Forty Farrer students participated in junior judging competitions in beef cattle, sheep meat judging, wool sheep judging and fleece judging on the Fridayof the show. Several of the Farrer students achieved excellent placings and all gained valuable experience.
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The agriculture Faculty, with the support of the Farrer community, eight years ago stopped exhibiting angus cattle, as the focus of the agricultural training of students at the school is on production rather than those traits valued in the show ring, which rarely translates to commercial reality. This is demonstrated by the success of both studs which are student driven and generated income from sales in excess of $315,000 last year.
The school does show white suffolk sheep at Dubbo, steers in the Northern School’s Steer and several hoof and hook competitions, lambs in the Northern Schools Prime Lamb competitions and dairy at Dorrigo.
We question the educational benefits of having others prepare stock through the Christmas holidays with students having five or six weeks to prepare stock for Tamworth Show (or have animals custom fed in commercial feedlots over the holidays as some other schools do).
We, instead, take students to select steers, as we did two weeks ago, and have students care and prepare these animals over two terms in our Year 9 and 10 agriculture teaching program.
Our farms and stud enterprises are tightly integrated to our educational programs.
In cattle the entire production program from AI , breeding, measurement, care for cows, calving, growth, selection and preparation for our on-property sale and conduct of the sale is entirely carried out by Year 11 and 12 students at our Trade Training Centre at Brewongle near Loomberah.
Students who gain a certificate III in agriculture are keenly sought after by industry and advanced skills recognised nationally with many gaining employment with large corporations such as the Australian Agricultural Company.
Two of our recent graduates are principals of local stock and station agencies.
Our agriculture programs focus on meeting the current needs of industry. We use the latest in technologies such as 50K SNP chips and EBVs to expose students to the cutting edge of agriculture which is why our cattle and sheep are demonstrably among the best in Australia.
At times it is easier to gain exposure for what we do in sport than it is in agriculture, however I can assure you the school’s focus is firmly on agriculture with the highest number of agriculture school based trainees and primary industries VET students in NSW.
