Toledo urban agriculture initiative makes its first hires: two students from TPS's Natural Science Technology Center

Paid farm positions put classroom agriculture to work in the field

The urban agriculture initiative backed by the Vistula Foundation and United Way of Greater Toledo has made its first hires: two students from Toledo Public Schools' Natural Science Technology Center, who join as paid farm support for the coming season — planting, weeding, and harvesting across the initiative's growing operations.

The Natural Science Technology Center, part of Toledo Public Schools' Aerospace & Natural Science Academy of Toledo, offers specialized programs in urban agriculture and hydroponics, wildlife and sustainability, and animal science. The new positions connect that classroom training to paid work on real production sites in the students' own city.

“Every career in agriculture starts the same way — with someone trusting you with real work,” said Tom Waggoner, a member of the initiative's program committee and former Senior Vice President at The Andersons, Inc. “These are paid jobs, not field trips. If Toledo is going to grow its own farmers, this is exactly where they will come from."

The positions are the initiative's first paid roles of any kind — a deliberate first. The farms are being built to generate livelihoods, and the first paychecks went to Toledo students.