Bailey Garwood teaches AgriScience and Environmental Technology to junior and senior students at Oakland Schools Technical Campus Southwest in Wixom, Michigan. The hands-on curriculum she teaches focuses on several different industries of agricultural science that students could go into including plants, animals, environmental and natural resources.
 
“Often times when students begin the program as juniors, they walk into the classroom like a deer in the headlights with little knowledge of what they want to do in the future,” Garwood says. “Then through field trips, job shadows and other educational experiences they expand their knowledge base of what they can do with their skills and a plan for the future.”
 
Having a sense of community is important to future career satisfaction, so educators are often seeking ways to get students involved in their communities from the beginning. Garwood knows that the best way to do this is through teaching them skills that they can turn around and give back to the community.
 
In addition to the everyday hands-on curriculum Garwood provides students in the classroom, she also allows opportunities for students to bring their skills to the community. For the past 44 years, students in the Oakland Technical Schools AgriScience and Environmental Technology program have hosted holiday sales and spring sales for the community.
 
In the fall students learned how to create floral arrangements. They then use this skill to create holiday centerpieces, wreathes, poinsettias and grave blankets for the community holiday sale from mid-November through the holidays. In the spring students host an even larger community sale. Throughout the months leading up to the spring sale, students learn about annuals so that they feel confident in sharing their knowledge with the community members looking to purchase at the spring sale.
 
The curriculum taught in this classroom goes beyond agriculture and ties back into what students are being taught in their core classes. Not only do the students create the items to be sold, they also handle all sales and marketing of the events.
 
“Our career-focused education is an extension of the core education students receive at their homeschools, so we ensure that curriculum is embedded in ours,” Garwood explains. “Students are aware that agriculture is rigorous science and even math, but they often don’t realize how many language arts skills are touched upon in our classroom. Many of our students go throughout their traditional education thinking ‘oh, I’m not good at language arts,’ but they’re building these skills in our class without even realizing it. When they get back to the traditional classroom they’re amazed at what they can do.”
 
In career-focused education, collaboration is of the essence. The AgriScience and Environmental Technology program often cross-clusters with Oakland Technical Campus’ culinary program. This collaboration is working to enhance nutrition in schools. Students in Garwood’s program grow tomatoes, herbs and lettuce to provide the culinary program fresh produce for school lunches. The class recently had a project where they had the opportunity to raise chickens and make all their own decisions on what to feed them and how to raise them. This project covered many of the core principles Garwood teaches throughout the year.
 
“We talk a lot about making our own decisions for nutrition, the importance of knowing where your food comes from and how eating and buying local stimulates the economy,” Garwood says. “The power of knowing they have the ability to make these decisions energizes the students.”
 
The community sales the AgriScience and Environmental Technology program allow students to connect with citizens and experience the power of buying local firsthand. Career-focused education ties experiential and hands-on learning to core curriculum while simultaneously tying students to the community.