Making Kansas Cool for Our Kids

I’ve said it before and I will say it again…I did not like Kansas when I was growing up.

I thought Kansas was so boring!

But the truth is, everything is boring everywhere when you are growing up – that’s just life!

As parents we all appreciate the beauty of living in a great place to raise kids. We are looking for good schools, safe streets, light traffic, and a good cost of living – but kids don’t care about any of those things. Our kids grow up here, are educated here, and then leave us! Off to explore some fabulous city (at least in their minds) and leave us in the dust.

Employers across the state are always trying to think of ways to retain our young talent in Kansas. Doesn’t it seem like all we need to do is make Kansas a place that kids feel proud of? A place that they think is cool too.

We need to teach our kids from a young age what makes Kansas special. We may not have skyscrapers or Time Square or subways, but what we do have is so much cooler than all of that…we have agriculture and a whole lot of it.

Wait, what?

 I know, on the surface it just doesn’t seem that cool. But when you realize that agriculture is part of everyone’s daily life, doesn’t that at least make it a little bit cool?

We all eat = FOOD = Agriculture

Our kids don’t leave the house naked (most of the time) = CLOTHES = Agriculture

Don’t forget about work, sports, school and EVERYTHING in between = Agriculture!

Every single portion of our lives are surrounded by agriculture…and for most of us, without a single tractor in sight…isn’t that cool?

The fiber in the clothes on your back or fabric on your couch, leather for your shoes or baseball glove, and nutrients to keep you healthy and growing. All of these things are agriculture and all of them are grown here in Kansas.

What if when our kids traveled and people asked where they were from, they would proudly stated, “Kansas!”

‘Home of the gorgeous Flint Hills! The largest intact expanse of the Tallgrass Prairie.’ or ‘We are the top producer of wheat in our nation! Almost 1.4 billion dollars in revenue last year.” Or ‘Did you know cattle outnumber people two-to-one in our state? Making Kansas the 3rd largest producer of cattle in our country!’ Or simply ‘Talk about wide open spaces! It’s wonderful.’

My journey miles and miles away from my life as a city girl, out to the country to begin lessons in raising kids, crops and cows – my agriculture knowledge has increased by 1,000,000% (I realize this isn’t possible…but I’m serious..)

And the most important thing I’ve come to learn in all those lessons is something that I wish I would have realized in my youth and something that I’m so glad that I know now…

Kansas is awesome.

Most adults don’t even realize how awesome Kansas is. In large part because they don’t even understand how our food is grown. These days with only 2% of the population farming, we get a lot of our food knowledge from social media, infomercials and documentaries. Instead we should be talking to our neighbors about how cattle are cared for, the benefits of GMO crops and why farmers are the best environmentalists with the extensive work they put into maintaining the grasslands, fields and waterways.

If you chose to learn these things, to make an effort to understand what is happening on the sides of Kansas highways, wouldn’t your kids would want to learn too? We have an opportunity to not only teach our kids why we love our state, but in teaching them about the agriculture happening around them perhaps they would have more of an understanding of food production. Nationwide there seems to be a confusion about where our food comes from these days and what a blessing it would be to have future generations to not have the food fears we seem to have today. Learning about modern agriculture now could ensure their confidence in the future.

And maybe they will never think that the Little Apple is as cool as the Big Apple, but wouldn’t it be awesome if we tried?

Let’s show our kids how much we love where we live.

Let’s show them what an important role Kansas plays in our country’s livelihood.

Let’s make them proud of the place we all call home and hopefully they will continue to call it home too.

After all, as we all know, There’s no place like home.

 

Jamie Lindamood
Jamie lives outside of Eureka on a cattle ranch with her favorites...husband, Diltz, and their three kiddos, Sydney (10), Henry (8) and Charlie (6). Works at Krehbiel Architecture in Wichita and spends quite a bit of time in her hometown working, playing, and volunteering. At home in Eureka, she is overly involved too...working with the community for revitalization and always enjoys encouraging people to learn how their food really gets to their plate as an advocate of agriculture through her Day at the Ranch tour, You Are Here agriculture education program and Greenwood County Cattlewomen social media outlets.