Greetings from the Dairy and Food Science Department's newest quarterly newsletter!
Our Department is truly blessed with wonderful alumni, supporters, and partners, and we are working to strengthen our communication with all of you, including through this newsletter. My name is Londa (Vanderwal) Nwadike and I was fortunate to return to SDSU as the David A. Thompson Endowed Department Head and Professor in June 2024.
I grew up on a diversified crop and livestock farm outside Bruce, South Dakota and was active in Dairy Foods Judging in FFA. I double majored in Animal Science and Food Science at SDSU, graduating in 1999. More information on my background is available in the press release linked below.
I want to take this opportunity to truly thank all of you for all your support of our department over the years! We are very appreciative of all the scholarship donations, gifts, presentations in classes, allowing students to visit your farms and processing facilities, and all the other support that you have provided over the years. My vision for the future of the department is to continue to provide teaching, research, and extension in the areas of dairy production, dairy manufacturing, and food science. We appreciate your support as we continue to work out the details of all these different aspects of our department.
Please feel free to reach out to me if you have questions or would like to visit about our department.
We are excited to host a retirement party for our Program Assistant I, Jayne Raabe. Jayne has been a wonderful presence in our Dairy and Food Science Department office for 38 years, serving in various ways including accounting, budgets, event planning (our annual scholarship banquet), organizing industry interviews, and so much more! We appreciate all that she has done for our department. All are welcome to celebrate her milestone on January 17th, from 3 to 5 PM in the Raven Building's main floor atrium.
Remarks will be shared at about 3:30 PM. We suggest and appreciate if you could RSVP prior to the party via the link below to support our planning efforts.
We welcomed Dr. Chen at the start of the semester. His research is in small grains as it pertains to the food we eat. He conducts his research in the Young Brothers Seed Technology Lab.
Dr. Tony Bruinjé, Assistant Professor Dairy Production
We are pleased to announce that Dr. Tony Bruinjé will be starting in January 2025 as an Assistant Professor of Dairy Production, specializing in Dairy Reproduction and Population Health. Tony has been working on postdoctoral research through the Ontario Veterinary College at the University of Guelph. Link to his research via Google Scholar, here.
We are currently searching for a new Extension Dairy Occupational Health and Safety Field Specialist I. Please consider applying or spread the word to anyone that you think would be a good fit and interested. More information & to apply click below.
A brand new role titled, "Extension Food Processing Specialist I. This position has been created to provide strong regional and statewide leadership in developing research-based programming in particular to support the dairy industry in South Dakota. Apply to this exciting new opportunity!
We would like to gather input from our alumni and industry partners on our curriculum in the areas of Dairy Production, Dairy Manufacturing, and Food Science, in both our BS and MS/PhD programs. We want to know what things you think we should continue and your suggestions on how we should improve to meet industry demands. This initial survey (link below) is a preliminary sign-up to gather interested participants first. Please complete by January 15th, 2025.
After retrieving interested participants we will send out a brief follow up survey in mid-January 2025 for you to fill out by late January. We will then host online sessions to discuss in greater detail via Zoom in February 2025.
Hands-on experiments have been a great way to connect with prospective students of all ages, even teacher trainings. Our hope is to spur curiosity in the entire "cow to cone" experience and the science behind our everyday foods. Spring is a great opportunity to connect with students at regional FFA milk quality contests as well as state FFA and FCCLA conventions.
This August we had our first Dairy Production student travel to the Netherlands & Belgium via SDSU's Jacks Start Abroad program, gaining insight into dairy farms and cheese processing abroad before starting her first semester of class. This was a fun opportunity to build community and to spur greater curiosity for the industry we love!
Here are ways we are continuing to connect with the future students in our department and the next leaders in the industry!
Attending National FFA & regional state conventions
World Dairy Expo
World Ag Expo
Dakota Dreamers Camp
Big Sioux Water Event
Alumni Collaborations
Attending Midwest state FCCLA conferences
Visiting Family & Consumer Science or Agriculture classes
Junior Achievement - Sioux Falls
Women in Science - 8th Graders
Increasing our mailing to FFA judging teams competing locally, state, and national levels
Seeking Alumni Recruiters
We are working hard to recruit more undergraduate students into our department and would like to kindly request your help in recruiting students in your area! We are planning to have a kick-off event to discuss our alumni and supporter recruitment initiative on Friday, January 17, 2025 from 1:30 - 2:30PM in Alfred Dairy Science Hall 122. This happens to be before Jayne's Retirement Party. Please RSVP for this event so Londa & Cheyenne can plan marketing materials to share accordingly.
Dr. Maristela Rovai organized an event on H5N1 in Dairy Cattle on July 19, 2024 in the Alfred Dairy Science Hall at SDSU. Over 60 dairy producers, dairy processors, veterinarians, governmental officials and others were in attendance, with very good discussions.
Student Updates
Since December 2023, we had 16 students graduate from our Department with a bachelors of science, 13 with a masters of science and 5 with a PhD.
Our Department awarded $202,760 in scholarships to our students in 2023- 2024 thanks to all our generous donors and supporters!
Students in our department also received College, University, and other external scholarships.
2024 Dairy Cattle Judging Team, Competing at NAILE.
2024 Dairy Products Judging Team. Preparing for Nationals with a new team this April
2024 Dairy Challenge Team
Events & Calendar
We are excited to host the US Regional Dairy Challenge Competition Brookings from Feb 12-14, 2025! We are planning on 120 students from 14 different universities and technical colleges competing, so there are many opportunities for volunteering at the event. More information on the event and volunteering is available at our link below.
April 14, Dairy and Food Science Department Scholarship Banquet - Brookings, SD. More information on scholarships: DFS Student Scholarships
Share & Subscribe
We are thankful to have your continuous support for our programs and students each year! Thank you for taking the time to read our first quarterly newsletter. We plan to continue one newsletter each quarter of the year starting in 2025.
We encourage sharing this newsletter with classmates and colleagues with ties to our department, to subscribe and stay in the loop on our up coming events, opportunities, and updates! Subscribe button is on our website and will be available on the Quarter 2 Newsletter.
Department of Dairy and Food Science, Alfred Dairy Hall 136, Box 2104, Brookings, SD 57007
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