Reflecting on the 2026 Ohio/Pennsylvania Herpetology Symposium

   The Ohio/Pennsylvania Herpetology Symposium started as the OU/JCU Herpetology Symposium in 2011 as a way to bring together herpetologists from Ohio University (OU) and John Carroll University (JCU). Current SSAR Secretary and Associate Professor at The University of Scranton (then Ph.D. student), Vincent (Vinny) Farallo, helped start the symposium along with friends and colleagues at both OU and JCU. Vinny completed his undergraduate degree at JCU and was working on his Ph.D. at OU when the first symposium was planned. The symposium has always included at least one invited speaker who gives an hour-long plenary, as well as other participants giving 15-minute talks. Poster sessions were added as the symposium grew. The first symposium was held at OU, and the invited speaker was Dan Portik, who at the time was a Ph.D. student at the University of California-Berkeley and a former undergraduate of JCU. After the initial symposium, it became an annual tradition, rotating between being held at JCU and OU. Invited speakers included amazing herpetologists including Maureen Donnelly, Aaron Bauer, Christopher Beachy, David Weisrock, Joe Mendelson III, and many others! After 9 years, the symposium was put on hold in 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic. In 2024, the symposium was revived. At this time, many of the initial graduate students who helped plan and organize the symposium over the years had moved on to faculty positions, so the symposium was rebranded as the Ohio/Pennsylvania Herpetology Symposium.

   The first OH/PA Herpetology symposium was held at the University of Scranton with Aaron Griffing as the invited speaker. The symposium now rotates between John Carroll University, The University of Scranton, and the University of Dayton. As the symposium has progressed, participation from other universities has increased tremendously with attendees from 11 universities/organizations at our most recent symposium. The 2026 symposium was held at John Carroll University with generous support from the SSAR and EnviroScience. This extra financial support allowed the symposium to be free for all students and include food and refreshments during the meeting, as well as a closing social. The invited plenary speaker, Walter Tapondjou, recently joined the Cleveland Museum of Natural History as the Curator of Biodiversity. This latest meeting was a great success with 56 attendees, most of which were students (22 graduate; 14 undergraduate), 16 talks, and 6 posters. We look forward to next year’s symposium that will be held in Pennsylvania!