The Agronomy Club was started, just six years ago, to fill a hole in ABAC’s ag club offerings, when they became the first that focuses specifically on crop production.
“We have food at every meeting,” said Dr. Justin Ng, who serves as an advisor for the club alongside Dr. Ray Smith and Trey Davis. The Agronomy Club. Ng also talked about how the agronomy club will have a guest speaker come and speak about the ag industry.
Also at the meeting, the Agronomy Club frequently talk about fundraising. Through fundraising, the club is able to take farm tours throughout the school year. The money the members help raise for the club goes towards their personal trip, so the more they work, the less the members have to pay.
Some of the fundraisers the agronomy club host throughout the year consist of the truck and tractor pull, the annual skeet shoot, a car wash, raffles, and Surrcherros night. The Agronomy clubs next fundraiser event will be the annual skeet shoot coming up September 8.
This year also marks the beginning of a new fundraising endeavor that may interest students’ enrolled in Ng’s classes regardless of their interest in the Agronomy Club. With this fundraiser, Ng plans to sell note packets that contain blank spaces for students to fill in, and after he deducts the material cost, he plans to put the rest of the money towards the Agronomy Club.
Each year the Agronomy Club goes on a farm tour. Last year the students toured farms in California and the year before that they toured the Midwest.
This fall the club plans to visit Philadelphia but also hopes to visit notable sites in Washington, D.C. and New Jersey on this tour.
Smith said the places they could see this year included The Liberty Bell, downtown Philidelphia as well as The National Mall in Washington D.C.
Although the Farm tours offer the Agronomy Club an opportunity to see new sites, the main goal of the trip is to see how the production of agriculture works in different areas.
The bulk of the tour will be spent learning about ag in the region —with tour destinations like a cranberry bog, winery, container nursery, mushroom farm, and a hops farm. Then during the spring semester, the club will take another farm tour but stick closer to home.
The club’s first regular meeting this semester already featured a guest speaker, Sam Cloete, the CEO of Kannar Earth Sciences, a company that makes seed coatings. Cloete’s goal was to teach students to find where their heart is, and what they’re best at so that they can find the career that’s right for them. He shared how he personally was able to find that in the agriculture industry where he feels he’s able to be “a catalyst for lasting, positive change.”
So if you are interested in joining the Agronomy Club, they meet every other Thursday at 6:00 p.m. in Ag Science 139.
