Featured Undergraduate: Phillip Floyd

Aug. 16, 2013

Featured Undergraduate Student: Phillip Floyd

Phillip Floyd does it all; he works at the Waterman Farm, is a full time student, and is in the United States Army. Phillip is a junior majoring in Sustainable Plant Systems. He originally became interested in agriculture when he first attended a vocational school for horticulture and landscape design while in high school. When asked why he decided to pursue agriculture Phillip said, “I really like plants. They’re used for everything and I’m an outdoors guy.” He started his academic career at the Agricultural Technical Institute (ATI). Phillip transferred to the Columbus campus after two years to continue his education in the field of agriculture. While Phillip liked the small class size at ATI, he says there are some great benefits of being on the Columbus campus, “Columbus is more diverse than ATI. The are more opportunities to get involved in big projects and you have more faculty to go to if you need help and have questions.” Now at Columbus, Phillip got involved with the Garden of Hope. He was introduced to the project by Glenn Mills, the manager of the Waterman Farm. The Garden of Hope was a project jointly designed by the Waterman Farm and the James Cancer Hospital. Its purpose is to help cancer patients, cancer survivors, and their families escape from the trails and tribulations of cancer and cancer treatment and give them a chance to grow their own fresh vegetables for a healthy living. Phillip Floyd has been there from the beginning. Working with Glenn Mills, Phillip helped develop the garden from a bare field to full-grown lush plants ready for picking. “Working with the cancer patients is great. It puts a smile on their face. It’s helping others and it’s for a good cause,” Phillip said, “It’s a good feeling.” Phillip always looks for opportunities to spread the word about the HCS program. “Not a lot of people know about the program but it’s really great!” Phillip feels that all students who are interested in being outdoors and who like to work with their hands should give the Sustainable Plant System major a shot, “You’re always learning something new; discovering new plants, designing new plants through cross breeding, and creating new techniques for landscaping, it’s really fun”.