FIELD OF THE YEAR SCHOOLS AND PARKS FOOTBALL
One of the biggest issues we have in high school education is giving the students a reason to actually learn . We go into the actual plant science and the fertility chemistry and show them the science behind the art of sports field management .
instruction with the freshmen . Then it ’ s sophomore year onward that they ’ re really out on everything . For football season they are doing a lot of painting and prep work for games . Our juniors and seniors do a lot of the mowing and maintenance . We also have several bermudagrass practice fields . We don ’ t just manage our fields . We have landscape classes that manage all our grounds .
This year we ’ re adding credential exams to our classes . Our junior class is going to be taking a private pesticide applicators license at the end of the year , and our seniors will be taking the certified turfgrass professional exam from Virginia Tech .
But a lot of the instruction is hands on . After Thanksgiving we are usually inside for class because everything outside has been put to bed . But by November , the students will have topdressed , aerated , mowed , painted and fertilized . We are inside from November until the end of February . By the time Mother Nature lets us outside in March , the students understand the scientific background of the practices . From March until June we ’ re outside for spring sports , prepping the fields .
The whole point in the classroom is to get them to understand why they ’ ve done what they ’ ve done . That ’ s why this Field of the Year is so great . It showcases the fact that what they are doing is recognized by the industry .
SFM : You started the program 2016 . Can you give us an idea as to the growth of the program since then ? Also , how do you raise awareness of the program among new students ? Miller : It was a traditional agriculture program before I got here , and for the 2016-17 school year we had approximately 70 students . This past year we had almost 190 . Next year we will have 220 , which is our biggest ever .
We just got the funding for the first ever high school turfgrass research center . We are going to be building a $ 5 million facility for the program on our grounds , so it ’ s a really big deal and we are very excited . This will allow for college credits in the classroom . We have UT , Virginia Tech , Penn State and Ohio State all on board to run trials . The students will work alongside those professors to make sure that everything is done correctly , and then hopefully have some published .
We are a specialty program in the county , and that means students from across the county can transfer to Brentsville just to take our classes . It ’ s our job to recruit students to the school so that we have students in the program . But because of things like Field of the Year , we are probably one of the most recognized programs in our county when we talk about community and the student base . Everyone knows what ’ s going on , everyone knows who we are , and they know the impact that we have on them .
When other sports field management professionals visit our facilities , they are like , “ This is insane . I don ’ t see this anywhere else .” That ’ s great to hear and it ’ s what we aim for . And that feedback doesn ’ t just come back to us ; it goes to our admin , our school board and to the division as a whole . Our students do a lot of work in the area — whether that ’ s local parks and rec or other high schools and middle schools . We reconstruct their mounds , edge their cutouts , fix lips , stuff like that . It takes a lot of time and a lot of effort from our students . They go above and beyond , not just for us , but for our community . SFM
16 SportsField Management | September 2024 sportsfieldmanagementonline . com