When looking at hazardous occupations in the world, agriculture is consistently in the top ten. There are many factors that go into this: the large equipment, working long days and longer evenings, and the repetitive heavy labor that just wears down the body over time.

Additionally, there is an alarming statistic that is on the rise thus making agriculture even more dangerous.

According to the Center for Disease Control, professions that are ag related sadly have the highest rate of suicides in the US. In July of 2016, 84.5 out of 100,000 in Ag took their lives compared to a national average of 13.4 per 100,000. The disparity is disturbing and unfortunately the number is on the rise with the uncertainty in agriculture at this time.

Agricultural occupations are unique in the job market and many of the factors that make it unique also make them much more stressful.

The higher stressors include: engaging in dangerous activities much of the time, the lack of control on conditions such as input pricing, commodity pricing, and weather. These all play into whether a producer can pay his bills. Sustained higher levels of stress can cause depression, fatigue, anxiety, and other triggers that cause a greater propensity of attempting suicide. The negative stigma of mental health issues can also make it difficult for producers to feel that they can reach out for help.

There is help available specifically to the agriculture community, assistance from individuals who understand a producer’s lifestyle and are ready to help.

The Kansas Agriculture Mediations Services at (800) 321-3276 can help producers with several programs in place. They will gather information from you and can connect you with financial advisors, legal advice, lawyers, and can also connect people with mental health facilities close to your location. One phone call can get you in touch with many people that can help your unique situation.

Also, the National Suicide hotline is (800) 273-8255 and provides 24/7 free and confidential support.

Some people do not want to talk on the phone. You can also text 741741, or chat online at imalive.org.

Most of all, watch out for your family and friends. If you feel that something is wrong, ask.

It is also good to implement strategies that can help daily. Some practices you can implement are: Taking a walk, get a massage, try guided restful breathing practices, listen to relaxing music, or just take 10 minutes to write down your blessings. Positive thoughts and practices can go a long way to improving an outlook on life. And most of all, if you need help, seek it. Your friends and family need you.

Alicia Boor is an Agriculture and Natural Resources agent in the Cottonwood District (which includes Barton and Ellis counties) for K-State Research and Extension. You can contact her by e-mail at [email protected] or calling 620-793-1910

By RON WILSON
Huck Boyd National Institute for Rural Development

When a bank and a school both close, what is to be done with the two buildings? Today we’ll learn about a rural community which seized the opportunity to convert a former school into a library and a former bank building into a museum. These actions help preserve and promote the history of the community’s citizens.

Verl Coup is director of the Talmage Historical Museum. He grew up near Talmage and lived here his whole life, other than during his service in the Army. Verl was a long-time rural letter carrier. He started collecting artifacts of the Talmage community.

“When the older people would move to the nursing home, they knew I was interested in history so they would pass some of their things along to me,” Verl said. “Otherwise, when they pass, their money and artifacts go to the big city.”

One day in 2010, he got an important call. “A lady who used to live here said the bank was closing and they would give us the building and most of the furniture,” Verl said. Sure enough, the Talmage branch bank closed and the building was donated to the Talmage Historical Society to become a museum.

“My wife (Kathy) was happy to get all these things out of our house,” Verl said with a smile. Kathy now volunteers at the museum. A local farmer left an endowment to support the new use for the building. In December 2010, the new museum opened its doors.

“The museum highlights the stories of the people from here,” Verl said. The old bank building was organized into various displays. The teller area has places for various area families to display their family trees and photos. The bank offices have been organized into different types of rooms.

For example, there is the school room with various artifacts from school buildings and classes through the years. I had to laugh when I saw the hairstyles, eyeglasses, and short basketball shorts of yesteryear.

There is the picture room with lots of images from around the county, and a place for photos of farmers and their equipment. The vault has safety deposit boxes which are used for storage of pictures and memorabilia. There’s a veterans area, a memorial wall where people can honor someone with donations that help sustain the building, and much more.

