The National Agricultural Center and Hall of Fame in Bonner Springs has been awarded a $150,000 Bayer USA Foundation grant, according to a news release today.
The three-year grant will help create a new children’s exhibit within the Ag Hall’s Children Agriculture Science Center, according to the announcement. The new exhibit is scheduled to open in 2018. Bayer has been a major supporter of the Ag Hall.
“We are so thankful to Bayer for its generous support of the Ag Center through this grant from the Bayer USA Foundation,” said Dawn Gabel, executive director of the National Agriculture Center and Hall of Fame. “It is exciting to imagine that a child who will visit this future exhibit could one day become an inductee into our very own Hall of Fame thanks in part to what they learned here about agriculture.”
Through this new children’s exhibit, as well as other educational initiatives like “Making Science Make Sense” – a program advancing science literacy across the United States through hands-on, inquiry-based science learning – Bayer seeks to inspire students of all ages to learn more about what makes agriculture not only exciting, but also essential to the future of the planet, a spokesman said.
More than 900 million people in the world suffer from chronic hunger. When the global population reaches 9 billion by 2050, that number will increase drastically unless farmers can produce at least twice as much food as they do today – all while using less water and less land in the face of a changing global climate, according to a spokesman. Bayer is engaged in the effort to make agriculture faster and more efficient through agricultural innovations.
High-quality science, technology, engineering and math education is necessary to fill the nearly 58,000 jobs open each year in the agriculture industry, and Bayer is committed to supporting programs that instill a lifelong love of STEM in students at an early age.
“The National Agricultural Center and Hall of Fame is truly one of our country’s greatest treasures, and Bayer is proud to support its mission as part of our own efforts to inspire the next generation of leaders in the agriculture industry,” said Paul Nagy, site leader for Kansas City Bayer Crop Science. “In all of our local communities, it is essential that programs and initiatives like this exhibit are available to support parents, teachers and other leaders in providing these sorts of educational opportunities for students of all ages.”