Rutgers Day is a festival held on the last Saturday in April every year at Rutgers University. It typically brings in tens of thousands of festival-goers onto Rutgers campus.[1][2][3][4] Open to the general public, it offers approximately 500 free programs that feature demonstrations, child-friendly interactive activities involving animals and plants, student performances, cultural traditions, exhibits, food vendors, football scrimmage, and live music.[5][6][7][8]
History
What is now the Rutgers Day tradition started in 1906 as an agricultural field day for farmers to learn about the New Jersey Agricultural Experiment Station[9] and its studies.[10] The late Linda Bassett, who worked in community affairs at the university, helped create an annual event for the state’s residents to learn about and experience the university, starting in 2009.[11][6]Since that year, Ag Field Day has been held as a part of Rutgers Day.[12]
Ag Field Day at Rutgers Day
A campus horse in a barn at SEBS.
Rutgers Agricultural Field Day, known as “Ag Field Day,” is a farm-oriented event held by the School of Environmental and Biological Sciences (SEBS) at Rutgers Day on Rutgers University's Cook Campus in New Brunswick, New Jersey. The SEBS event includes 4-H animal fairs, a petting zoo, farm tours, plant sales, evolutionary and archaeological displays, and department-specific exhibits such as the entomology department's cockroach races.[13]
The plant sale next to Bartlett Hall and the Marine Science Building attracts attendees from across the region to purchase unique and popular varieties of vegetables and herbs as well as many other plants.[10] “The selection of plants draws gardeners from three states away, resulting in a huge diversity of traditional and heirloom plants.”[14][15]
The New Jersey Folk Festival is an annual folk music and cultural festival held on the Great Lawn at the Eagleton Institute of Politics on the Douglass Campus during Rutgers Day. Established in 1975, the New Jersey Folk Festival at Rutgers Day typically presents the traditional music, crafts, art and food vendors of the various cultural communities within the state and its surrounding region.
Other live music
In addition to the folk festival, the festival is the site of other live music. WRSU 88.7 FM Rutgers Radio helps present live musical performances by various local bands and other acts on stage at the festival's College Avenue Campus. Performers from the university's arts conservatory, Mason Gross, entertain audiences as well.
^ ab"Remembering Linda Bassett, Who Connected Rutgers and Communities". TAPinto. "The annual opening of Rutgers' doors to the state each spring is credited with introducing the university's faculty, staff, students, farm animals, folk music and myriad academic programs to hundreds of thousands of New Jerseyans."
