Greener pastures

Morris student Allison Tange and her horse, Surprise.

From M, spring 2003

St. Paul isn't the only place where U students can ride and research horses. The Crookston campus offers a bachelor's degree in equine industries management (EIM), which prepares students for careers in breeding, racing, and stable management. The students learn to run, manage, and market a business--grappling with such nuts-and-bolts items as taxes and liability insurance. "In most other programs, you're just on top of a horse the whole time," says Dawn Sherwood, interim program director of Crookston's EIM program.

Eighty-seven students are currently enrolled in the program, and participants have come from as far away as Colombia and Germany.

Crookston students, while they can't bring their own horses to school, have access to 41 horses, stalls, and a 90-by-120-foot arena. Some courses are transmitted via video hookup to the St. Paul campus. The program has trained judges for the state 4-H horse shows for several years running.

Students at Morris, meantime, can bring their horses to school with them.

"That's one of the main reasons I decided to come here," says Allison Tange, a junior from Aitkin, Minnesota, who is majoring in English. "When I found out Morris had a horse barn, I knew immediately that this is where I should be."

She's one of roughly a half-dozen students who pay a flat fee to board their animal in the campus's 21-stall stable. Riding helps her relax on weekends, and feeding and grooming Surprise, her 11-year-old Morgan, reminds her of home.

Tange is president of the Morris Saddle Club, which has 20 members and sponsors occasional programs for elementary-age kids and future horse owners. The club recently built a new arena and is trying to raise money for new stall doors.

"It's not a big program or a big stable," Tange says, "but the opportunities for horse owners at Morris are definitely exceptional."