Casey DeField, 2018 Green Mountain High School (GMHS) grad, became the first Career Pathways graduate to enter the pipeline to become an Ag/Ed teacher when she entered Colorado State University this fall. When she started high school, DeField’s goal was to become an attorney. Now her end goal is to return to GMHS to work with her former teacher and mentor, Courtney Mayo, and Principal Colleen Owens to build the program that includes horticulture and landscape classes.

DeField says her “desire was always to help people and I thought being a lawyer would do that. But I don’t like being inside an office.” The turning point for DeField came her sophomore year, when she was placed in the Intro to Ag class where students learned plant and animal science. “I hated the class the first two weeks,” she says, but also admits soon she was excited about the program.

By her junior year this enthusiasm led her to offer Kindergarten Day at Green Mountain for more than 200 students from 5 nearby schools. Along with fellow students, DeField helped kiddos work through hands-on activities such as milking a pretend cow and planting veggie seeds in paper cups.

The father of one of the students is a Jeffco Schools Superintendent who said his daughter talked about the event for hours afterward. That led to DeField leading a tour for Jeffco administrators to show them the Ag/Ed program. Later, she spoke to 300 principals telling her story about Kindergarten Day and her passion for getting students closer to nature. Her story brought many to tears and ended with a standing ovation.

When DeField entered CSU this fall, it was with a full-ride freshman scholarship courtesy of Colorado Garden Foundation. She is a triplet and with three children entering college this fall, DeField says her family is very grateful for the help this scholarship provides.

Both Owens and Mayo say they are anxiously awaiting DeField’s return to GMHS. In the meantime, Kindergarten Day will continue as an annual event at the high school.

Read more in this issue of Colorado Green NOW:
Greenhouse management and landscape maintenance at July teacher training
McCord adding no-penalty cancellation clauses to contracts
OSHA releases training videos and FAQs for silica dust standard
Make sure your landscape company is protecting employee and consumer data