As part of a commitment to educate the next generation about the importance of agriculture, Perdue Farms has renewed its support for Pennsylvania Friends of Agriculture Foundation's Mobile Agriculture Education Science Lab with a $20,000 grant funded through its Franklin P. and Arthur W. Perdue Foundation. The donation from Perdue's charitable giving arm is part of the company's Delivering Hope to Our Neighbors initiative focused on improving quality of life and building strong communities.
"The Mobile Agriculture Education Science Lab program is a classroom on wheels that travels to schools in Pennsylvania providing agriculture-based education through interactive hands-on experiments, using lessons incorporating math, science and literacy," said Natalie Slembarski, Pennsylvania Friends of Agriculture Foundation director of operations.
The curriculum offers more than 30 STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math)-based lessons that meet the Pennsylvania Department of Education's academic standards and are backed by the Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture.
"On our labs, students learn to hypothesize, work cooperatively, collect data, solve problems and draw conclusions," Slembarski said. "While on the lab you could find students making plastic out of corn; analyzing water to determine a contamination source; learning how to be an environmentally friendly farmer or making crayons from soybeans."
Each lab is stocked with more than 30 lessons and the supplies students need to perform experiments. Slembarski said the program's goal is to educate more children and communities and promote the significance of agriculture in daily life.
"To date, more than 1.4 million children in our communities have learned about agriculture in the foundation's Mobile Ag Ed Science Labs and we expect to reach an additional 100,000 students each year across Pennsylvania as the program continues to reach students who might otherwise have no connection to agriculture," Slembarski said.
"The Pennsylvania Friends of Agriculture Foundation believes that we must reach out to our communities to offer programs that educate on all agricultural commodities," she said, adding that students' before and after knowledge is evaluated to gauge the program's success and learn how to improve and expand it.
"We at Perdue are so excited to invest in this fun and educational opportunity for the community," said Kim Nechay, executive director of the Perdue Foundation. "STEM programs are so important for our young people and the promotion of agriculture through this mobile programming is just fantastic."
Categories: Pennsylvania, Business, Education