re coming to Otterbein is pretty cool regardless of whether you’re, like, Republican or Democrat,” said third-year student Adi Tamarapll.
The Rike Center is undergoing a major transformation to ensure the event is smooth sailing.
“Normally when you think of them coming to Ohio, you just naturally kind of assume they’d go to Ohio State, you know, because it’s bigger,” said Tamarapll.
That isn’t an uncommon point of view, however, The Ohio Democratic Chair was eyeballing a suburban area to host the debate and Westerville got the call.
Many students and locals are hoping to get a chance to see the debate in person.
“I mean, I want to go pretty bad,” said third-year student Courtney Bussert. “We don’t have large events like this at Otterbein and it’s really, like, a neat opportunity for us.”
Otterbein students said they will be focused and starstruck.
Many students are looking forward to hearing about issues that are important to them right on their own campus and want to get a better feel for some of the candidates.
“It’s just a great experience for Otterbein and as students, I mean, we’re all coming to college and we’re forming our own views,” said Bussert. “It kind of just, like, brings light to the issues in our country right now and kind of gets our minds going about what we think about the issues.”
The president of Otterbein University, John Comerford, could not agree more.
“We want them having meaningful debates every day in their classrooms, in their residences halls, and on their sports teams, and so to have this on the campus is going to add to that education that’s already going on.” he said.
Comerford explained the planning has been going on for a while, and he’s just excited for the opportunity to represent Ohio.
“It’s bigger than Otterbein, it’s bigger than Westerville,” said Comerford. “It’s really a big deal for the region and the state.”
The debate is scheduled for October 15th, but it could be extended to October 16th as well, if needed.
Source: NBC4i
