On any given afternoon, a group of Bucknell students can be found around ten minutes from campus at Fox View Farm, trading backpacks and textbooks for horses and saddles. There, members of Bucknell’s Club Equestrian team gather to ride, train and build a community rooted in a shared love of horses.
Leading the team this year are three captains: Samantha Bruhin ’26, a Biology major with a minor in Film & Media Studies; Kayleigh Miller ’28, a Linguistics major, and Ella Cabets ’28, a Cell Biology/Biochemistry major. Though they come from different academic backgrounds, they are united by years of riding experience and a commitment to growing the program.
For Bruhin and Cabets, riding has been a lifelong passion.
“I’ve been riding horses pretty much as long as I can remember,” Bruhin said. “So finding a school that had an equestrian program was really important to me.” She even brought her horse to campus her freshman year.
Cabets echoed that lifelong dedication. “I’ve been riding since I was a kid. I think I started when I was about 6 years old,” she said. Back home, she has “ridden so many different horses, owned and leased a bunch of different horses and did shows all throughout childhood.” She also gained hands-on experience with barn management, cleaning stalls and training horses. “I knew I wouldn’t be able to go to college without riding horses,” she said. “When I was picking a college, they had to have some sort of club riding team, and Bucknell had one, so I wanted to join.”
Miller’s path back to riding looked slightly different. Although she rode for years as a child, she stopped in high school after moving to a new town. When she discovered Bucknell had a team, she was eager to return to the sport.
“I had no idea that Bucknell had a team,” Miller said. “When I found out that there was one, I really wanted to get involved again, and I was so excited that I could finally be back involved with the sport and find a team of girls that all shared the same interests as me, because I didn’t really have that where I was from.”
All three joined the team in their freshman year. This marks Bruhin’s first year as captain, a role she stepped into following the graduation of former captain Siena Vestri ’25.
“Last year, the senior captain who graduated, Siena, kind of saved the club, so we really appreciate all the work that she did,” Bruhin said. “I love doing it… and I’ve found [being a captain] very rewarding.”
For Miller and Cabets, serving as captains is both an honor and a chance to pay forward the mentorship they once received.
“I definitely attribute a lot of the way that I was able to get accustomed to Bucknell to our previous captain, Siena,” Miller said. “It was so nice having someone welcome you with open arms and really act as a mentor. So with that being said, I really wanted to be able to be that for other people. I wanted to be a friendly face, someone welcoming, and I love being in the position where I can guide younger girls. I think you can create really strong bonds when people are able to look to you for help, and I think it just creates a really good team dynamic.”
Cabets shared a similar perspective. “She built such a great team my freshman year and really revived us,” Cabets said of Vestri. “I look up to her and want to carry on every precedent that she set. It’s just really nice to have people look to you for help and to build strong friendships. Horses are such a great way to get involved and get away from campus, too– to take a breath of fresh air and reconnect with everything.”
Practices take place once a week at Fox View Farm and require a significant time commitment. “It’s about three hours of time when it’s all said and done– driving there, getting the horses ready, riding and cooling down,” Bruhin said. At the beginning of each semester, captains coordinate schedules to ensure members can attend.
Lessons are tailored to the rider’s experience level. “We’ve had students join our team who have had no prior horse experience, so their lessons look a little bit different,” Miller said. Beginners receive more one-on-one instruction, while advanced riders participate in group lessons, sometimes alongside community members who ride at the farm. “You also get to connect with the Lewisburg community, as well as strengthen the bond of the team.”
The team trains under Katie Shoop, their coach at Fox View Farm. Cabets described her as “such a great coach” who “gives such positive encouragement and feedback” while offering clear direction for improvement. Shoop attends shows with the team, helping riders prepare for unfamiliar horses and competitive environments.
Schoop also competed in the Intercollegiate Horse Shows Association (IHSA), the collegiate riding organization in which Bucknell participates. Unlike traditional horse shows, IHSA competitions require riders to draw a horse at random and compete without a warm-up.
“You essentially draw from a hat what horse that you have to compete on, and you get no warm-up time,” Bruhin said. “You just kind of get on. If it’s jumping, you go straight to your first jump and start the course. If it’s flat, you go into the ring and you have to feel it out and figure out what to do.” Riders receive a brief description of the horse beforehand, including height, color and small notes about temperament.
Competitors are placed into divisions based on experience, ranging from beginner to advanced levels. As Cabets said, riders accumulate points by placing at shows and can “point out” of a division after earning 36 points, advancing to the next level and potentially qualifying for regionals and nationals.
Beyond competition, the captains emphasize growth and belonging as key goals for the future. “Personally, I want to continue growing our team,” Miller said, noting that many students discover the club mid-year or assume prior experience is required. “Getting our team out there more is really helpful, and just gathering interest.”
Bruhin hopes to further strengthen the community within the team. “People join for the horses, but they also join to find people with shared interests,” she said. “That’s really important.”
When asked what advice they would give prospective members, their answers were simple.
“Go for it!” Miller said.
“Don’t be scared,” Bruhin added.
Cabets encouraged students to fully embrace the experience. “Make the most of it. Try your best to learn as much as you can and be as close with the team as you can, because it makes the experience so much better. Use it as an outlet to get away from campus. School gets hard, so it’s nice to get off campus and enjoy that time away.”
At Fox View Farm, Bucknell students are doing exactly that, finding not only a sport— but a second home.
