Spartan Bus Tour highlights MSU’s Upper Peninsula partnerships 

From Iron Mountain to Marquette and beyond, Michigan State University Spartans have spent decades working alongside communities in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula to improve health care, grow local economies, support education and steward natural resources. This fall, the Spartan Bus Tour will spotlight those partnerships and the impact they continue to have across the region.

From Oct. 19-21, President Kevin M. Guskiewicz, Ph.D., will join faculty and university leaders on a three-day route, visiting more than a dozen stops across the U.P. and northern Michigan to meet with partners, visit key sites and explore new opportunities to collaborate. Previous tours have traveled through West Michigan and metro Detroit.

“Michigan State maintains partnerships across the Upper Peninsula and northern Michigan that, in some cases, span generations,” Guskiewicz says, “and I’m eager to build on these connections. We’re working with communities to address health disparities, education, prosperity, sustainability and more as we work together toward a better future for all.”

Bus tour participants will visit places like Iron Mountain —  MSU head basketball coach Tom Izzo’s hometown —  where an iron mine offers an immersive look into the region’s mining heritage. In Escanaba, the MSU Forestry Innovation Center is an AgBioResearch center focused on connecting research to logging and maple industries. In Marquette, the UP Health System’s Upper Peninsula campus, which is affiliated with the MSU College of Human Medicine, leads a program to educate more rural physicians.

Strengthening rural health and local businesses

While separated by distance, MSU’s activities generate significant impact for all of Michigan. Statewide, MSU has a $6.8 billion total economic impact, including more than $40.5 million across the U.P. In the state’s first congressional district, which encompasses the entire U.P. and much of the Lower Peninsula’s northern half, MSU contributes $8.9 million in spending with local businesses.

Many Spartan alumni and current students hail from the region, too. The university educates more Michigan students than any other school, and the U.P. and northern Michigan are well represented, with over 1,400 enrolled at MSU. And 17,000 of the state’s more than 306,000 Spartan alumni come from here.

Much of MSU’s impact in the region is in health care fields, and the bus tour will be exploring long-running partnerships.

In the 1970s, a physician shortage in the Upper Peninsula prompted leaders in the MSU College of Human Medicine to launch one of the nation’s first rural training programs for medical students. The inaugural cohort began taking classes in January 1974, at Doctors Park in Escanaba, the original site of the Michigan State University College of Human Medicine Rural Physician Program.

Today, the program is headquartered in Marquette, where approximately 20 third- and fourth-year medical students complete their clerkships in Marquette and other community hospitals and clinics throughout the Upper Peninsula. Research has shown that medical students who train in the U.P. are more likely to stay and practice in the U.P. and select a specialty needed in a rural community. Since the campus began, nearly a quarter of Rural Physician Program medical students have practiced in the U.P. after graduation.

“Having MSU leadership and the Spartan Bus Tour visit our campus is an affirmation of the incredible work our students, residents and faculty are doing every day,” says Stuart Johnson, community assistant dean for the Upper Peninsula campus. “It means a great deal for our learners to see that their efforts in patient care, education and community engagement are valued at the highest levels of the university. We hope visitors leave with a sense of pride in how the U.P. is shaping future physicians and health care leaders, and with an understanding of the impact our graduates have on the health of communities across the Upper Peninsula.”

Connections in the region extend beyond health care, and the tour will make stops at a few local businesses like Connor Sports Flooring in Amasa. The business is a global leader in portable and permanent hardwood sports flooring systems, manufacturing elite-level courts used in venues like NCAA March Madness and Final Four tournaments, the NBA/WNBA, the Olympics and high school gyms.

The Spartan Bus Tour will also visit the MSU Forestry Innovation Center in Escanaba. Work at the 1,745-acre AgBioResearch center is focused on advancing forestry research and innovation in areas such as forest genetics, silviculture, biomass energy and non-timber forest products.

“Having the Forestry Innovation Center featured on the Spartan Bus Tour is a chance to show the broader MSU community what we do every day in the Upper Peninsula,” says Jesse Randall, director of the Forestry Innovation Center. “It’s an opportunity for faculty and leadership to see firsthand how our work connects research to industry and community, from training Michigan’s loggers to advancing maple science with global partners.”

Experiencing Michigan agriculture, arts and more

At the Keweenaw Bay Ojibwa Community College, or KBOCC — located in the central Upper Peninsula on Lake Superior’s southern shore in L’Anse — Spartans will get an inside look at a cultural hub for Ojibwa and non-Ojibwa learners while reaffirming that MSU values tribal nations as important partners in education, research and community engagement.

Chartered in 1975 by the Keweenaw Bay Indian Community, the Keweenaw Bay Ojibwa Community College is a tribal community college that offers associate degrees, certificates and applied programs rooted in Anishinaabe culture, language and values. Located on the L’Anse Reservation, it serves as both an academic institution and cultural hub. MSU also has a strong Anishinaabe presence in East Lansing, where the Education Anishinaabe: Giving, Learning and Empowering program works to increase the involvement of American Indians in all levels of the university community.

“Having MSU leadership and community members choose to visit the L'Anse Indian Reservation means so much to us,” says Megan Haataja, interim president of KBOCC. “We are honored to be included in this visit, as it gives us the chance to share who we are and where we come from."

Plus, bus tour participants may have an opportunity to meet future Spartans: KBOCC is part of the Michigan Transfer Network, giving students an inside track to transfer to MSU with qualifying credits.

“While they are here, we’re excited for them to learn about our cultural traditions, including the processing of manoomin (wild rice), which has been a vital part of our way of life for generations. We hope this experience helps them see the deep connections we maintain with the land and water, and how those traditions continue to shape the lives of our community today, leaving them with a greater appreciation for this unique part of Michigan.”

Prior to arriving in the U.P., the bus tour will stop in Cadillac to learn about Up North Arts, Inc., a nonprofit community arts center, and to visit a vibrant new mural downtown that was created thanks to a partnership between MSU Extension and the city.

In Tom Izzo’s hometown of Iron Mountain, the tour will stop at the nearby Iron Mountain Iron Mine, where participants will have the opportunity to ride an underground train 2,600 feet into the historic East Vulcan Mine, where guides demonstrate mining techniques and tools used during its operation from 1870 to 1945.

The tour will also sightsee at iconic locations such as the Mackinac Bridge, the Sand Point Marsh Trail in Munising and the Seul Choix Pointe Lighthouse in Gulliver. The bridge, in particular, has had many connections to MSU throughout the years, including an MSU civil engineering graduate who was a key engineer and later served as the first executive secretary of the Mackinac Bridge Authority, guiding its operations for decades.

It’s easy to find Spartans anywhere, even at some of the state’s most iconic locations.

Follow along

Guskiewicz believes this third iteration of the Spartan Bus Tour is a golden opportunity for faculty and administrators to see the commitment and impact Spartans make in this region of the state. It may also spark new collaborations and projects among faculty and communities they visit.  

“As ‘Michigan’s state university,’” Guskiewicz said, “Michigan State’s connections with communities across the state are strong. Whether we’re in our own backyard in East Lansing or visiting more distant parts of our wonderful state, we look forward to learning from and contributing to every corner of Michigan.”

You can follow the Spartan Bus Tour on social media while it’s on the road by using the hashtag #SpartanBusTour and by following along on the president’s accounts. Now a bi-annual event, the tour will continue to explore other regions of the Great Lakes State.