Ted Halbach: 126 years of Short Course + preview days
Transcript:
Sevie Kenyon
An introduction to the Farm and Industry Short Course. We are visiting today with Ted Halbach, director of the Farm and Industry Short Course, University of Wisconsin Extension and the College of Agricultural and Life Sciences, Madison Wisconsin and I am Sevie Kenyon. Ted, welcome our microphone. Introduce us to the Farm and Industry Short Course.
Ted Halbach
Farm short course is the college’s oldest program, it is 126 years this year. We just celebrated our reunion. It is a program that is based on agricultural classes and training young people interested in production agriculture.
Sevie Kenyon
Ted, can you give us a sense of the kinds of programing available through the Farm and Industry Short Course?
Ted Halbach
This is not a degree program, this is a certificate program. We actually offer 7 certificates and those range from crops and soils management…dairy farm management, actually that is about 65% of our students are in our dairy farm and management specialty, farm mechanics, farm service and supply…the landscape industry is something new, reasonably new, in the program, meat animals and then pasture based dairy and livestock.
Sevie Kenyon
Ted, over the years, where has the biggest change been in the short course program?
Ted Halbach
One of the big changes in short course is obviously the use of technology. I will just use dairy as the example. The students are now taking a course in dairy records management and it has got the latest software. There are courses like that that are now in the curriculum that weren’t a few years ago and it is going to make these people better in their jobs, in their careers and ready to hit the ground running.
Sevie Kenyon
Ted, if people are interested in this, where do they get more information and how do they find out about it?
Ted Halbach
We have a website, you can put in your search engine: “Farm and Industry Short Course” and you should find it. There are upcoming preview days, which are February 16th-17th. That would give students a chance to see for themselves what the college experience that they would find here is like.
Sevie Kenyon
Ted, a student who completes this program, what can they expect at the other end?
Ted Halbach
It’s very interesting how many of our students come here and they actually know where they are going to go. A lot of them go to family farms or a business who suggested it was a good idea that you go get training at short course and then come back. What those people can expect is that they are going to get somebody that is a better employee, a better manager when they get home.
Sevie Kenyon
We have been visiting today with Ten Halbach, director of the Farm and Industry Short Course, University of Wisconsin Extension and the College of Agricultural and Life Sciences, Madison Wisconsin and I am Sevie Kenyon.