By: Athletic Communications Assistant, Louie Abounader
BEREA, Ohio - In Baldwin Wallace University's entire 174-year history, only 36 students that have completed their undergraduate degree from the institution have come from the state of Montana. While undergraduate enrollment from this particular far state may seem like a scarcity, for Hardin, Montana native, and BW sophomore cross country and track runner David Prather (Hardin, Mont.), it is the path that he intended to choose, navigate, and embrace himself.
Currently in his second season with the BW men's cross country and track teams, Prather has secured an integral role on the team's first fleet of distance runners. He is a strong candidate to earn his first Academic All-Ohio Athletic Conference honor this season, as the neuroscience and chemistry double major has also garnered an impressive cumulative 3.512 grade point average in a very challenging curriculum. Prather is well on his way to realizing his academic, professional, and athletic aspirations, but the journey travelled to get there makes each checkpoint increasingly more rewarding.
Playing basketball and baseball as his primary sports from an early age, Prather had not initially given running much of a thought.
"When I was in sixth grade, I was diagnosed with exercise-induced asthma," Prather explained. "My mom did some research and found out that running can really improve asthma symptoms. I had never tried competitive running before then, so that's what initially got me into the sport."
It was only fitting that Prather began his cross country career in a state whose scenic routes and landscape are as diverse as they are marvelous.
"At times, I miss the scenery back home. I wasn't necessarily situated in a mountainous region of Montana but it was still very picturesque for me. Montana's nickname is the "Big Sky State" and it's true, because you can see horizon after horizon most places you go."
While the dazzling sights and natural aesthetics are what Montana's most popular for, its economy is dominated primarily by the agricultural sector; a sector not too unfamiliar for Prather and his immediate family.
"My family is a very agriculturally-involved family; there are a lot of agricultural teachers," Prather elaborated. "I live right next to my aunt and uncle, with my mom and grandpa, and for my whole life, we've had a bunch of animals. We have sheep, quite a bit of horses, but recently we've been getting more involved with cattle. I often refer to it as a small start-up ranch when I talk about it with my teammates and coaches at practice."
There is no shortage of responsibilities to go around on a family ranch and despite Prather's limited availability during the school year, he contributes as much as he can when he is home.
"Whenever my aunt and uncle are gone, I feed the animals with my mom. We carry many different kinds of feed out to the animals, and carry hay out to them too. This summer, there were some calves that we put in the sheep pen and we had to feed them milk from a special bucket. We use some machinery to clean the pens out as well. I work well when they catch me going from place to place, so I'm ironically, the runner of the family. They'll want me to open the gate for the tractor to get into the corral to dump stuff, or walk around with a shovel and help scoop everything up," Prather added with a chuckle.
Despite a potential smooth and effortless transition into the family business, Prather's interests and future professional goals are aimed elsewhere. These aspirations are ultimately what drove him to further his education in Berea, Ohio, roughly 1,500 miles away from home. Having not received an acceptance letter from an abundance of college applications in January of his senior year, Prather received an email from one of the BW cross country coaches.
"It was the first email BW had sent me and I was already halfway through my senior year," Prather recalled. "So, I decided to give it a chance and started looking into it. I knew that I really wanted to go into neuroscience so that really narrowed down my college choices for a bachelor's degree. When I looked into BW's neuroscience program and saw that the Society of Neuroscience gave them the award for Best Undergraduate Program in 2012, that really sparked my interest."
The accolade Prather alluded to was the 2012 International Society for Neuroscience (SfN) Undergraduate Program-of-the-Year. The prestigious SfN award recognized BW's multidisciplinary program for excellence in educating neuroscientists and applauds the University for providing innovative models to which other programs can aspire. If it was the hype surrounding the neuroscience program that invoked Prather's interest, it was his visit to BW that sold him.
"One of the admissions counselors had called me and said that if I was interested, I could apply for an all-expenses-paid visit for one or two days in the spring. So, I thought about it and decided I would go for it. My visit went really great. I loved the people, the atmosphere, and I liked how I felt when I visited the classes. It felt like I was learning something despite it being a topic I was not particularly well-educated on in the first place. But the professor put it in simpler terms, even for me to understand it."
When Prather returned home to eager interrogations from family members and friends, his decision was as clear as day.
"They said whenever I talked about BW, I was noticeably more excited and happier so that pushed me over the edge on committing. I've been very happy about my decision so far."
Roughly halfway through fall semester of his sophomore year, Prather exhibits promise to lead the next generation of Yellow Jacket distance runners and has been an exemplary aspiring neuroscience graduate. The Hardin, Montana native may long for his hometown's natural scenery, but the horizon on the "Big Sky" that is Prather's future, seems to be glistening ever so brightly for the young student-athlete.
