Lt. Gov. Mary Taylor made the first of three campaign stops Monday at Kent State University to discuss her reelection campaign with Gov. John Kasich and to encourage students to get involved with politics.

She attended a luncheon hosted by the Kent State College Republicans that focused on job growth in Ohio and the importance of small businesses.

“We are reaching out to colleges and College Republican groups across the state of Ohio,” Taylor said. “I think it’s really important for us to get in front of these kids, especially the Kent Republicans which has traditionally been very strong and helpful during campaigns.” 

The College Republicans spent the summer working on the Kasich-Taylor campaign, knocking on doors, spreading literature and getting the word out.

They also plan to do all they can to help Republican candidates in Ohio that are up for reelection, with Election Day less than two months away

“We’ll be working on the governor’s campaign through the fall, along with hers,” Christian Pancake, president of the College Republicans and sophomore political science and philosophy major, said.

Several members of the College Republicans came out to support Taylor.

“I care a lot about our future,” said freshman political science major Erica Seman. “I think it’s important for people our age to be able to get involved because were going to be running the country one day.”

Taylor also said she feels that student involvement is important to the political process.

“We’re talking about their future,” she said. “They go to college, they work hard to get their college degrees and we want to make sure they have the opportunity for the job.”  

Currently, Kasich and Taylor are working on a couple of initiatives that will help current and recent graduates find jobs, including the launch of a new app.

The first is the Ohio Means Jobs initiative, which focuses on putting all available jobs in Ohio onto ohiomeansjobs.com.

In order to connect more with students, the new app will allow high school and college students to research jobs, understand what positions are needed in the state, qualifications for those jobs and what the predicted salaries for those jobs might be.

The second initiative is insuringohiofutures.com, which was originally rolled out at KSU, and promotes the insurance field and its job growth. The site was created to target students, job changers and military veterans, Taylor said.

Contact Hannah Armenta at [email protected].