What is SHAEAC?

In December 2019, the Robbins Family, along with local agriculture, education and business leaders, established the Sackets Harbor Agricultural Education and Awareness Center (SHAEAC), an organization that now has official 501(c)(3) status and is registered with the New York state Attorney General's office as a charitable organization.

Current board of directors: 

Nathan Pistner ~ Plant Manager Byrne Dairy Syracuse, NY

Tedra Bean ~ Agriculture Teacher & FFA Advisor at Belleville Henderson Central School

Jennifer Gaffney-Goodnough ~ Superintendent of Sackets Harbor School District

Aaron Kimmich ~ Retired Vice President/Commercial Banking Officer, Community Bank NA

Jay Matteson ~ Jefferson County Agriculture Coordinator

Amanda Muto ~ Partner/Owner Locust Hill Dairy LLC in Mannsville, NY

Shellie Marks ~ Agriculture & Dairy Advocate

Emma Alton (treasurer) ~ Operations Accountant, Byrne Dairy, Syracuse, NY

Julia Robbins ~ General Manager at Old McDonald's Farm in Sackets Harbor, NY

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Initial Project ...

In early spring 2020, the board of directors as well as Emma Shirley, the Education Coordinator at Old McDonald's Farm/North Harbor Dairy and SHAEAC, developed several projects for implementation in 2020, but as the pandemic hit the United States, these projects shifted and changed over the duration of the year.

For example, initially, the Life Sciences Road Show was developed as a STEM-based elementary level presentation that aligns with current science and math curriculums in schools.  As schools budgets decrease and field trips become harder for schools to fund, the Life Sciences Road Show would bring agriculture to the students.  Presentations would include:

 

* Fantastic farm products

* Honeybees and pollination

* Crops and chemistry (a+b)

* A day in the life of a dairy cow

* Traditional crop breeding techniques

* The dirt on soil

* Wonderful water

* And more!

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While Old McDonald's Farm was open in summer and fall 2020, Emma Shirley (education coordinator) utilized funding from the American Farm Bureau and Farm Credit East to put on "Hump Day Science Days" utilizing the Life Sciences Road Show presentation. 

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Pivoting due to covid ...

However, as visitors continued not to be allowed in local school into 2021, the Life Sciences Road Show went LIVE!

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ZoomDairy!

We bring our dairy farm into the classroom (or home classroom) through a live stream!  Our live tour through the dairy farm allows students, teachers and families to ask questions about what they are seeing "in real time".  Every class or family also has the opportunity to "adopt" a calf and receive updates on their calf monthly.  ZoomDairy is available November - May, Monday - Saturday.

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