Kayla Jones, 17, of University City, watches as water drains through soil samples during an agriculture science class on Wednesday, Oct. 23, 2024, at University City High School. Students at the high school are part of the only approved agricultural program in the St. Louis metropolitan area.
UNIVERSITY CITY — The University City School District has decided to do what few, if any, other urban schools in the area have done. It’s started to teach students about agriculture through hands-on experience.
The district’s high school launched an agriculture program this school year — the first of its kind in any urban St. Louis school district, district leaders say.
And it’s in high demand.
The high school added an agriculture class last year, which started with only four students. This fall, school leaders decided to create a whole program for agriculture and added another class. Eighty students have enrolled.
The district plans to hire additional staff and add more classes to accommodate the interest, in addition to purchasing a “shipping container farm” where students will learn vertical growing.
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“Agriculture programs are really big in other parts of the country and even other parts of the state,” AP Biology teacher Pamela Lester said. “But as far as the St. Louis metropolitan area, we’re it.”
That isn’t to say there isn’t a demand for ag jobs here. Businesses focused on agricultural technology, or “agtech,” employ over 7,500 people in the region, and St. Louis boasts one of the highest concentrations of plant scientists in the world, Greater St. Louis Inc. reports. Big-name agriculture biotech companies such as Bayer, Benson Hill and leading seed supplier KWS are either headquartered or have locations here.
At least one other St. Louis County district also plans to tap in. The Lindbergh School District is building an agricultural STEM learning center, which will serve students in preschool through 12th grade, at the historic Concord Farmers Club site near Sperreng Middle School.
On a recent school day at University City High, students during Principles of Agricultural Science were testing the influences of organic matter in soil. How do plant residues in soil affect how much water the soil can hold? If you pour 100 milliliters of water through a tube filled with gravel, how long will it take for the water to run through? These are the questions students were trying to answer.
Most of the students said they took the class because they were interested in the coursework. Only one student said they wanted to pursue a career in agriculture.
Sophomore Max Rojas plans to work in landscaping because he said he enjoys hands-on work. This is his second year taking Lester’s courses.
Dr. Pamela Lester stands for a portrait in her classroom on Wednesday, Oct. 23, 2024, at University City High School in University City. Lester has taught at University City High School for four years and is the head of the Agriculture Sciences Program at the school.
“It teaches you the different types of soil, the ones that are good and bad for the plants,” Rojas said.
Senior Shilah Lewis said she wants to become either a forensic or medical laboratory scientist.
“I like everything science,” she said.
Other students said they wanted to be dancers, artists, real estate agents, veterinary technicians or nail stylists.
There’s a benefit to teaching “city kids” agriculture, Lester said. They have little connection to the food they eat. And most don’t know the career options that are available to them in the field.
“Less than 3% of the population in the United States farms, but everyone eats,” Lester said. “In order to solve the problem of how we feed the masses, we need students involved in agriculture.”
Lester is the kind of teacher who brings things to life. Sometimes almost literally. Her classroom and lab are full of living creatures. There’s a small tree in a corner she nursed back to health after a coworker tried throwing it away. Water plants she grew from a single cutting fill one aquarium. Tiny, pale-pink shrimp live in another.
It was Lester’s enthusiasm for the coursework that breathed the most life into a recent school day.
Throughout the 90-minute class, Lester flitted around the room in a white lab coat, going from table to table to answer questions and help students who fell behind direction.
The agriculture program is a passion of Lester’s, who’s been teaching for 20 years after working as a postdoctoral researcher for the U.S. Department of Agriculture. She’s a plant pathologist by training, with both a Ph.D. and Master of Science in the subject.
“I get to do what I went to school to do, and I have my fabulous babies here who are ready to do it with me,” Lester said.
Dr. Pamela Lester speaks with students after a lab demonstration on Wednesday, Oct. 23, 2024, at University City High School in University City. “What do you want to do? We can find a place in ag for you,” Lester said about how pervasive agriculture is in daily life.
Dr. Pamela Lester, center left, speaks with her students while they conduct a test on water retention in soil on Wednesday, Oct. 23, 2024, at University City High School in University City. Lester curated the soil samples that students used to conduct the test and has taught at the high school for four years.
View life in St. Louis through the Post-Dispatch photographers’ lenses. Edited by Jenna Jones.