Teaching Ag in an Urban Setting
By Hank Wilson
Part 1 – Welcome to the Future – Agri-Science Program – Madison High School – San Antonio Texas
I’ve spent a large portion of my life either visiting or living in the city of San Antonio, Texas and frankly, it’s probably my favorite city in the United States. I remember when it was much, much smaller than it is now, when the city was surrounded by farmland and ranches.
And I remember when the outermost road that now circles the city was a two lane road, that the locals called ‘the death loop’ (lots and lots of accidents back in those days). Now though it’s known simply as Anderson Loop or Loop 1604. As I said, twenty years ago, if you travelled along Loop 1604 you were in the country, you were truly on the outskirts of town. That is no longer accurate.
Today Loop 1604 is a highly trafficked main artery that during rush hour can resemble an incredibly long parking lot. It represents the transformation that has taken place in San Antonio, it’s no longer a quiet little city in the country, it is a major urban setting and to me it reflects many of the changes that have taken place around the country. Some have called it the ‘Urbanization of America’ and some have praised it and some have cursed it and some have adapted to it.
Located just a couple of mile inside Loop 1604 is an oasis and one of the best examples of adapting to a changing environment that can be found. It is the Ag Department at Madison High School. What was once a small struggling program geared towards the traditional Ag courses has become a model for school districts throughout the country.
Last year I had the chance to visit Madison while construction of their new facility was underway and I was given a tour and had a chance to visit with program director John Mack and we talked about what was going on at Madison and what he thought the future held for Ag education in the traditional urban centers and Ag education in general.
Madison High School’s Ag Department has been transformed into a model Agri-Science program and is now a ‘magnet’ program for all of the Northeast Independent School District. That means that if you are a student in one of the seven high schools that are in the Northeast Independent School District in San Antonio and you want to study Agriculture, you attend Madison High School. And according to the numbers, there are a lot of students who are interested in Agriculture. To become a member of the Agri-Science program students have to apply, survive an interview and understand that life will be different for them and that they will be receiving a tremendous education.
Teaching Ag in the city, what’s the point? According to John Mack “One of our big focus’s here is making sure elementary kids get a true appreciation for agriculture as a science, a need to protect agriculture and the environment, and everything that goes into what is good production. All elements of agriculture. That is one of our major focuses. With that in mind, we are going to be shipping a whole lot of kids out into the Ag community with both a real world view and interest in agriculture and hopefully a passion within one of these niches. “
So who are these kids? “We don’t have ranchers. We don’t have farmers. This is an urban setting with subdivision kids. Instead of going home and getting on the computer or going downtown, they are taking care of animals and doing things they can in areas they are interested in.” OK, normal big city kids that are interested in Ag, but since the Agri-Science center is adjacent to the main campus, I asked John if the students are truly a part of the school or are they considered somehow different. After all, a significant portion of them do come from one of the other schools and those schools are traditional rivals of Madison.
Not to worry, he told me how the students are truly immersed into life on the campus ‘This is the Madison Mavericks. This is the Agri-Science School magnet. The students graduate as Madison Mavericks and they have access to the Madison counselors. It’s a great concept. We have quality instruction. We are a recognized campus with good stuff going on in every one of the core classes. We have great electives. They can play football. They can play baseball. We have all the bells and whistles of being a Madison student. This is just an elective for those kids interested in agriculture.
I remember when I was in school how when I tried to choose an elective it was one that wouldn’t make me work all that hard. So I was wondering how well today’s Ag students were able to incorporate these electives into their regular studies. We now live in a time of ‘standardized’ testing and I know that a lot of schools spend a ton of time preparing students for those tests, so it is easier or harder to get it all in. What’s the benefit to doing it this way?
As John told me, “It’s much easier now for us to integrate what’s going on in math with what we are doing in science. We have a tremendous advantage in teaching Ag-Science because we get to make it relevant. In a classroom, it’s within those four walls for that 90 minute period. We can take them out and do those things, but our responsibility then is to make sure that they learn that, and then here it is applied . . . there is the volume of that water inside that tank. You just learned volumes again, and here is the ratio in that feed . . . use the same wording that you see on a standardized test. This magnet program is still the same fundamental reading, writing, and arithmetic at the main campus. Then they come here for their Ag elective. The students choose to be here.”
Since it’s a choice, I wondered how popular is it? How well is it working? Pretty well, it would seem because there are currently about 650 students involved in at least one of the areas of study offered by the program, and he says, Out of the 650 kids, for about 400 of them, it is their life. For 250, it’s their elective. They may venture into one of these other areas, but it doesn’t consume their time. They may be heavily involved in band or ROTC or football or basketball or some sport, spirit group. So they have other things competing for their time. For the majority of them, it’s their everything”. These kids can have way too much on their plate. Their opportunities are unbelievable.”
In my next report, we’ll take a look at five specific programs offered to the students and exactly what some of those opportunities are.