Artifacts continue to be donated. One morning Verl found a box left anonymously on the front step. Among the contents was a homestead certificate signed by President Chester A. Arthur.

The grade school in Talmage had closed in 2000 and then served as a church for a time. It has now become the Talmage Library and Events Center. Shawni Sheets, a board member of the Talmage Historical Society, is director.

The Talmage Library and Events Center is located up the street from the museum. In addition to the library’s own collection, the Manhattan Public Library loans a rotation of books to the library every two months. As one might guess, the former school building has a kitchen and dining area. The big gym is available for recreation, and an additional game room has pool, foos ball, ping pong, and exercise equipment. The facility is for rent by donation. Shawni Sheets said that many volunteers have donated books and other resources.

In spring 2019, the Dickinson County Community Foundation conducted a Match Day where donations to various worthy projects in the area were matched and doubled. “By noon that day, we had matched our $10,000 goal,” Verl said. “The community support is there.”

It is impressive to see such remarkable, repurposed facilities in a rural community like Talmage, population 99 people. Now, that’s rural.

For more information, go to www.talmagekansas.com.

When a bank and a school close, what is to be done with the buildings? In Talmage, they are being re-used in creative ways. We commend Verl and Kathy Coup, Shawni Sheets, and all those involved with Talmage for making a difference by repurposing and maintaining these buildings in ways that benefit the community. They could school other communities – you can bank on it.

Kansas Can, launched by the Kansas State Board of Education is a visionary project to create more effective PreK-12 learning. Begun in 2017 with seven schools, today Kansas Can has grown to include 66 of the 286 districts in Kansas.

Aimed at statewide, overall school redesign, the KSDE board laid out a concept for the project then engaged teachers to drive the course of action. All districts are expected to join the redesign process by 2026.
How much do we know about this ambitious undertaking to make the changes required for student success in today’s world?

Redesign emerged from conversations held in 2014 by then newly named KSDE Commissioner Randy Watson. Watson traveled the state conducting focus groups that totaled more than 2,000 people to learn their thoughts on the future of Kansas public education.

Kansans interviewed said that students needed to be better prepared upon graduation. Many said students should be learning “soft skills” including team work and responsibility.

Based on the feedback, the KSDE board established five redesign outcomes for measuring progress. Teachers in participating schools will measure steps taken for students to engage social-emotional development, kindergarten readiness and creating a plan of study focused on career interest. The outcomes also require collecting data on changing high school graduation rates and data on student participation in or completion of post-secondary learning.

At this point, the five KSDE board outcomes have been presented to school districts that volunteered to participate. No extra funding is allocated from KSDE or state education budgets. The work is school-site specific enacted by teachers in the 160 schools within the 66 currently participating districts.

For example, in Stockton, to promote social/emotional growth, the school provides for students and adult employees to meet regularly in a multi-age, small community to cultivate commitment to democratic values and participation in improving society on behalf of all people. In Wellington personalized learning through basic academic content is offered by a free online/computer-based program within a limited number of carefully selected classrooms.

Neither online learning nor school communities are required as part of current school redesign—redesign rests with how teachers in each school interpret the KSDE outcomes.

School redesign is well known by educators but not widely known by the public, except in districts where there has been criticism of the new activities, often centered around classrooms where online learning covers basic content instruction.

While many Kansans support the current, free KSDE online learning opportunities that serve individual students away from teacher-led instruction, the public opinion jury is still out on whether shifting substantial group time to online for academic study is more beneficial than regular school.

Voters in Wellington will help make that call. This fall’s local school board election will see three open board positions contested by candidates, whose platforms, in part, address online classroom learning.

Change is often needed, but change also can be stressful and occasionally not productive. The important point to remember is that online classrooms are just one way to implement one part of the much larger redesign project—not the defining element of the KSDE redesign’s critical and far-reaching mission for each Kansas student to succeed.

Kansans can make redesign, though challenging, a change for the better. After all, redesign is not nearly as challenging as sending a man to the moon.

