I’m glad to see schools investing more in students’ career readiness

College. It’s a great thing for many people, myself included, but it isn’t for everybody. You know what, that’s not a bad thing.

Mark White is Editor of The News Journal.

Yes, the world needs engineers, scientists, astronomers, doctors and lawyers. It also needs electricians, carpenters, plumbers and farmers.

I’ve long held the position that our society is making a mistake trying to send everybody, or nearly everybody, to college right out of high school.

Fortunately, this mentality is starting to change as our local school districts are putting more emphasis on getting people more career ready while they are still in high school, and not just college ready.

Corbin High School has opened a new career and technical education building for this school year where commercial carpentry and industrial HVAC/sheet metal is being taught.

Whitley County High School is also in the process of building its own career and technical education building on the high school campus where carpentry and electricity related career pathways will be taught. The school already has a welding career pathway.

These are great things as many of our tradespeople are getting older and approaching retirement age.

Another big push that some of our local school districts are making to get people career ready is in the area of agriculture.

While many may not realize this, farming is big business not only in Kentucky, but in Whitley County in particular.

Consider these facts that Kentucky Agriculture Commissioner Dr. Ryan Quarles cited during a trip to Whitley County last month.

There are 76,000 farms statewide and 548 farms in Whitley County with 59,000 acres farmed here bringing in over $6 million in revenue annually. Farming is the second biggest employer in the state behind manufacturing with 200,000 Kentuckians depending on farming to make a living.

Williamsburg High School is starting its first ever agriculture program this school year. You can tell the school’s new agriculture teacher, Toraleah Shelley, is passionate about what she does.

Passionate teachers usually end up having passionate students. It isn’t lost on Shelley that she is a female teacher in a field most people usually associate with men. She is hoping to get more female students involved in agriculture, and I suspect that she is going to be successful at that.

Over at Whitley County High School, the agriculture department is adding a second greenhouse this fall, which will house its hydroponics program. For those that don’t know, hydroponics is basically a fancy term for saying growing plants in water rather than in dirt. The nutrients are mixed by the students into a liquid form that is put into barrels. Sensors then check the water, and insert needed nutrients to get produce to grow.

I had the chance to be on hand last spring when the agriculture program harvested its first crop of hydroponic grown lettuce, which was impressive. Agriculture teacher Brian Prewitt seems to know his stuff. More hydroponic crops are being added this fall with the new greenhouse.

A major advantage of using hydroponics to grow crops in a greenhouse is that crops can be grown year-round, and more crops can be grown in a smaller amount of space, which is good considering the amount of farmland around the world has been steadily shrinking for years.

According to Prewitt, 30 times more produce can be grown inside hydroponics labs than can be grown outside in the ground.

Most large-scale hydroponics programs, like one near Somerset, use the same technology that Whitley County students are being taught to use. The hope is that WCHS agriculture students not wanting to go to college or wanting to go to college but needing to work while they do so, will be able to get jobs at these major hydroponics operations, or who knows, maybe one day start their own.

Success in life isn’t defined by a college degree on your wall.