Final report for YENC24-217
Project Information
What we taught youth about sustainable agriculture:
Climate resilience, regenerative grazing and nutrient management
Educational approach and youth learning outcomes:
Through this grant, students managed a small group of cattle on a rotational grazing system. The students participate in moving the cattle to different paddocks within our current 2 acre pasture throughout the year to maximize the growth of beneficial forages and reduce the impact of overgrazing.They also developed and led lessons involving elementary students in grades 1-4 at Zane Trace School.
In addition to learning sustainable pasture management systems, many students developed a greater understanding and appreciation for the labor involved with bringing dairy products from farm to table. The majority of the 3rd grade students who participated in our elementary ag lessons had never even touched a cow, let alone milked one! They had a great amount of interest in how the milk differed from the milk they typically saw at home.
Conclusions:
I would love to see more agriculture instructors in Ohio apply for and implement SARE Youth Educator grants in their programs. Students were able to engage in activities that were both scientific and production-based in nature. They collected and labeled samples, analyzed results, installed fence, learned how solar energizers work, handled cattle and calves, identified forages, taught youth about pastures and milk production, and even toured local farms and production facilities to see every step of the "field to table" process.
Youth, educator, and parent adoption actions:
At least one student is interested in adopting rotational grazing on their existing operation. We will continue this program into the future.
- Increase rotational grazing and animal husbandry skills among 40 high school agriculture students by involving them in management tasks related to raising a small herd of Jersey females in a dairy/beef crossbred operation at Zane Trace High School.
- Provide educational outreach to increase awareness of sustainable agriculture for at least 350 students in grades 1-4 at Zane Trace Elementary through pasture tours and classroom visits.
- Introduce high school agriculture students to livestock career opportunities through a visit to the Ohio State Dairy Farm, a local pasture based livestock operation and three guest speakers in class.
Cooperators
- (Educator)
Educational & Outreach Activities
Participation summary:
Our largest and most impactful educational outreach program was the "Dairy Days" lesson series that was delivered over the course of 3 days to all third-grade students at Zane Trace Elementary. The lessons were prepared and taught by high school agriculture students. These students came to meetings during their lunch periods to prepare materials and plan activities appropriate for the grade level. They received assistance from the Dairy Association Mideast in the form of videos and online resources to share during the lessons. Students developed lesson materials that involved breed identification, dairy cattle terminology (heifer, calf, cow, bull, yearling, etc), dairy cattle care (nutrition, shelter, health), and dairy product nutritional benefits.
During these lessons, which were taught in the spring of 2024 and 2025, over 200 third-grade students participated, and a total of 19 high school students assisted with the lessons. Teachers of the third-grade classes and educational aides participated as well. The highlight of this educational program was the opportunity for students to milk a Jersey cow and compare the difference between fresh milk and milk purchased from a grocery.
On October 23rd, 2025 students from the high school food science and animal science courses participated in a tour of Snowville Creamery near Pomeroy, Ohio. The tour introduced students to the science involved with pasteurizing, processing, and packaging milk, as well as the ways in which milk properties change throughout the year due to nutritional differences in available forages and feeds. The field trip provided students the opportunity to learn how milk is collected from local farms, transported to the creamery, tested, and then processed into cheese, yogurt, fluid milk, flavored milk, and creme fraische. Students were able to operate one of the bottling lines to see how the small milk cartons are filled and labeled. They learned the nutritional advantages of A2 milk for certain members of the population, as well as the nutritional differences in grass-fed milk. The students were able to sample products at the end of the tour as well.
On April 3rd, 2024 and March 27th, 2025, students from the Zane Trace Agriculture Program participated in the Ohio Dairy Expo and Dairy Judging contest in Columbus, Ohio. The students toured the barns to learn about dairy breeds and see top females from various farms on display. They learned dairy evaluation skills and competed with other students from FFA Chapters and 4-H Clubs in the Ohio Spring Dairy Expo judging contest. During this educational experience, students spoke to the owners of two dairy farms and decided that they would like to raise a Milking Shorthorn heifer on the school farm because of their history as a dual-purpose animal. This was deemed important since the calves from our female dairy animals will likely be sold as dairy-beef feeders. This quiz was developed to help agriculture students learn the skills of selecting dairy cattle prior to their trip to the Ohio Spring Dairy Expo.
In September 2025, students from the ZT Animal Science class visited Congrove Farms, where they learned from local beef farmer Ben Congrove how he rotates pastures to improve forages and how effectively his cattle gain weight on the grass they access. He explained the importance of allowing grass to regenerate between grazing and on erosion and soil management. Ben showed students the 60 x 20 heavy-use pad he installed in 2023 and explained how the pad allowed livestock to access their feed and water without degrading the soil. This helped greatly because the students were able to install their own heavy-use pad at Zane Trace to accomplish the same purpose. During this trip, students also learned effective methods to use when handling cattle and performed a topical parasite prevention treatment.
In October of 2025, students from the Animal Science and Food Science classes at Zane Trace participated in a hands-on field trip to Congrove Farms again. This time, students visited a portion of the farm that was being renovated for pasture development. The students observed fall seeding and were able to see pastures in different stages of growth. They also assisted in the removal of tree roots and invasive plants from a section of land and learned how natural water features were being utilized to create water sources for the cattle. Mr. Congrove had just developed a spring-fed water trough and was able to show the students how the water was being routed to the tank and the techniques that prevented the tank from overflowing and freezing. The students learned that the trough was made possible through a USDA grant as well.
