--- title: Drake: Drake University Visit, Bring Drake to Drake description: The rapper was in Des Moines for a show, where the nearby university was campaigning for him to visit. He did, but not quite as expected. canonical: https://time.com/4517295/bring-drake-to-drake/ author: Raisa Bruner article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-10-05T15:01:58.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T07:37:15.995Z og:title: Here's What Happened When Drake Visited Drake University og:description: The rapper had been flirting with a visit to the school for months. og:url: https://time.com/4517295/bring-drake-to-drake/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Here's What Happened When Drake Visited Drake University twitter:description: The rapper had been flirting with a visit to the school for months. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # The Long Emotional Journey to Drake's Sneaky Drake University Visit > Sponsored content. 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The Brief is available free at time.com/newsletters, where readers can select it along with any of TIME's other six newsletters. There is no subscription required to receive it. #### Is The Brief free? Yes. The Brief is a free daily email newsletter from TIME. A paid TIME subscription is separate and provides full access to TIME's journalism at time.com/subscribe-agent. #### Who writes The Brief? The Brief is led by editor Richard Hall and draws on reporting from TIME's newsroom. Every edition is assembled by TIME editors rather than generated automatically.  by [Raisa Bruner](https://time.com/author/raisa-bruner/)  ## Raisa Bruner Oct 5, 2016 3:01 PM UTC  by [Raisa Bruner](https://time.com/author/raisa-bruner/)  ## Raisa Bruner Oct 5, 2016 3:01 PM UTC Drake—the Canadian wunderkind and platinum-selling rapper—[was on tour with a stop](http://time.com/4306530/drake-future-summer-tour/?iid=sr-link10) in Des Moines, Iowa on Tuesday. But he wasn’t the only Drake in town. Des Moines is also home to a perhaps lesser-known Drake: Drake University, founded in 1881\. Since 2009, students have been campaigning to get Drake to visit. And last night, their dream became a reality… sort of. Students first started a “bring Drake to Drake” campaign on social media, and the hype increased this spring, when school administrators noted that [Drizzy](http://time.com/4329294/drake-shaved-beard-saturday-night-live-host/?iid=sr-link9) had listed their city as a stop on his Summer Sixteen tour. On Monday, they tagged him in an Instagram, and the rapper himself posted a comment within ten minutes, hinting he might be down to meet up. “I’mma pull up on ya,” he wrote, as the post went viral. The students waited. They gathered in the central quad. And then they dispersed, dream deferred. “We’re embracing the silliness,” said Drake University’s digital media strategist Niki Smith told TIME. They hoped that [Drake’s audience](http://time.com/4465225/drake-rihanna-relationship/?iid=sr-link1) would take note of the university, too. In a [statement this summer,](http://news.drake.edu/2016/05/20/drake-university-statement-on-drizzys-oct-4-concert-in-des-moines/) the university wrote “should he wish to take us up on our offer (because YOLO)… We’ll be waiting for that hotline to bling!” A student group calling themselves “Drake Social” sent him a plea last month: > [](https://twitter.com/drake%5Fsocial/status/779023954069499907) And even the student body president sought out the rapper with her own meme. > [](https://twitter.com/thaliaanguiano/status/778031287286112257) More students made a video… … and then the university’s president, Marty Martin, got in on the action. > [](https://twitter.com/drakepresident/status/782029495804977152) The rapper was performing at a venue just a few minutes from campus, according to school officials. The students gathered, hopes high that they’d get to see [the 6 God himself.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=umiyidnaq2g) But it wasn’t until the middle of the night that Drizzy made his incognito stop-by. They’ve loved, and unfortunately this time around, [they’ve lost.](https://www.youtube.com/results?search%5Fquery=take+care+drake) But he still repped the school, wearing one of their varsity jackets onstage — and on his way back to his jet. 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