Mobile Science Activity Center stops at Red Cross Elementary

By MICHAEL CRIMMINS
Glasgow News 1

As the brightly-colored, yellow school buses dropped off Red Cross Elementary students, a special guest was also getting ready for the daily morning assembly and to educate kids on the importance of Kentucky agriculture.

Mallory Hudson, a Bowling Green native who was recently crowned at this year’s Miss Kentucky, traveled to Red Cross Elementary School — one of the roughly 240 visits she has made across Kentucky so far — on Feb. 2 where she was greeted warmly by the students. Her morning message featured a reading of Charlotte’s Web and had the overarching message best summed up by a Red Cross student as “Don’t Judge a Book by its Cover” and that a small act of kindness can have a big impact on others.

At the end of her morning talk she connected her message to her full-time job with the Kentucky Department of Agriculture and the Mobile Science Activity Center that was parked behind the cafeteria. The activity center, or MSAC, provides “hands-on” scientific experiments that exposes students to various aspects of agriculture and the approximate 76,000 farms in Barren County.

“So when we say agriculture is important we really mean it,” Hudson said. “I travel the state and talk to children about the importance of agriculture.”

The MSAC is one of three trailers in the Education and Outreach Department and was staffed by Charlene Martin, the department coordinator who mainly handles the western region of the state, who has worked for the department in total about 5 years.

Martin said she loves her job instructing children on the importance of agriculture and giving kids a glimpse into the farming world.

“There’s a lot of students in this state that have no idea where their food comes from,” Martin said. “I’ve had students who have never seen a cow in person…and there’s so many products students have no idea come from a farm for instance tires or some tennis shoes soles…so I like to see the kid’s eyes light up to learn that.”

In 50 minute intervals science students participated in the Super Slurper activity where they had to hypothesize what the best agriculture-related material would be for absorbing a liquid spill.

This was an all day activity and one of Hudson’s “favorite activities to do as Miss Kentucky.”

“Agriculture is the backbone of our state,” Hudson said. “We need some of our youth to go into farming and farming related jobs and if they don’t choose that route it’s still important to understand that their food is not grown in a grocery store, that there’s at least one more farmer out there than Old McDonald and that chocolate milk doesn’t come from a brown cow. Learning about agriculture can really shift their perspective and form an appreciation for the land of Kentucky.”