Engaging Inner City 6th Graders on the Farm.

The primary goal of the Illinois State University Agricultural Science Club (ASC) is to engage and educate the local community about agriculture technology through organized student driven outreach programs. Thus, the students of the club designed an inner city field trip to the Illinois State University Research and Teaching Farm to engage the entire sixth grade class of Evans Junior High School (285 students). This field trip consisted of a series student driven learning activities that included livestock viewing and animal nutrition, exploration of sheep and the function of their digestive track, crop identification, integrative pest management, and soil conservation and erosion models.  As a result of aggressive fund raising and contributions made by local agriculture commodity groups the ASC was able to sponsor the entire field trip on behalf of the Evans Junior High School. We believe that the tour provided a quality farm experience for inner city students, while exposing them to agricultural science and technology principles that are crucial to the sustainability of agriculture.