The Blog

Elementary Students Attend Ag Showcase

Last month, our fourth through sixth grade students had the opportunity to attend the Merrick County Ag Showcase at the fairgrounds here in Central City. Matthew Needham, a fifth grader, described the day as “a fun learning experience about agriculture.” Many experts from the University of Lincoln Extensions and local experts came and spent the day teaching Merrick County fourth through sixth grade students on a variety of agricultural topics. Several of our sophomores also volunteered their time to attend this day and help with the elementary.

The students from the area schools (Central City, Palmer, High Plains, Twin Rivers, and NC) were divided into seventeen groups, but students from the same schools stayed together. After being divided into groups, the students spent the day engaged in hands-on activities educating them on subjects like livestock information, machines on the farm, soil, and production of farming products. Our students attended the following stations: Safe Livestock Handling, What Cattle Eat, Commodity Carnival (cost and overhead of raising livestock and what they would get for them on the market), Positively Popcorn, Soil Critters Corral, Grape Harvest, Amazing Machines (combines and tractors), Kernel of Opportunity (Aurora Cooperative), Model Beef Lab, and Eggs as a Safe Food Source.

Miss Amy Schreiber, the 4th-6th grade teacher, hopes her students “come away with an understanding of how agriculture affects their everyday life and to have an appreciation of the science involved in every aspect.” The day seems to have been a great success, for Needham and Cal Seip, a sixth grader, sum it up like this: “IT WAS AWESOME!!!! And we are now ag-smart, and educated in many ways to preserve the economy around the nation.”