Farm Bureau International Young Farmer Study
CAMP HILL (Cumberland
Co.) —Eleven young member* of
the Pennsylvania Farm Bureau
(Farm Bureau) will be traveling
through Europe August 16-26 as
part of the farm organization’s
pilot Young Farmer and Rancher
(YF&R) International Study Tour.
The YF&R group will be visiting
farmers, farm organizations, edu
cational institutions and agribusi
nesses during the tour of four na
tions starting in Munich, Ger
many.
Members of the YF&R over
seas tour group are: Brian and Fay
Dietrich of 8459 Kistler Valley
Rd., New Tripoli; Rebekah Grass
of 190 Manchester St, Manches
ter, David and Beth Hartman of
RR 3, Bemville, Ralph and Crys
tal Moyer of 91 Frystown Road,
Frystown; Donald and Joanne
Stoltzfus of RR 1 Morgantown;
and Steve and Bonnie Wenger of
549 Schaeffer Rd., Lebanon.
The purpose of the trip, accord
ing to tour coordinator Ralph
Moyer, will be to gain “an up
close look at the European ap
proach to agriculture and find out
what European farmers think
about international trade issues.
We will also be asking them about
environmental and animal rights
issues which they’ve been dealing
with longer than we have in the
United States." Moyer is past pre
sident of PA Farm Bureau’s
YF&R committee.
The group will be headed by the
current YF&R chairperson, Re
bekah “Becky” Gross of York
County. “It’s not going to be a va
cation.” she said. “The tour is the
capstone of YF&R’s leadership
training program. We hope to gain
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a global perspective that will help
us as future leaders in Farm Bur
eau.” All eleven tour members
have participated in the YF&R
stale leadership conferences. PA
Farm Bureau annual meeting pro
grams and the YF&R Washington
Tour.
Every member of the group will
be keeping a travel journal to re
cord their observations on produc
tion agriculture, marketing, real
estate, education, government,
farm organizations and farm sup
ply and service businesses in the
countries they visit. Upon their re
turn they will help compile a re
port for Farm Bureau’s State
Board of Directors. The State
Board is supporting the young
fanners by helping to underwrite
tour expenses. Group members
also contacted local sponsors in
the agribusiness community for
additional support and will be
available to them for follow-up re
ports on the trip. “Raising funds
from local supporters is part of the
educational process for these
young farmers,” explained Farm
Bureau’s Director of Program De
velopment and Training, Fred
Kerr. “It gives everybody—Farm
Bureau, the local sponsors and the
young farmers a vested interest
in the outcome of the tour.” The
young farmers will also be making
a presentation during Farm Bur
eau’s annual meeting in Novem
ber.
One of the highlights of the tour
will be a two-day stay by each
couple with host farmers in south
ern Germany. The tour agenda
also includes a visit to the Agricul
tural University at Freising-Wech
enstephan and the Bavarian Cen
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ter of Animal Husbandry. A meet
ing with the Bavarian Farmer’s
Association is planned. In Swit
zerland the group will tour Alpine
dairy and livestock operations and
meet with representatives of the
provisional agriculture depart
ment. They will meet with the
U.S. Agricultural Attache and
Pennsylvania Minority
UNIVERSITY PARK (Centre
Co.) Some 39 minority high
school students got the chance to
dig into the turf at Beaver Sta
dium, digest the workings of a
cow's stomach, make a flower ar
rangement and a host of other acti
vities as part of a Food and Agri
cultural Sciences Workshop held
Sunday, July 24 through Friday,
July 29 on Penn State's University
Park campus.
Designed as a recruiting effort
to get science-minded minority
students to consider the College of
Agricultural Sciences’ education
al opportunities, the workshop
featured five days of intensive,
hands-on demonstrations by vari
ous departments in the college.
The workshop, funded by the
university’s Equal Opportunity
Planning Committee, was targeted
toward high school sophomores
and juniors who have not yet made
a decision on a career path, says
Dr. Cathy Bowen, assistant pro
fessor of agricultural and exten
sion education. Cathy Bowen and
Dr. Blannie Bowen, C. Lee Rum-
Swiss Agricultural Ministry in
Bern as well as members of the
Swiss Young Fanners. They will
visit the Ciba-Geigy Corporation
headquarters in Basel, Switzer
land and will tour mountain farm
operations in Liechtenstein and
Austria. Tours of livestock mar-
Get Ag Grand Tour
berger, professor of agricultural
and extension education, organiz
ed and planned the workshop.
The college sent flyers to high
school science teachers and coun
selors across the state who recom
mended nearly SO students, many
from eastern Pennsylvania.
Activities for the students cen
tered on demonstrations and tours
rather than classroom work. “We
wanted to make sure the kids were
not silting in a classroom listening
to someone talk, because there is
no quicker way to turn off their in
terest,” Cathy Bowen said.
Blannie Bowen, who organized
the activities for the students, em
phasized that most of the demon
strations delved into complicated
and scientific issues. “Many of the
kids coming in don’t have an ex
tensive background in science, so
we want to catch them early
enough so they can go back and
pick up those science courses,” he
says. “We wanted to make sure
they went deeper into the science
aspect than a tour of the Univer
sity Creamery,”
Bowen pointed out that the Col
lege of Agricultural Sciences loses
many talented science students
minority or otherwise because
high school students are simply
unaware of the scientific work
done within the college. “Those
kids go into biology or engineer
ing and we lose out,” he explain
ed.
After a Sunday orientation ses
sion, the workshop started Mon
day, July 25, with food science
and, yes, a tour of the Creamery.
Lancaster Farming, Saturday, August 6, 1994-A29
Tour Set
kets and a dairy cooperative are
also planned
“lime will be some time for
sightseeing but it’s a pretty full
itinerary,” said Mrs. Gross. “The
opportunities to learn are unlimit
ed. We hope this will be the first
of many international YF&R tours
to come."
Students
Demonstrations in food chemistry
and sensory analyssis followed.
Monday aftemon was dedicated to
delving into plant pathology.
On Tuesday, July 26, horticul
ture was the focus as the students
toured university greenhouses and
took in demonstrations of land
scaping, fruit production, floral
design and biotechnology.
Wednesday, July 27, found the
kids experiencing animal science,
including sessions in dairy, animal
and poultry science. Visitors look
ed inside the four chambers of a
cow’s stomach, and worked with
ultrasound technology as well as
horse handling. Wednesday after
focused on agronomy as the stu
dents headed to Beaver Stadium to
analyze turfgrass. The day ended
with a look at forest products.
Thursday, July 28, opened with
a session on urban forestry and
then the group headed out to a
nearby state park for an entomolo
gy field trip, where the kids cap
tured, preserved and classified in
sects. A visit to the university’s
mushroom research facility ended
the day.
Friday, July concluded the
week with a discussion group, an
awards lunch and a talk on agri
cultural literacy by Eddie Moore,
a professor of agricultural and ex
tension education at Michigan
State University.
Blannie Bowen summed up the
aim of the workshop: “When kids
think of science they usually see
the space shuttle or chemistry.
With this workshop, we just want
to say ‘Hey, take a look at this.”