Ag Education Part 2

With today's massive urban areas and sprawling suburbs many school kids have never even seen a farm animal or crops growing in a field. That's where the Colorado Ag in the Classroom program comes in. Bette Blinde is the Executive Director for the Colorado Foundation for Agriculture that oversees the Ag in the Classroom program. They take the teachers out for an immersion class in ag.

BLINDE: We'll take them out and show them the research farms that are going on through Colorado State University ands they learn about the research that's going on with animal agriculture and with the crop side of agriculture. Then we go out and tour a different variety of agricultural operations so we show them large operators, small operators, organic, conventional and show them the diversity of crops produced here in Colorado.

Besides just touring farms, Blinde says the teachers spend one day actually working that farm or ranch.

BLINDE: They get a whole a whole new perspective of agriculture working that day on the farm or ranch with that farmer. And then the last day we share with them the project Food, Land and People curriculum materials so they have 55 lesson they can use in the classroom with their students.

The Foundation is always looking for support.

BLINDE: We receive no public funding. Everything that we do relies on people to make a donation to make it happen. So we have an adopt a classroom program where for $60 you can provide a series of readers into the classroom. We're also coming up on February 14, Valentine's Day. We're having our fundraising dinner.

For details, check out growingyourfuture.com.

And that's Colorado Ag Today. I'm Greg Martin, thanks for listening on the Ag Information Network of the West.