10/22/2026
🍂🌾 A Beautiful Fall Day Exploring Careers in Agriculture! 🌾🍂
What a beautiful, sunny fall day for our Wyoming County Youth Leadership Academy students to explore the many career opportunities in agriculture right here in our own backyard! 🚜🐄🍎
We started our day where it all begins at the farm! 🐄🌱 The students learned what it takes to operate a farm and how every aspect of the operation plays an important role in caring for the animals and producing high quality products. They discovered that running a farm takes a whole team of professionals, including animal nutritionists, hoof trimmers, lab technicians, veterinarians, and so many more!
Ted Wolf from Perry Vet, who shared what a career as a veterinarian looks like and demonstrated how veterinarians use ultrasound technology to check cattle for pregnancy. The students got a firsthand look at the knowledge, skills, and technology involved in caring for farm animals.
We also explored how agriculture connects to so many other local businesses. 🌾🧀
We learned what cattle eat can influence the flavor of the cheese they produced at 🧀 East Hill Creamery in Perry, NY
🌸🍓 Burley Berries and Blooms showed us another connection. The compost created on the farm becomes rich, nutritious soil for growing flowers and fruit crops. Megan also uses milk from the farm to create delicious cream top milk, a variety of yogurt flavors, and gelato created at her creamery. 🍨
The students even enjoyed a lesson in marketing and learned the difference between being a price setter versus a price taker when selling products. 💴
At Burley Berries, we met with Mike and Carley from 🌾 WNY Crop Management, who shared what a career in crop management looks like. They explained how they work alongside farmers to help them grow the best crops possible. Students even had the opportunity to volunteer to collect a soil sample and learn how soil pH is measured, along with how soil conditions help determine which crops will grow best in a particular area.
🌱 Next, Megan Rodwell from Tompkins Bank introduced the students to the world of agricultural banking! She took the time to talk with each student about their future career interests and showed them how those interests could connect to agriculture. From banking, accounting, business, science, welding, engineering, architecture, law, technology, healthcare, and marketing, students learned that agriculture offers countless career opportunities beyond working directly on a farm.
And, of course, we couldn't leave Burley Berries without making some delicious gelato! 🍨 The students enjoyed making their own treats and sitting together in the sunshine on such a beautiful fall day.
We wrapped up our day at Yankee Beef, where Erica Siler shared how she and her husband built their 🍁 maple syrup and beef farm and expanded their business by opening a new processing facility. Erica talked about recognizing a need in the community and turning that need into an opportunity to grow their business. She, along with our other wonderful volunteers, also emphasized the importance of building connections, supporting one another, and working together to strengthen our community.
❤️ One of the biggest lessons of the day was that agriculture is so much more than working directly on the farm. It takes a community of people with different skills, interests, and careers working together to keep our agricultural industry thriving.
We are so fortunate to live in beautiful Wyoming County, where agriculture is such an important part of our community and where there are so many incredible career opportunities for our young people to explore!
A HUGE thank you to everyone who took time out of their busy schedules to make this such a memorable and meaningful day for our students:
👏 Megan Burley from Burley Berries and Blooms👏 Megan Rodwell from Tompkins Bank👏 Ted Wolf from Perry Vet👏 Mike Younger and Carley from WNY Crop Management👏 Erica Siler from Yankee Beef
Thank you for sharing your knowledge, experiences, and passion for agriculture with the next generation of leaders! Your willingness to connect with our students and show them the many possibilities within agriculture makes a lasting impact.
🌾 It takes a community to grow the next generation of leaders, and we are so grateful for the incredible agricultural community right here in Wyoming County! 🍂☀️
