Colorado Foundation For Agriculture Inc

Literacy project: the literacy project is an annual interactive learning experience where each participating class receives a free class kit complete with educational resources and enough supplies to complete hands-on activities with students. This program integrates agricultural themes into prek-12 instruction, connecting to academic standards for language arts, social studies, stem, and afnr. This project seeks to cultivate a love for reading while enhancing the understanding of agricultural concepts, ultimately fostering empowered and literate communities. A new topic and book, featuring colorado agriculture stories, are chosen each year. This is a free program for prek-12 students. The topic for the 2024 literacy project was pueblo chiles and featured a brand-new children's book titled "seed, sprout, spice! All about pueblo chiles!" the book was written by rachel allnutt, illustrated by sierra linke, and published by mccall knecht. The class kits included a free copy of the book for teachers to keep, frozen pueblo chiles for a student tasting experience, pueblo chile seeds and planting supplies for each student, a virtual field trip video from history colorado, and eight student activity worksheets. The 2024 literacy project reached 23,309 students in 1,130 classrooms from 254 schools. This project was sponsored by a usda specialty crop block grant, pueblo seed & food company, pueblo chile growers association, csu rural initiatives, colorado farm bureau women's leadership committee, pueblo county farm bureau, plus many individual sponsors.

Summer agriculture institutes: the summer agriculture institutes are multi-day professional development courses designed for teachers. Attendees learn about colorado agriculture, tour farms, ranches, and food production facilities, and gain innovative, standards-based ways to incorporate food, fiber, fuel, and natural resource topics into academic curriculum. Two courses are offered each year in different locations across colorado. The courses for 2024 were: sai fort morgan: agriculture on the eastern plains a 5-day course exploring the diversification of farms, ranches, and agriculture production in the lower south platte river basin; and sai san luis valley: agriculture in the san luis valley a 3-day course that took a deep dive into colorado's potato production and other agriculture production in the region. A total of 45 teachers received training through these two professional development events.

Activity books: designed to increase the level of understanding of a particular topic, each book varies in length ranging from 24 to 72 pages and can be taught over multiple class periods. They include a variety of reading and activity pages to make learning fun! The activity books are available in print and via digital flip-book in the cfa digital library. Nearly 6,800 copies of the activities books were distributed in 2023-2024.journey 2050 and farmers 2050: experience agriculture like it's never been taught before through this educational gaming platform. Students explore world food sustainability as they make inquiry-based decisions to see the ripple effect on social, economic, and environmental factors locally and globally. Journey 2050 is ideal for grades 6-12 and comes with stem-based lesson plans. Farmers 2050 is a fun farming game for kids of all ages. Journey 2050 and farmers 2050 are provided in partnership with nutrien and the national agriculture in the classroom organization. Colorado has more than 60 active educators utilizing the journey 2050 program. Additionally, approximately 3,200 users from colorado visited the journey 2050 website and 400 users from colorado visited the farmers 2050 website in 2023-2024. Student, educator, and public eventsthroughout the year, cfa staff and volunteers attend various student agriculture and water festivals, professional educator conferences, and public events. These events are key for educating students, teachers, and the general public, as well as promoting the many programs and resources provided by colorado agriculture in the classroom. In 2023-2024, cfa had direct contact with 72,000 students, teachers, families, and individuals at 40 such events held throughout the state.