Tanque Verde High students to study agriculture in new barn

Genesis Lara

Students at Tanque Verde High School are now able to delve deeper into learning about ranching and farming after the school received grant money to build a new barn and improve its greenhouse.

The barn, which officially opened this month, is already housing three Brangus cattle and two lambs, and will soon shelter chickens and pigeons for the students to work with. In the greenhouse, students will experiment with different ways of cultivating plants, said Principal Amy Cislak.

"This was something that we thought would be a really great way to educate future generations about food stability — how food is produced, the business behind it, the safety behind it, and have our kids be really active parts in sustainable lifestyles," she said.

Students will now learn about animal genetics, large animal breeding and raising young cattle. Eventually, Cislak said, the students will take the cattle to market and reinvest the money to sustain the barn and agriculture program.

She added that, given a lot of students' interests in ranching and farming, administrators wanted to ensure that they understand both the ethical and scientific research behind breeding and food production.

In the greenhouse, students will be able to study plant genetics and chemical-free pest control, as well as to experiment with aquaponics and hydroponics gardening methods.

Aquaponics refers to growing fishes and plants in the same environment, with the fish waste becoming nutrients for the plants. Hydroponics uses only water and chemical nutrients to grow plants without soil.

Also, Tanque Verde High School has partnered with Hatch Chile Co. to have students grow hatch green chiles, learn about the genetics of chile peppers and have a hand at producing them.

Barn and Outdoor Learning Center — Students from Tanque Verde High School who worked on the barn as part of the new outdoor learning center gather for a photo and ribbon cutting.
Mamta Popat photos, Arizona Daily Star

Cislak said one of the main purposes behind the outdoor learning center is to provide students with the opportunity to have "safe fails."

"We want students to take risks and try new things when they're in high school, where maybe the worst thing that happens is they learn they don't like something, and that's just as productive," she said.

Community effort

Administrators' dreams of providing those opportunities started coming to fruition after the school hired Craig Bal to spearhead the school's agriculture program, the principal said.

In August, Cislak secured a $300,000 grant from A for Arizona, a nonprofit organization that advocates for investing in education. More than $100,000 was invested each in the outdoor learning center and a new computer science, coding and robotics classroom on campus.

The rest of the money will fund additional projects in the robotics program during the spring, as well as ongoing costs for the animal husbandry program, Cislak said.

About 100 students in Bal's agriculture and precision manufacturing classes have put in hard work from the beginning on the barn, from working with architects to choosing the site, preparing the land and building the barn.

The students also used their welding skills to design and create chicken coops and panels for the corral spaces. Many community partners also stepped in to help with their expertise and resources, Cislak said.

"It's been a really serendipitous moment for us to invite our community back on campus, invite them to be active participants with our kids, and it's been incredible how excited people are to help," she said.

The Tanque Verde Unified School District was formed in 1885 to serve the rural ranching community of the Tanque Verde Valley on the Tucson area's northeast side.

Though the district now serves a primarily residential suburban community, its website says, the Tanque Verde Valley continues to preserve its ranching history and identity.

Tanque Verde High School held the grand opening of its new barn and updated outdoor learning center on Dec. 7, which included student-led tours, demonstrations and a chance to meet the animals living in the barn. Video courtesy of Tanque Verde High School.

Video courtesy of Tanque Verde Unified School District

Learning opportunities

During the barn's opening ceremony on Dec. 7, students led tours of the facilities, showed community members the animals now living on school grounds, and gave demonstrations of some of the work that they'll be doing.

Malina Travis, a 16-year-old senior at TVHS and president of the school's Future Farmers of America chapter, for example, took her horse to the opening ceremony to give a roping demonstration.

She said she will occasionally take her horse to school to teach the younger students involved in FFA about horse evaluations, saddle parts and how to put shoes on a horse.

While she has grown up in the ranching and rodeo scene, she's excited her other classmates now have the opportunity to learn more about it.

"Now everyone actually understands that what we do is cool and that we feed all of the population. Agriculture feeds the population," Travis said.

Douglas Sheppard, a 15-year-old sophomore at TVHS, said he plans to continue working in both the barn and greenhouse, but he expects he'll spend most of his time working with the plants.

"I'm really excited about being able to experiment with different types of soils … and what plants grow best in aquaculture and hydroponics versus just normal beds," he said.

The process of building the barn was already a learning experience in itself, he noted. Whenever challenges came up, Bal allowed students the time to think and come up with their own solutions, Sheppard said.

"I think that's really cool because that helps us build our problem-solving skills, so that when we're launched into work, when we move off into the real world, we know how to figure things out on our own without needing help from someone else," Sheppard said.