Career opportunities focus of Amazing Ag Adventure

Dozens of high school students, at Agriculture in the Classroom’s Amazing Agriculture Adventure for the first time, learned that whatever their career choice for the future, they are likely to find it in some way connected to agriculture.

This year’s Amazing Agriculture Adventure again featured 10 interactive stations, giving elementary students a close-up view of different phases of agriculture from honey bees to beef, but added to the event for the first time, was a high school component.

High school students also toured the five stations at the Bruce D. Campbell Farm and Food Discovery Centre and then moved on to the Manitoba Dairy Farmers dairy barn and outdoor stations, including one featuring beef. For the older students, volunteer presenters concentrated on the various agriculture careers involved, as well as providing details about raising livestock, protecting the environment and caring for animals.

The veterinary, dairy, beef and watershed stations helped students gain an understanding of how animals are cared for, how agriculture plays a role in their daily life, and how they could one day be part of an exciting career in agriculture.

At the watershed display, Edward Shao used a water spray bottle shaped like a cloud to “rain” on a model depicting the different kinds of pollution which could be produced in different settings. Shao explained how runoff would take pollution to various waterways and challenged older students to suggest ways the damage to the environment could be mediated.

As part of his presentation, using the model, Shao showed high school students a number of examples of the kind of environment-related career options that were available, be it in a factory, farm or rural community setting.

Sharing his own career path, Shao told students that after graduating with a degree in Environmental Studies he had tried the Winnipeg job market and found the same obstacle at every turn. Employers wanted somebody with a degree and experience. Having just graduated, he had the qualifications but not the experience.

Returning home to Swan Lake, he applied for a job with the Swan Lake Watershed District and was hired. In a small community, getting a job is sometimes easier than tackling the job market in a big city.

“It’s not always what you know, but who you know. In a rural community, everybody knows everybody.”

Over at the beef station across from the dairy research barn, Josie Pederson demonstrates how to assist a cow during a difficult birth, using Clover, a life-sized calving model of a beef cow with a calf inside.

Pederson is the extension coordinator for youth programming at the Manitoba Beef and Forages Initiatives near Brandon.

She told students she had grown up on a cattle operation and had early aspirations of becoming a veterinarian. She changed her mind while studying Animal Science at the University of Manitoba and spending summers working at MBFI, 20 minutes north of Brandon. Manitoba Beef & Forage Initiatives is a research and demonstration farm dedicated to working with farmers to support the advancement of the beef cattle and forage industries.

When a position in extension work at Beef and Forages Initiatives became available, Pederson decided this would give her the best of both worlds, and has been there ever since. Her position became full time in January.

Joining Pederson at the beef station was Mark Good, a beef farmer from Alonsa, and a member of the board of Manitoba Beef Producers.

He told students he had become a beef producer as a teenager, when his father presented him with his own cow as payment for the chores he did on their beef operation. The family, which operates a 300-head cow-calf operation, moved to Manitoba in 2001, because “land was cheaper here.”

An interested group of students from St Mary’s Academy peppered both Pederson and Good with questions ranging from the average lifespan of a cow, which is nine years, to, “Does a cow go inside during the winter?”

Good assured the students that beef cows are outside year round. Five months are spent outside on grass pasture and then their food is supplemented once cold weather sets in.

“The beef cow has a fur coat and only needs shelter from the wind. They only come into the corral twice a year, once to be vaccinated, and again at calving time.”

The students were also interested in the slaughter process and were told the animals were killed as humanely as possible, by firing a bolt into the brain.

Good explained that the cow and calf in the display were brought to Amazing Agriculture Adventure for their beef station because all the cattle at Glenlea are dairy cows. After their visit to AAA, the beef cow-calf pair would be going back to Miami, he said.

Over at the dairy barn, retired veterinarian Doug Bazinet explains the function of a cow’s collar in tracking the movements of the animal, through automated feeding and milking by robots up to three times a day.

He tells an astonished group of high school students that a cow produces an average of 24 litres of milk every single day.

Bazinet, who has been a veterinarian for over four decades, says he volunteers for the Agriculture in the Classroom event because he enjoys talking to young students and is hopeful some will choose to follow careers as veterinarians.

Bazinet tells students there are many great career opportunities as a vet.

“You can work with cows, pigs, and horses, or with dogs and cats. Most people have pets in their homes. In rural areas, there are some outside and some inside.”

Veterinarians also work outside the animal practise by making recommendations to the feed industry to create better nutrition for livestock, Bazinet said.

“Sometimes I think animals get better nutrition than we do.”

Enthusiastic about the AITC program, Bazinet says it exposes young people to agriculture, and if one of these students thinks about becoming a veterinarian, he will be happy.

At another station in the dairy research building, Bill Ryaniczuk, Manitoba Agriculture Industry Development specialist and rural leadership specialist Leanne Tibbatts use dozens of business cards, and a cattle “fit bit” collar to demonstrate the connection countless careers have with agriculture.

Students are asked to pick five cards they think are part of developing the “fit bit”.

It turns out that in this case there are no wrong answers, for every one of the cards on the table can be connected in some way to agriculture.

Ryaniczuk suggests that trying to come up with a profession that does not have any agricultural connection would be difficult.

It takes countless different people just to come up with this one product, he said. The farmer who uses the fit bit is the most obvious, but along the way, the development of this modern technology includes manufacturers of the equipment, livestock consultants, software developers, accountants and attorneys.

Ryaniczuk and other volunteers at the Manitoba Ag station explained how each card students picked played a role in agriculture.

And as Agriculture in the Classroom plays a pivotal role in making sure that students have the opportunity to learn about opportunities for a future in agriculture, government and the agriculture industry alike are stepping forward with funding to make their task that much easier.

Recently, through the Sustainable Canadian Agricultural Partnership, the governments of Canada and Manitoba provided $400,000 to Agriculture in the Classroom Manitoba.to be used for the Amazing Agriculture Adventure Program.

At the same time, Agriculture in the Classroom-Manitoba announced a three-year funding partnership with Manitoba Beef Producers amounting to $105,000.

Katharine Cherewyk, Executive Director of AITC-M, says her organization is incredibly grateful for the unwavering support of the province, and the many sectors of the agriculture industry.

“Their commitment is a testament to the vital role agricultural education plays in shaping informed and engaged citizens. Together, we are paving the way for students to gain a comprehensive understanding of the agriculture sector, including the beef industry.”