ZT FFA Celebrates Dairy Days With 3rd Graders (Article published in late May edition of the Circleville Herald Newspaper)
- Host webinar or in-person workshop
- Series of short videos and/or social media posts
Learning Outcomes
In elementary school, we’ve been focusing on third graders to start with, and plan to expand based on how that goes. Third graders are learning about ecosystems and a little bit of anatomy, and so we’re tying the lessons about the functions of different parts of the pasture, as well as ruminant digestion so they can see why cattle are such a good fit for pasture (as opposed to, say pigs). The first lesson was spring ‘24. By the last week of May, we bought a dairy heifer and dairy cow in to talk terminology, the kids had a chance to milk the cow, brainstorm together about what they thought they would eat vs. what we would eat.
High schoolers have been involved in a couple of different branches of the project:
Fall ‘24 was when we started our first calves. We spent time creating the paddocks inside the enclosed 2 acre area. The high school animal science class learned how to portion off the areas, create the gates, hook up the solar powered portable fence generator, etc.
The first round of calves were not dairy calves, but some cross-bred calves that we were able to purchase from 300-450lbs. That small size was very approachable: less intimidating for the students and they didn’t go through pasture so quickly. The students raised them from Sept - second week of January. We sold them at auction, and the pasture was allowed to rest.
Now we’re in the process of buying the dairy calves (from someone in Holmes Co. OH…we were going to buy them from OSU, but OSU moved all of their animals to Wooster. We’re about 45 minutes south of OSU’s campus, but they are rebuilding their barn and creating a new livestock facility and sold half of their animals and moved the rest to Wooster. We changed that plan and we will purchase instead from a closer farm. We’ll take a field trip for the students to visit the farm to pick out the two heifer calves (maybe a summer and a fall heifer) so that their sizes will be a little staggered, and their calving might be staggered. The students who are participating in the field trip to select the cattle participated in the FFA dairy judging contest. They got to learn about selecting, and at the Expo also learned about forages (including what we could sow into the ground to improve the pasture in addition to good grazing practices).
This spring (2025), the pasture is looking great. It’s vibrant green and nice regrowth of good pasture forages. Observationally, there’s much less multiflora rose. Later this spring, we will do the quantification of forage. The students pointed out which paddocks had been grazed more frequently or not, and how beneficial rotational grazing has been in just one year. We did our soil sampling in mid- to late-May last year, so we’ll do that again this year at a similar time.
Project Outcomes
This grant was administered through the agriculture education program at Zane Trace High School. There were no additional funds to provide additional organizational support.
The sustainable agriculture practices we adopted through our grant included rotational grazing to improve the soil properties and forage diversity on our small two-acre pasture at Zane Trace. At the beginning of the project, in the spring of 2024, soil samples were collected from various points in the pasture and sent to Spectrum Analytics for testing. The pasture was then divided into three sections using an electric fence and a solar-powered charger. The calves raised on the property were rotated between the three areas weekly during times when the forages were actively growing. In the winter, the cattle were held in the front portion of the pasture with access to hay and grain. Once the pastures began greening up in the spring, the cattle returned to their rotation.
Over the course of the project, the amount of organic matter in the soil improved from an average of 1.6% in the three sections of the pasture to 2.2% over the course of 20 months. The cation exchange capacity (CEC) improved from 5.0 to 6.7. Calcium rose from 931 ppm to 1080 ppm, Magnesium rose from 173 ppm to 207 ppm, Potassium rose from 124 ppm to 132 ppm. Phosphorus remained steady, with a slight decline from 46 to 43 ppm. The soil pH also fell from 6.2 to 5.7 on average across the 2-acre pasture.
The increase in organic matter over the time of this grant indicates that further rotational grazing could improve the soil's ability to retain moisture and tolerate volatile climate events. The improvement in CEC indicates that the soil will be able to retain a higher level of nutrients, thus providing enhanced nutrition to forages. Increases in Calcium, Magnesium, and Potassium are all beneficial to plant growth as well. The Ca, Mg, and K levels are all within the optimal range for cool-season grasses at the time of this report. These improvements were the direct result of rotational grazing, as no other amendments were made to the pasture.
While the pH and Phosphorus levels are still low, they can easily be amended by adding lime and supplemental P to the soil.
Where we noticed the most improvement was in the quality of the forages that grew within the 2-acre pasture. We observed increases in the amount of beneficial forages, including red clover, purple vetch, and orchardgrass. These increases came about because the cattle were moved away from sections of the pasture for periods of time, and allowed these plants to re-grow effectively. Continuation of this management system will likely result in additional improvements to forage stands.
One of my agriculture students, Isaac Detty, has raised a steer as part of our county's Calf Scramble program for the past three years. Through this program, students catch and halter a calf during an event at our county fair, then take the animal home and raise it for 12 months before bringing it back to the fair the following year for the market beef show and sale. This student was involved with establishing the rotational grazing setup on our small school land lab. He stated multiple times that the rotational grazing system was something he would like to create and utilize on his home property, now that he could see the ways it extended available pasture resources and improved the soil health.
In addition to learning sustainable pasture management systems, many students developed a greater understanding and appreciation for the labor involved with bringing dairy products from farm to table. The majority of the 3rd grade students who participated in our elementary ag lessons had never even touched a cow, let alone milked one! They had a great amount of interest in how the milk differed from the milk they typically saw at home.
I would love to see more agriculture instructors in Ohio apply for and implement SARE Youth Educator grants in their programs. This grant provided opportunities for my students that they otherwise would not have been able to access due to a lack of funds and resources in our school district. They were able to engage in activities that were both scientific and production-based in nature. They collected and labeled samples, analyzed results, installed fence, learned how solar energizers work, handled cattle and calves, identified forages, taught youth about pastures and milk production, and even toured local farms and production facilities to see every step of the "field to table" process. I am so grateful to SARE for this grant program and hope that by sharing my involvement in it with fellow agriculture teachers during the Summer OAAE Conference in 2025, more of them will consider a SARE project for their own programs.