Environment
Why More City High Schoolers Are Taking Ag Classes
Complete with crops and farm animals, agriculture programs are exposing city students to careers they might not have otherwise considered.
Several years ago, leaders of the public-school district in Decatur, Illinois (population 72,000), realized something was off. The city has the highest poverty rate in the state, as well as neighborhoods with 20-percent unemployment. Yet it’s surrounded by agriculture giants—equipment manufacturer Caterpillar and grain processor Archer Daniels Midland—and they’re hiring.
“We’re right here in the middle of the agribusiness universe,” said Zach Shields, the executive director of the Decatur Public Schools Foundation, “and we were not connecting our city kids to those opportunities.”