Newbury & District Agricultural Society Shortlisted for Prestigious Award

Newbury and District Agricultural Society (NDAS), organisers of next month’s Royal County of Berkshire Show (17th and 18th September) have been shortlisted for the Bayer/FACE Awards ‘Farm to the Classroom Award’

The award celebrates farmers making a valuable contribution to school life away from the farm, whether it be covering curriculum activities, setting up a school farmers’ market or helping with growing activities, as not all farms are conducive to hosting educational visits.

NDAS’ entry was centred around the huge variety of projects run for pupils from pre-school through to secondary, mainstream and special education, including the annual Farming, Sustainability and Environment Challenge for secondary school children. This project sees Berkshire youngsters join forces with a farm and create a project which benefits both partners, and then give a formal presentation on their ideas.

Taking the farm to the classroom is fundamental in much of what NDAS does. Wooden animals; Buttercup the cow and Rasher the pig, (who comes with a sausage making demonstration) are used to educate pre-school and Primary aged children about where their food comes from (not ‘the supermarket’ as many children presume). The animals travel to schools all over Berkshire and in 2010 11 they saw over 2000 pupils in 32 schools.

Farmhouse Breakfast Week is a morning workshop for Primary schools, which educates the pupils about the fact that a healthy breakfast is the most important meal of the day and lack of breakfast seriously impinges on their ability to learn and concentrate in school. The team met 400 children in 2011 alone.

NDAS also sees 450 children planting potatoes each year, takes a cookery school into secondary schools to educate secondary students about local produce, healthy eating and seasonality and holds a Harvest Festival celebration for six primary schools.

The annual Bayer/FACE awards have become extremely important to the farming community and are unique in their focus on farming and the education of young people on farming and agriculture. The prize giving will be held in London in September.

Royal County of Berkshire Show tickets are on sale now and there are some attractive discounts on those bought in advance. Tickets can be purchased online at www.berkshireshow.co.uk or by telephone from the Newbury & District Agricultural Society on 01635 247155. Other local outlets in and around Newbury are also selling tickets details of which can be found at www.berkshireshow.co.uk