KENTUCKY: From Classroom to Cafeteria: Ag Program at Lexington School Grows Lettuce for Community

By Christopher Leach

December 31, 2024

Students at Carter G. Woodson Academy in Lexington show off their lettuce crop. Courtesy of Future Farmers of America Association Agriculture students at the Carter G. Woodson Academy in Lexington have an uncommon opportunity: to grow food that’s served in the school cafeteria and eaten by classmates.

The food — lettuce, mainly — comes from the school’s hydroponic container, part of a program run since 2019 by agriculture teacher Jacob Ball.

It gives students involved in the agricultural program at the academy — an all-male school for students grades six through 12 that offers a rigorous curriculum through the lens of Black history — the opportunity to learn alternatives ways of farming outside of a traditional field. Hydroponic containers like the one at Woodson Academy are indoor, environmentally controlled farms where plants can grow in a shipping container using nutrients other than soil. Water tanks inside the container hold and flow water through the plant roots.

The school received the container farm in the summer of 2021 from AppHarvest, an Eastern Kentucky-based agriculture tech company that filed for bankruptcy in July 2023. Ball said at one point there were only 12 container farms located at Kentucky schools, most of which were at eastern Kentucky schools.

Interior shot of the hydroponic container farm being utilized as a classroom and agricultural business base at Carter G. Woodson Academy on November 27, 2024, in Lexington, Ky. Tasha Poullard tpoullard@herald-leader.com

At Woodson Academy, agriculture students gain access to the container farm through the school’s greenhouse technology class, which students can take beginning their sophomore year. The class teaches plant science, plant anatomy and growing conditions, and students use that knowledge to grow leafy greens in the farm. There are roughly 15-20 students in the class. Students are broken up into small groups and take turns growing and harvesting the lettuce.

“We rotate through so every student gets the opportunity to get out there — we say get their hands dirty, but their hands don’t get very dirty because it’s a pretty clean environment out there because there’s no soil,” Ball said. The system saves water, as plant roots are continuously fed all necessary water and nutrients in a shallow stream and recirculates any excess water back through the system. It takes roughly six to eight weeks from when the seed is planted to when the plant is ready to harvest, and the students work together as a team to share the rewards of their hard work.

“You can’t just do it by yourself. You need people to actually help you do everything,” said Faustin Luka, a junior at Carter G. Woodson Academy. “People need to transfer, harvest the plants and also weigh the plants. It’s a flow that works really well with each other.” As the fall semester came to a close this year, the container farm was dormant while students focused on their academics ahead of winter break. But when it’s in full operation, students plant about 275 head of lettuce, which yields about 50 to 60 pounds of crop. Some of the lettuce gets donated to the school’s cafeteria. It gives students pride when they see their own products being school lunches.

“You feel a lot more proud of something when eating it. You know where it came from as well,” said Tyren Harris, a senior at Carter G. Woodson Academy. Outside the school’s cafeteria, lettuce from the container farm is also sold to Woodhill International Market and FoodChain, along with other vendors. Ball said the money raised from the sales is mostly used to run the farm, but it also supplements Future Farmers of America costs. “

It is kind of a business,” Ball said. “We do teach agribusiness classes, so teaching those concepts of, ‘What do we have to sell our lettuce at to make sure that we’re profitable and continue to run the farm?” Ball said the container farm is not primarily thought of as a business, but mostly as a teaching tool for his students. It has shown students an alternative, technology-dependent method of farming instead of traditional farming in a field. “

That is an aspect of agriculture that is obtainable,” Ball said. “They can say, ‘this might be something I can do someday,’ and to see students get involved and see agriculture as a career path is pretty rewarding.”

Harris has had an interest in agriculture since he was a kid. He’s already enjoyed growing plants in the soil in his backyard, but growing in the container farm has introduced him to a new method of farming. “It’s just a way to connect my passion of agriculture in some way I can see doing it in the future,” Harris said.

Christopher Leach Lexington Herald-Leader Chris Leach is a breaking news reporter for the Lexington Herald-Leader. He joined the newspaper in September 2021 after previously working with the Anderson News and the Cats Pause. Chris graduated from UK in December 2018.