Growing Young Farmers - High School Kids Farm at School

by Hanna Raskin, Posted Jul 10th 2009 @ 5:00PM

Down on the C.A.S.E. Farm. Photo: Wesley Paulk

Like diagramming sentences and calculating quadratic equations, making grits -- as an academic pursuit -- might be deemed by high schoolers irrelevant to modern life.

A renewed national interest in local food has helped stimulate agricultural education in some rural areas, however, such as in Irwin County, Ga. There, students at the high school's demonstration farm are growing and harvesting corn, then churning out cornmeal and grits for an eager local audience.

Educators at the school's 30-acre C.A.S.E. Farm – the acronym stands for Center for Agricultural Study and Excellence – have seized the opportunity to teach their charges about value-added products (sales of which help fund the program itself). "With the economy getting like it is, people are trying to keep their money at home," explains Wesley Paulk, Irwin County High's young farmer advisor.

In a region historically dominated by corn, cotton and peanuts, Paulk and his colleagues are trying to make an agricultural future viable for their students. "We're teaching processing, marketing and selling," says Paulk. "It's been a real positive program."

There are few programs anywhere as developed as C.A.S.E. The seven-year-old farm includes an organic peanut patch, three acres of sweet corn and a pig barn. The program's 100-plus enrollees, Paulk says, mostly "like being outside."

Agriculture education isn't new in Irwin. But the students' and teachers' shared confidence that the curriculum could translate into steady work surprises even Paulk, who as recently as a decade ago frequently heard that a farmer wouldn't fit into a 21st century economy. While Paulk may seem too gentlemanly to say 'I told you so', the message is embodied by every bag of C.A.S.E. Farm grits.

Filed Under: Farming
Tags: southern states