Nov 12, 2025
By Sedgwick County Harvest Hub
Emily Kerschen of Garden Plain has found her sweet spot of combining her love of teaching with her knowledge of how farming and ranching works to get food to our plates.
“Since only 2 percent of the population are involved in farming and ranching, there’s a good chance people don’t know where their food comes from,” Emily says. “While my family is involved with agriculture, that’s not the case for most people. It’s important to us as farmers, and it’s important to our Sedgwick County Farm Bureau board, to look for ways to share about agriculture, especially with school children.”
A former teacher in the Maize public school system, Emily uses her background in education to bridge the gap into classrooms in her role as the Sedgwick County Farm Bureau (SCFB) education coordinator.
“I understand how busy teachers are, so we make it as easy for them and fun for the students as we can,” Emily says. “We can’t add yet another burden to their heavy loads or ask them to leave a classroom to go on a field trip, so we’ve come up with ways to take it right to the students in their own schools.
“Over the course of several weeks in spring 2025, farmers from Sedgwick County visited 22 elementary classrooms in eight different buildings to read to elementary students and share a little about farming, agriculture and where our food starts. Every class we visited was so fun, and the kids were engaged and inquisitive in a really meaningful way. We are grateful to all the teachers who opened their classrooms to us and helped coordinate these visits. A special shout out goes to our farmers who stepped out of their fields and into schools to share their stories.”
Some of the programs are available on the Sedgwick County Farm Bureauwebsite.
PRE-K: ADOPT A COW
Classrooms can adopt a cow (virtually) for their classroom for the year. This program is offered in conjunction with Discover Dairy . Classrooms adopt a calf and watch it grow over the course of several months. Sedgwick County Farm Bureau provides additional learning materials and resources, including ag accurate picture books about dairy and materials to make butter in a jar.
KINDERGARTEN AND FIRST GRADE: READ AND GROW BOXES
Teachers can check out a themed box to use in their classroom for a month. Each box includes four picture books, coloring pages and worksheets to accompany each book, materials for a hands-on activity and a snack. “Read & Grow” topics include Kansas Grains, Farm Animals, In the Garden, Let’s Eat, Kailey’s Agventures and Beyond the Field.
SECOND AND THIRD GRADES: AG BAGS
Teachers can sign up each month to receive a kit for students. Each kit comes with a hands-on activity as well as additional materials and resources to use with students. “Ag in a Bag” themes for this year include Pumpkin Pie in a Bag, Farmer Read Aloud, Oh Christmas Tree, Kansas Day, Butter in a Jar, The Importance of Ag Sticker Contest and Earth Day.
FOURTH AND FIFTH GRADES: AG MAGS
This year-long program focuses on building agriculture literacy through Ag Mags, a non-fiction, newspaper-style reader introducing students different agriculture topics like wheat, beef,
dairy and more. The program includes Ag Mags for seven months (one for each student, per month) and a hands-on activity and snack for each semester. Ag Mags cover topics relevant to Kansas agriculture, including soybeans (with edamame snack), farming practices, dairy (with emulsion activity), wheat, beef (with beef stick snack), snacks and corn (with corn growing activity).
FARMER PEN PAL
The Farmer Pen Pal Program connects local farmers and ranchers with second grade classrooms through three letter exchanges during the school year. Students learn firsthand about agriculture in an authentic way. The program ends with an on-the-farm field trip or classroom visit/pizza party, making it a fun, meaningful way to connect kids with where their food comes from. Through her role with Sedgwick County Farm Bureau, Emily also works closely with seven different FFA chapters in Sedgwick County. One ongoing collaborative project is placing Book Barns in schools. Through funds from SCFB and local donors, several FFA chapters have helped build the Book Barns, which are filled with ag-accurate books, and then donated to elementary schools in the county. In addition, she partners with Sedgwick County 4-H in creative ways to engage students in learning about agriculture.
Emily’s creativity (she also is a graphic designer) is evident in her latest idea of an Ag Bus, a mobile classroom that teaches people of all ages where their food comes from. While it’s not ready yet, she expects to roll it out (pun intended) in spring 2026. Emily is grateful to work for SCFB and the support the board and membership has given in making ag education a priority in Sedgwick County.
If you are a teacher in Sedgwick County, or know someone who is, please share this article with them and have them contact Emily. [SW5] [RM6] There are a lot of creative, fun, hardworking farmers in Sedwick County Farm Bureau eager to teach your students where their food comes from.
Emily Kerschen
Email [email protected]
Cell: 316-992-9074