Agriculture continues to play a serious position within the state and native financial system, and Madison-Oneida BOCES is proud to offer college students in our area with a number of pathways towards viable careers within the agriculture trade.
We provide space highschool college students alternatives to discover varied features of agriculture via quite a few our Profession and Technical Schooling (CTE) applications.
By way of our Conservation program, college students achieve hands-on experiences in maple and honey manufacturing, beekeeping, logging, landscaping, forest administration, wildlife administration and surveying. These college students compete in regional abilities competitions at Morrisville State School and Paul Smith’s School, they usually go on to profitable careers within the trade.
In reality, the 2020 NYS Maple King, Kyle Hale, is a graduate of the MOBOCES Conservation program and the Canastota FFA, the place he served as chapter president and held state management roles. He’s now finding out Agriculture Enterprise and Administration at SUNY Cobleskill. Hale mentioned one in every of his passions is selling the agriculture trade, and he has run his personal maple tapping and manufacturing operation for a number of years.
“I like advocating for agriculture and FFA,” he mentioned after receiving his Maple King title. “I’m extraordinarily fortunate to have this place and be capable of do one thing I like.”
MOBOCES additionally presents agriculture trade connections via its Equine and Animal Science program, the place college students observe caring for horses at an area barn and be taught massive animal anatomy and physiology in preparation for careers in veterinary care, breeding, and animal coaching and administration.
Even applications outdoors of the core Agriculture observe – significantly these within the Development and Mechanical Trades fields – have appealed to many college students who reside or work on farms. These college students come to us with intensive prior information of farming, however they need to be taught extra about repairing engines on farm tools, working heavy equipment, constructing a barn from the bottom up, or putting in electrical wiring. Many of those MOBOCES college students journey to regional agriculture-focused occasions, akin to Farming Your Future and Development Careers Day, an occasion we co-host annually.
A core side of our CTE applications is work-based studying, which permits college students to spend time in native companies and organizations to see first-hand the work that trade entails. Lots of our college students achieve their work-based studying hours via website visits, job shadows and full semester internships at native farm-related companies, akin to heavy equipment outlets, horse stables, animal hospitals, state parks, fish hatcheries, motorsports shops, and native freeway departments.
This listing represents only a small sampling of the agriculture and agribusiness trade. The sphere encompasses so many numerous profession alternatives for our future workforce, and we hope center faculty and highschool college students think about additional exploring agriculture for his or her faculty or profession path.
