Science in the real world
Darfield High School is part of the Secondary Schools Employer Partnership (SSEP) run by MPI. The aim is to connect secondary school students with local employers, so that students can see how what they are learning in class connects with the real world.
As part of this 10VR and 10SG visited Barenbrug to see how they develop new varieties of rye grass through breeding and trialing of the varieties. This tied in with the Science and Fiction topic students studied in Science classes.
Students collected grass from the field trial plots and measured them to see if grasses produced by sexual reproduction had more variation than grasses produced by cloning. They also toured the labs to see how the seed was analysed and cleaned before being released for sale.
Amber Law from MPI commented "What a great visit to Barenbrug this morning. So interesting and awesome the students were engaged and asked great questions."