The future of Kewaunee County agriculture was measured in the hundreds of smiles you saw on the first day of Ag Career Days, organized by the Kewaunee County Economic Development Corporation. Approximately 900 students from Algoma, Kewaunee, Luxemburg-Casco, Denmark, and Southern Door schools will have filed through Pagel’s Ponderosa Dairy in Kewaunee by the time the two-day event closes on Wednesday. During that time, students will have seen everything from how the farm addresses comfort and milking to cheesemaking and packaging to accounting and information technology. Three students from Luxemburg-Casco said they learned a lot from the experience.

Ag Career Days was an idea of the late John Pagel, who saw the biannual event as a way to introduce kids to all aspects of agriculture and, with a little hope, keep them close to home rather than watch them move away after high school and college graduation. It has been five years since Pagel’s sudden passing and it has been just as long since the county has hosted the event because of the pandemic. His son, JJ, hopes his dad is smiling down on what they have been able to accomplish in the years since and what is still on the horizon.

Ag Career Days, which began in 2012, is held in opposite years of the KCEDC’s Manufacturing Days. Several dozen volunteers helped make the event a reality, which took kids through eight different stations highlighting the different career paths available in agriculture.