By Reilly Cahill

Before thousands of Ohio State students crossed the Oval for the first day of classes, the Sports and Society Institute brought together new and returning students to help them start building connections for the year ahead.

SSI hosted its Welcome Week event Aug. 24, drawing 45 students interested in learning more about the institute, exploring careers in sports and connecting with others who share their interests.

The event included an introduction to SSI, roundtable discussions about issues in sports and small-group conversations organized around students’ career interests. Students had the opportunity to interact with fellow attendees, SSI interns, affiliates and governing board members in areas including sports analytics, media, social media, internships, events and more.

For Brianna Mentzer, a first-year journalism student, and Noah Wright, a third-year statistics and sport industry student, the event provided insight into their respective career interests.

“One thing I learned is that there’s so many different ways to do sports media, whether you want to be in front of a camera, being that main broadcast person or being a beat writer on the sidelines covering stories,” Mentzer said. “There’s so many different ways to create media with sports.”

Wright said conversations focused on analytics helped him better understand his options.

“For my specific career of trying to get into analytics, it definitely cleared up some questions I had,” Wright said.

For returning SSI participants Sammy DeMarco, a third-year sport industry student, and Makalya Pindroh, a fourth-year marketing student, the event offered another opportunity to learn about professional opportunities while connecting with students pursuing similar paths.

“There’s just a lot of opportunity available, and just being in the room to soak in that knowledge and to have the ability to kind of go out and apply for things is definitely very helpful,” DeMarco said.

“It’s always cool to talk with other people interested in what you want to do and get their takes on things and build ideas and brainstorm and get inspiration from other people as well,” Pindroh said.

Students also connected with SSI interns, governing board members and alumni who attended the event.

Brianna McNary, an SSI and Ohio State alumna, said she enjoyed seeing students take advantage of the opportunities the institute provides and explore the many ways they can build careers in sports.

“I just loved how specific some of the students are when it comes to how they want to be involved in sports,” McNary said. “I think it’s no longer black and white, there’s a lot of gray area and there’s so many different ways you could be involved in sports. You don’t have to take the traditional way anymore.”

For Mentzer, the event came before she had even attended her first class as an Ohio State student. But she left already looking forward to becoming more involved with SSI.

“I walked away from this so excited to keep up with [SSI] throughout the year and the rest of my experience at Ohio State,” Mentzer said. “I cannot wait for the next event.”