Hands-on precision ag lessons yield ‘aha’ moments for Iowa high school students

AMES, Iowa (June 1, 2026) – Students from Jim Fitzgerald’s precision agriculture class at Boone High School pushed a utility cart across one of the school’s athletic fields on a recent sunny spring morning, trying their best to roll along a straight but invisible line. Without assistance from the cart’s GPS-powered tools, it was a tough mark to hit. 

“We were off by 17 feet after a single pass, so think how much we’d be off over a whole field,” Fitzgerald told the students. The return pass – this time, with GPS – hewed the line, driving home the value of guidance and steering systems widely used by farmers. 

This was Fitzgerald’s first year teaching the curriculum designed for the precision ag cart, which can simulate various types of agricultural machinery. Learn-by-doing exposure to the basics of digital agriculture has been an engaging and often surprising introduction to modern farming advancements, Fitzgerald said. 

“There have been a lot of eye-opening experiences for students, seeing the technology that goes into agricultural equipment and production,” he said. 

Opening eyes was part of what Iowa State University’s Digital Ag Innovation Lab was aiming for in creating the Precision Ag Technology Curriculum for High Schools (PATCH) program, which debuted this school year in 22 high school agriculture classrooms in Iowa and will expand to another round of schools across the state this fall. 

“We are showing these students there are so many STEM career options in agriculture. It takes all kinds of people with a variety of skills to develop, deploy and utilize these technologies,” said Kate Groe, a Digital Ag Innovation Lab test engineer who helped establish PATCH. 

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Originally published by Iowa State University in June 2026.