An Entrepreneurial Education
Each year CALS forestry students spend the first weekend of December in the Stock Pavilion for their annual Christmas tree and wreath sale. The event raises some money for the club and give students a little taste of an important Wisconsin forestry business. The club also sold maple syrup donated by agronomy professor Gordon Harvey, who has a sugar bush in the Baraboo Hills.
The sale is advertised only on campus and runs only three days to minimize competition with commercial vendors. The Wisconsin-grown trees are purchased from a local wholesaler. This year the sale netted the club $5,000. The proceeds go to subsidize living expenses for two required Forestry Field Trips. One is Forestry 655 (affectionately known as Summer Camp) an intensive, three-week field course held in late spring at the College”s Kemp Natural Resources Station. The other is a biannual field trip to forest areas in the Lower Mississippi River Valley.
Many College of Agricultural and Life Sciences College of Agricultural and Life Sciences student organizations develop career-related skills while raising funds. The Food Science club market gift packages featuring Babcock Hall cheese and other Wisconsin food products. Agricultural engineering students hold a fall lawnmower service clinic each fall. Students in the Badger chapter of the National AgriMarketing Association hire themselves for a variety of marketing chores, including staffing booths at World Dairy Expo and making calls for market surveys. Many campus buildings are greener thanks to purchases at the annual plant sale held by the Horticulture club.