On June 3, the students - who came from hometowns which span all of Oklahoma - arrived at Oklahoma State University without a firm idea of what the inaugural okPORK Youth Leadership would be like, where they would go or the kind of people who would be attending the camp with them.

The camp participants - Kelsey Brown, Clayton Davison, Kaydee Hall, Spencer Lukasek, Rachel Shuey, Katie Taylor, Lacie Underwood and Taylor Vaughn - did know a few things though. They knew they were the first class of students to be able to attend the camp, they were going to meet the Texas Youth Leadership Camp participants and they knew they were going to be able to get a hands-on experience with commercial pork farming most adults have never even dreamed of.

The entire trip began so early in the morning most of the inhabitants of the charter bus were too sleepy to even attempt to get to know one another. As the adventure began rolling toward the first stop in Perryton, Texas the students groggily got to know one another while the chaperones nailed down the details of what shape the day would take.

Upon arrival in Perryton, the campers slowly found their seats among the participants from Texas. As the group grew, time slid on toward orientation. To officially start the camp Roy Lee Lindsey - the executive director at okPORK and Ken Horton - the executive director for the Texas Pork Producers Association stood together and laid some rules and expectations on the table for the assembled campers from both states.

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