Penn State News

Penn State Hosts High School Students Interested in Turf

On Friday May 17th, close to 50 students and their teachers from Brentsville High School visited the Penn State Turfgrass Program. Led by Drew Miller, instructor and creator of the school’s turfgrass curriculum, the students had a tour of the sports and research facilities at Penn State to expose them to options for continued education after high school.

Thomas Goyne, Assistant Supervisor of Grounds, shared how the athletic fields at Penn State are maintained. Students tested some of the tools used to monitor fields to ensure players’ safety and asked questions about how the management varies for the different sports. Following the tour of Jeffrey Field, Matt Neri, Sports Turf Manager at Medlar Field at Lubrano Park, took the students onto the field and inside his maintenance facility where he shared the intricacies of managing the baseball field that serves as the home for both a minor league and collegiate baseball team.

The students, who traveled four hours from Northern Virginia, also visited the Valentine Turfgrass Research Facility and various research labs on campus. Grad students and faculty discussed their research on disease and weed management, sports field safety and drone technology to assess the health of golf course turf.

“The industry needs good people right now and the fact that Brentsville has this many students interested in turfgrass is amazing,” said John Kaminski, Professor of Turfgrass Science. “As a faculty, we wanted to help out by showing them as many aspects of what we do as possible.”

At the end of the busy day, the students learned about the educational programs at Penn State and had a Q&A period with Steven Craig, Superintendent at Centre Hills Country Club and Matt Wolf, Grounds Maintenance Supervisor at Penn State. Last but not least, students were treated to the world-famous Creamery ice cream and left with a nice “swag bag” of Penn State Turfgrass items.

Turf Students Receive PTC Scholarships

Douglas Apple, Tom Bettle and Samuel Lobaugh

The Pennsylvania Turfgrass Council is pleased to announce that Douglas Apple and Samuel Lobaugh are the spring 2019 recipients of the PTC scholarships.

Douglas Apple is a native of Hatfield, PA. He has interned at Indian Valley Country Club in Telford, PA and at Saucon Valley Country Club in Bethlehem, PA. He also worked for the State College Spikes minor league baseball team during his time as a Penn State student. Following graduation, he will return to Indian Valley Country Club as an Assistant in Training.

Samuel Lobaugh is from Pittsburgh, PA, where he has managed the landscape aspect of his father’s business, Lobaugh Maintenance, Inc. He completed an internship last summer at Oakmont Country Club and also worked at the Joseph Valentine Turfgrass Research Center while he was a University Park student. He has accepted a position as an agronomist at Oakmont Country Club.

Scholarship Recipients

D.M. Boyd, Co. Turfgrass Award

Ian Patterson

E.H. Griffith Turfgrass Management Award:

Paige Alcorn

John Shupp

George W. Hamilton Senior Memorial Scholarship in Turfgrass Science

William Covert

J. Robert Hummer Turfgrass Scholarship

Jonathan Kaschak

Andrew Wile

M. Forest Randolph Memorial Scholarship in Plant Science

Dylan Cellini

William Covert

Jonathan Kaschak

Sean Murphy

Benjamin Rita

Dr. James R. Watson, Jr. Memorial Turfgrass Scholarship

Kyle Roach

Congratulations to the recent graduates of the Class of 2019! We can’t wait to see what you do next!

Associate Degree in Turfgrass Science & Management

Brayden Brumley

Andrew MacCagnano

Kara Neterval

Nathan Williamson

Bachelor’s Degree in Turfgrass Science

Douglas Apple

Christopher Boal

Daniel Bove

Trever Browne

Christopher Cooke

Grant Cotchen

Kyle Dawson

David Hendler

Joseph Kopania

Samuel Lobaugh

Phillip Mahr

Ian Marshall

Nicholas Narog

Seth Re

Brady Scales

Dylan Sechler

Matthew Simonds

Justin Taylor

Robert Welsh

Kevin Whalen

Clifton Willis

Jacob Wilson

Masters of Professional Studies in Turfgrass Management

Debra Harlow-Aldecoa

Benjamin Pacific

John Rost