Student farmers find autumn a real struggle

Towards the end of the year, namely around the beginning of fall, the Midwest turns into an agricultural madhouse as farmers race to harvest crops. Country roads turn into interstate highways for combines, grain trucks, and tractors with wagons in tow. Small farm towns become busy epicenters, especially if they have grain elevators that corn and soybeans are stored in. There are a large number of Parkland College students that reside in or around these farming communities and are expected to help during harvest. So how do they juggle school, possibly a job, their social lives, and farming, all at the same time? And, as if to compound an already stressful time, this year promises to be one of the biggest harvest bonanzas to date-the year was one of the wettest and healthiest on record. However, the wet days have continued into the fall, making harvesting impossible for the large machinery. Farmers can only stare at a their profits as the temperature approaches the freezing point.

"I'd say that of all the classes I teach, probably one-third to one-half are actively involved in a farming operation," said instructor Larry Thurow of the Business Agri-Industries Department. "The other half, or the other portion, is non-farm students, but they may be involved in some sort of agricultural business on the side, working for whoever, maybe some sort of company."

As student farmers begin to be needed in the fields during the fall, things begin to change for them at Parkland. They have more issues with timeliness in returning assignments and class absences, which in turn causes these students to have to make up assignments, tests, and exams. However, many student farmers realize their availability during farm season and plan accordingly, usually trying for a more online-oriented class schedule. Most also make an effort to be out of class by one in the afternoon at the latest, which means morning classes.

"Most of those students take a lighter class load, or they'll go ahead and take an online class, which will allow them a lot more flexibility," said Thurow. To help his students during this hectic time of year, Thurow also utilizes the Internet and Angel, a Web-based social form for faculty and students. "I'll end up posting, which I always do, almost all of my lecture notes online, and then a lot of the quizzes are also on Angel as well."

Not all professors and instructors are as understanding.

"A lot of the time we end up having a lot of our agricultural students concerned with courses that are taken outside of our department; generally, the gen-Ed courses, in which faculty don't understand the type of commitment that (students) have," said Thurow.

"It's not just an hourly wage job they have," stressed Thurow. "It's their livelihood and a lot of the instructors who have no experience with agricultural students or rural students-they really don't understand that these students aren't just working for an hourly wage in many cases. This is their livelihood, which could end up involving a large sum of money, plus also supporting themselves."

Mitch Clapper is one of these student-farmers and gives insight on how he handles both school and farming.

"Well, I can tell you it's a lot of late nights." said Clapper. "When I'm done with class I head straight home to the farm and do whatever's needed, and right around harvest time it's until about nine-thirty to ten at night. Then I come back to my apartment and do homework until late-night. Then you just get up and do it all over again."

"There's some sleep loss." Clapper said, as he laughed. "It's hard, but you try to use whatever time you've got available wisely."

For Mitch and many others, this is a weekly schedule, which usually begins three to four weeks into the fall semester. And according to him, Parkland instructors do tend to understand these students' situations, as long as they are kept in the loop.

"If you can establish a good base with the teachers and explain to them, 'Hey, I live on a farm, and there will be times I'll be called to go home and help out with something, and I just wanted to let you know that I'm going to be doing this and there may be days that I'll be absent or there may be homework that's going to be late,'" said Clapper.

"I mean, if you can just go up to the teachers and be polite with them," he continued. "Or try to be as polite with them as you possibly can, there won't be any problem. There usually isn't."

Sometimes though, Clapper admits it can be difficult.

"There are some teachers that are like, 'No that's not acceptable, you have to be here for this class, I don't except any excuses for any reason,' I've had a couple of instructors like that, and you have to try to work it out as best as possible. Worst-case scenario, you miss the class and go do what has to be done."

During this time of year, instructors and student farmers need to work together so that everything both in and out of class runs smoothly.

Thurow strongly encourages that students keep in constant contact with their professors.

"They should always talk to their instructors about what's occurring, and why they may not be there, with, if not a phone call, an email." he said. "The problem is many times, a lot of those farm kids will not know when until maybe the day before, the fact they may not be there. That can become an issue. It's still the responsibility of the student however, to let the instructor know what's occurring, whether the instructor is understanding or not."

Professors and instructors at Parkland should also be aware of what these students deal with when deciding how to handle class work and attendance.

"The biggest thing that I would advise other instructors," Thurow said, "is to be very flexible, not to lower their academic standards, try to work with students, and provide ability for those students to have a little bit more flexibility. More flexible in fulfilling assignments, so that maybe instead of turning in a hard copy, an electronic submission could be used instead. That, to me, is the best advice I can give other instructors. They need to understand the impact that the fall harvest has."