When I was debating whether to go to forestry school, my parents and I attended a sort of a career day at my high school where representatives from various colleges presented their programs. The Oregon State School of Forestry showed a movie about their curriculum that included a lot of pictures of trees being cut down.
“It looks like they’re more about cutting trees than saving them,” my father whispered to me. As economist John Baden told me many years later, Oregon State’s forestry school was “the Vatican of sawlog forestry.” I could see that in 1970, but decided that, in order to save the forests, I needed to learn the language and tools of forestry.
Also influencing my decision was the fact that Oregon State was affordable. In-state tuition for my first year was a little more than $400. Tuition, books, room, and board for all four of my undergraduate years was about $5,000. Continue reading
