How Bishop Burton College is developing the next generation of farmers
Not only is our farm a mixed-use, commercial enterprise, it’s also a fantastic practical learning resource for our further education and higher education agriculture students.
Our team has normal routine tasks, as on any other working farm, but also added responsibility for bringing on the next generation.
Students spend regular time on the 300-hectare farm, which includes 120 hectares of arable, 300 cows and gilts, 85 suckler cows and 300 sheep.
Here, they carry out duties three times a week and learn how to work on a farm in a safe and efficient way. There are also practical sessions led by the agriculture academic team.
We’re always thinking about the best ways possible to involve our students in daily tasks, to help build their knowledge and skills.
We have students from Level 1 and 2 all the way through to degree-level, and we tailor their sessions accordingly.
As I sit here writing this, there are students out on the farm, carrying out their duties by helping the shepherd weigh lambs.
We’ve also had animal management students on the pig unit to watch the pig stockperson artificially inseminating the sows.
Before Christmas, the T-level livestock group weaned the second batch of calves from their mothers and sorted them into heifer and young bull groups, and the T-level crops pathway students undertook some winter ploughing.
Some of the countryside management students were undertaking estate skills and fixing the cattle race which had been damaged by a cow.
My aim as Farm Manager here is to involve the students in as much as I possibly can because there’s no better way of learning how to do something than actually doing it, in my opinion. We run the farm here as a commercial enterprise so the students are getting first-hand experience of the industry, led by specialist expert farm and academic staff.
Throughout the academic year students will get to drill the cereal crops, and see them grow, among other things.
I’ve been working with a machinery manufacturer which wants to use our maize crop this year for a trial to compare the establishment of the crop with one of their machines to conventionally establishing maize.
The first-year students will be involved in this from start to finish, which will be interesting as they will be able to establish the crop and see the harvest results too.
All our students are learning about sustainable farming, with the college working towards an ambitious target of being carbon net zero by 2030 – which is 10 years ahead of the NFU’s (National Farmers’ Union) aim for farming nationally.
We’re using a range of new technologies, including precision agriculture techniques, to help us towards that goal.
As a proud part of the Yorkshire and Humber Institute for Technology, we have access to Bishop Burton’s Centre for Precision Agriculture, which further assists us with this.
It’s a great experience for our agriculture students here at Bishop Burton College, fully preparing them for successful careers in the sector.
Find out more
To find out more about studying agriculture at Bishop Burton College, visit https://www.bishopburton.ac.uk/