by Austin Morton, Student Reporter
The winner of multiple FFA national awards, a key member in several campus clubs and a well dressed intellectual: Ethan Sacket.
Walking around campus, it is hard to find someone as widely known or as well-liked at as Ethan Sacket. This is because he’s not like most students. Ethan holds himself to his own standards and rules that help him accomplish more.
He can go follow whatever he sets out to do. This summer, Ethan watched a TED talk describing how to better use your time. After watching this, he was inspired to do the same.
He then proceeded to fit in 35 audio books into his regular schedule to further enhance himself with more knowledge. In this time, he also taught himself how to ride a unicycle, and puts in around 35 to 40 hours to learn and work his way to mastering it.
Ethan Gabriel Sacket is a junior here at NWOSU studying for a bachelor degree in business administration. While concentrating on his studies, he also finds time to stay involved around campus.
Being in the Student Government Association, a resident assistant in Coronado Hall, an officer and treasurer to the International Student Association and a Northwestern Scholar Ambassador, Sacket somehow finds time for all of this on top of maintaining his impressive grades.
Growing up, Sacket was born in Enid and was raised in Aline for the majority of his life. Forgoing the regular route that most of us would take in life from the very beginning.
Instead of going to preschool, Sacket would go and spend time at his grandmother’s house.
Here, he would be put to work outside doing tasks that may have been a bit too much for a young boy.
This ranged from raking the yard, making sure it was kept and even climbing the trees in the yard to pick out the dead branches to keep the trees looking good for the Yard of the Month contest that his grandma would enter. Thanks to Sacket’s help with the yard, she would win on a regular basis.
Sacket says that this is most likely the starting point for both his work ethic and his interest in starting his own lawn care business later on in his life.
His grandma and the rest of his family, helped give Sacket a family oriented way of life that would be mixed with a core of integrity and doing your best when it comes to whatever work he would be doing.
This led Sacket to strive for his best when he participated in Future Farmers of America (FFA) throughout high school.
Sacket had his hand in many aspects of FFA. Starting with land surveying, which sees members judge plots of land and their viability for different aspects of farming. He went to state in this his sophomore year.
One of his first large accomplishments was going to nationals for his Career Development Event. Sacket planned and worked with Freed Family Farms to produce a meal kit service similar to Blue Apron called Farm to Fork.
With Farm to Fork, Ethan and his team would prepare a variety of meal ingredients and directions for cooking and then package it.
These meal kits would then go to families that could prepare the ingredients for a well portioned meal. Farm to Fork won nationals.
This was not the only time Sacket went to nationals however, as his work in landscape management and turf-grass management took him to nationals for 3 consecutive years.
In these years, he was a finalist in landscape management, and won turf-grass management.
Sacket went on to receive his State and American FFA Degree. His success in FFA was also rewarded with a free trip to Ireland.
“Ireland gave me that small town feeling,” Sacket said.
This small town feeling is something that Sacket looked for when choosing where to attend college. Deciding to come to Northwestern Oklahoma State University was somewhat of an easy decision for Sacket.
Being only a small distance away from his home, and having family that attended before him, NWOSU seemed like the right choice. It would not be long before he made his presence felt on campus.
During his freshman year, Sacket was part of the President’s Leadership Class, Castle Players and began his activities in the Student Government Association.
People began to take notice, as Sacket seemed to be everywhere on campus. From students to faculty, Sacket left an impression wherever he went.
Olivia Yandel, professor and head of the SGA said, “He’s extremely hard working and never leaves anything half done.”
When discussing Sacket’s work ethic, one of Yandel’s first memories of Sacket was when he was doing his volunteer hours for SGA.
Instead of doing his one hour and leaving he stayed for an extra three hours just getting paperwork filed because he wanted to get it finished instead of doing it later.
Sacket has been very involved with the SGA. Starting as a senator his freshman year, he has quickly risen up the ranks during his three years involved. He moved up to treasurer his sophomore year, and then won a unanimous vote to become Vice-President his junior year.
Sacket says he is unsure if he will run for president.
Though he is unsure, Yandel believes that he would be a good fit for the presidency.
Outside of the SGA, Sacket is still as involved on campus as he was his freshman year. He also believes that it is important for other students to get involved as well.
Many of these students that Sacket speaks about, most likely know about Sacket even if they do not know him by name.
Coronado RA Dawson Maxwell knows what comes to mind when thinking of Sacket. “His work ethic, and how he dresses are the first things I think about,” Maxwell said.
Slacks, a button up, tie, vest, and hair neatly groomed.
This is Sacket’s “go-to” style on a day to day basis. Though it may seem overdressed to most people, Sacket’s reasoning shows that he is always putting his best foot forward.
“When you see the world, the world sees you,” Sacket said.
This goes further than just his looks. Sacket is always willing to put other people’s needs before his own without asking for anything in return.
“He is supportive of his residents in Coronado Hall, and is always quick to help others and be a good role model,” Sacket’s sister, Natalie Sacket-Evans said.
This positive attitude helps set Sacket apart from most people and makes him someone fellow students can look up to, even though their age difference may just be a year or two.
He is kind, caring, intelligent and well mannered. Even throughout his many National awards won, Ethan still stays humble and puts other people first.
With a family oriented and hum-ble personality, Sacket has the ability to branch out and be successful no matter what he does.
Natalie Sacket-Evens said it best, “I know he will be an excellent boss some day and will guide many others to success.”