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Greener pasturesAt some point, every farm kid is faced with a choice. Do I stay, or do I go? Much has been written about the mass migration of farm kids from small rural communities into larger urban settings. Politicians and community leaders lament this exodus, but little has been done to change the situation. Farm consolidation, rising input costs, increasing use of technology, outside land investment--these are just a handful of the reasons behind the decline of many rural communities. So, when rural children go to college, they get more than a diploma. They are also presented with a choice--stay in the familiar, or leave for the unknown? Speaking for my generation, I can tell you that we didn't take the choice lightly. You see, we were children during the farm crisis of the 1980s. I don't think I'm the only 30-something former farm kid with fuzzy memories of neighbors' farm auctions and whispered worried conversations among adults. As a result, many my age had the same thing pounded into their heads by concerned parents and relatives: "Get your education so you have something that can never be taken away." So we did. We got scholarships, went to college, studied hard and crossed the stage on graduation day. We did what they asked of us. We took our engineering degrees to the city and hired on with the machinery firms. We earned our animal science degrees and got jobs with pharmaceutical giants. We became veterinarians, ag law attorneys, doctors, teachers and agribusiness hot shots. We even became advocates for the industry, using those marketing and communication degrees we earned. Few of us returned home. You see, we'd gotten the message loud and clear. Now, whether or not this was right is not my place to say and I'm not passing judgment on anyone. Our parents and teachers did what they thought was best for us at the time. You cannot fault them for loving us and pushing us to be "more." I certainly don't. So, instead of seeing our children go to our old small high schools, we watch them enter overcrowded city schools. Instead of a one-stop-sign commute, we battle four-lane pile-ups. And, most every day, we wake up wishing we were back home. We ache for the communities we left behind, the people and the places that are familiar landmarks of our histories. Oh sure, there are visits to family and vacation time spent working in the harvest field instead of sunning on the beach, but they don't take the place of the every day spent back home. Just because you take the child off the farm doesn't mean you take the farm out of the child. See, we're the ones pushing for schools to educate students about farming and ranching in the classrooms, and countering the messages of PETA and HSUS. We're taking our rural values and using them to volunteer with the Red Cross, Habitat for Humanity, 4-H, FFA, and countless other organizations. We take our farm backgrounds with us into boardrooms, operating rooms, classrooms and courtrooms. We may be city folk now, but I would hope that we're representing our roots well. Maybe someday the situation will change, and future generations will have an easier choice to make. Maybe communities will look at the upturn of farm prices and decide now is the time to improve their infrastructures to lure youth back to Main Street. Maybe when my brother's children graduate from college, there will be more opportunities for them at home than somewhere else. Here's hoping that my generation can find a way to make the choice to stay or leave a little easier for the next. Jennifer M. Latzke can be reached by phone at 620-227-1807, or by e-mail at jlatzke@hpj.com. 7/7/08 Date: 6/30/08
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