If there are faster ways to disseminate rumors around rural America than farm radio and Facebook, I don’t know what they are.

Nebraska-based radio pundit Trent Loos heard rumblings that the nationally recognized agriculture education program at Wiggins (Colorado) High School was on the chopping block and took to the air, encouraging stakeholders to attend the Board of Education meeting. Chaos ensued. Loos walked his aired piece back, bringing a spokesman for the district on air to assure listeners no such plan exists.

Wiggins is the district my children attend. My older son was the president of the FFA Chapter two years in a row and went on to earn his American degree, the highest honor available to FFA alumni. My two younger kids are chomping at the bit to wear the blue corduroy jackets when they’re older. I’m invested.

One of the best reasons to support agriculture education is that it provides hands-on learning about the world’s most important industry. The second-best reason to support agriculture education is that it’s not just cows and plows. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, mind you.

Kids in agriculture education have been exposed to public speaking, hand tools, different types of welds, breeds of livestock, tractor safety, agriculture history, soil health, mechanics, parliamentary procedure, and can, with few exceptions, shake the hand of an adult while also looking them in the eyeball.

Kids in agriculture education learn about record keeping, budgeting, markets, sales techniques, agricultural issues and current events, and the importance of community service.

Kids in agriculture education also learn that there are unlimited types of career paths in agriculture and they have the opportunity to learn about those careers with their hands by competing in contests, completing internships, running their enterprises, and making connections with professionals in the industry.

The agriculture education and FFA program in Wiggins isn’t going anywhere. Still, these programs aren’t inexpensive investments for districts. When a program is on the block, it’s important that all stakeholders, not just the ones who have worn the jacket, but also those whose businesses could benefit from employees who received ag education. That’s everyone.

While ag education programs in, for example, Karval, Colo., look different than programs in more metropolitan or suburban districts, the absence of the program is negative no matter the zip code. In Karval, where there are a handful of students and the school has a nearly 100% FFA participation rate over the past decades, ag education has sharpened skills for students who will go into the trades or back to the ranch. For some others, it demonstrated how landowners and conservationists can come together to host an event centered around the Mountain Plover bird. Without the habitat made possible by ranchers, the bird wouldn’t thrive in the area. Without the bird, hundreds of people wouldn’t flock to the tiny town that doesn’t boast even a gas station, to spend time birding and stargazing in one of the darkest nighttime areas in the state.

In larger districts, students might not realize that floral design, flying drones, and wildlife management are all centered around agriculture and a love of these things can be made into a career.

Record keeping, public speaking, and researching the issues facing the ag industry nationwide may open doors to careers and interests.

One of the first things FFA members learn is the FFA Creed, written by E.M. Tiffany. The fourth paragraph reads: “I believe in less dependence on begging and more power in bargaining; in the life abundant and enough honest wealth to help make it so–for others as well as myself; in less need for charity and more of it when needed; in being happy myself and playing square with those whose happiness depends upon me.”

What a different world we would live in if more Americans believed these lines to be true.

As Tiffany said, I believe, “in the future of agriculture, with a faith born not of words but of deeds.” I believe this to be true, and I believe that a little more agriculture education would go a long way in righting our course here in this state, and bridging the rural suburban divide.

Rachel Gabel writes about agriculture and rural issues. She is assistant editor of The Fence Post Magazine, the region’s preeminent agriculture publication.

Rachel Gabel writes about agriculture and rural issues. She is assistant editor of The Fence Post Magazine, the region’s preeminent agriculture publication.