Dr. Sharon Hartin Iorio is Professor & Dean Emerita at Wichita State University College of Education.

In recent years, wheat producers are faced with an increasing number of varieties from which to choose. One of the reasons behind having so many available varieties is that many public and private institutions are breeding wheat varieties in the Great Plains: Colorado State University, Kansas State University, Oklahoma State University, Texas A&M University, University of Nebraska, AgriPro/Syngenta, Limagrain, and WestBred/Monsanto. Additionally, several companies license varieties from existing breeding programs, such as AGSECO, Dyna-Gro, AgriMaxx among others.

Producers can use different tools and publications to study each variety’s strengths and weaknesses, selecting varieties that best match their needs.

Making a better decision: Steps to select a wheat variety

The following information provides a step-by-step guideline, as well as relevant resources, to help producers make a better decision when selecting one or a few varieties to plant in their operation.

1. Select several varieties that are adapted to your region of the state.

Regardless whether you intend to plant one variety or several on your farm, it is important to start out with a list of several good candidate varieties. The final product of interest is grain yield and therefore, it is crucial to select varieties that have shown consistent performance and excellent yield record in the region. Varieties that worked well for you and your neighbors in the past should be considered, but also make sure and check yield results from nearby K-State (and other universities’) variety performance tests and demonstration plots. It is important to take into consideration the conditions experienced during the year in question. For instance, results from central Kansas during 2019 season were extremely variable due to excessive rainfall at several locations. Thus, when looking at these results it is very important that results from more than a single year, and possibly more than a single nearby location, are taken into consideration.

A few good resources to consult are:

1. K-State variety performance test: Start searching by year, narrow down your search by region and finally by site. Choose the site(s) nearest to you and look for varieties that are consistently toward the top. Repeat the procedure for different years to check the consistency of the variety performance. Go to our web site www.cottonwood.ksu.edu to access the K-State wheat variety performance test results.
2. Colorado Wheat Variety Database: This database encompasses replicated trial results from Colorado, Kansas, Oklahoma, and several other public state trials, so producers throughout the Plains can benefit. It is an excellent, easy-to-use resource that allows you to dig into data from single location, multiple locations, multiple years, and also allows for head-to-head variety comparisons. We suggest that users start by looking at “Single Location Trial Data”, selecting the location nearest to you, and repeating this step for several years of data for that location. Check for varieties that tend to be consistently toward the top. Afterwards, look at “Multiple Location Trial Data,” which will allow you to look at yields spanning a wider geographical region instead of a single location for one, two, three, or four years combined. Depending on region and number of years selected, you might be looking at more than 15 replicated trials combined. Thus, if a given variety remains a top yielding variety across all these replicated trials, it is a pretty good argument that you should at least look at that variety’s characteristics and consider it in your farming operation. Finally, after selecting a few potential candidates based on their performance, we suggest that users click on “Head-to-head comparisons”, so they can test whether those candidates performed statistically different over a wide range of environments. That web address is www.ramwheatdb.com/

Additional Resources

A few great resources to help you walk through each variety’s characteristics as far as maturity, disease ratings, drought, straw strength, winterhardiness, and other agronomic characteristics are:

1. K-State Wheat Variety Disease and Insect Ratings 2019: This comprehensive guide to wheat varieties will allow you to compare different varieties in their agronomic and disease resistance characteristics in detail. Many varieties are individually described, others are shown in a table format which allows for easy and fast comparison. It is available on our web site www.cottonwood.ksu.edu
2. Wheat Varieties for Kansas and the Great Plains by Layton Ehmke: This private-sector book is also an excellent, comprehensive source of information regarding different varieties and their characteristics. It provides detailed ranking of varieties by traits of interest, making it easy to use. It also has a good summary of several variety performance tests in the Great Plains. While not available online, producers can purchase it at https://thewheatfarmer.com/

Information provided by  Romulo Lollato, Extension Wheat and Forages Specialist and Erick DeWolf, Extension Plant Pathologist.