Fort Jennings educator and FTW alumni educator Jeff Jostpille shared the Race to Reach Net Zero ethanol virtual field trip with his students. 68 8th grade science and 10th grade biology students gathered for the VFT.
“We will be getting into cellular respiration and fermentation in biology in a month or so,” Jostpille said. “I used this as a preview to that topic after explaining the day before what we would be seeing. For the 8th grade, we just started our energy unit and I began with alternative energy sources since we were going to watch the ethanol video.”
Jostpille continues, “But by far, the best part was afterward we just de-briefed on what we saw, what they wanted to ask about, what they were confused about, and so forth. It was really a good discussion, from the science to the politics and new laws passed, such as in California with the no new cars having gas engines soon. Most of the students didn’t realize where our corn goes—animals and ethanol. They were interested in the carbon units reduction which was the VFT’s theme. We also stressed the complete use of the corn, from the proteins to the oils to the carbohydrates for the ethanol and even the CO2 recovery that is possible. That impressed them a lot!”
Join us for the soil health VFT coming up later this month!