Jonesboro, AR — (JonesboroRightNow.com) — April 10, 2025 — Agriculture programs at Nettleton and Valley View schools began selling annual flowers, tomatoes, peppers and more from their respective greenhouses this week, providing the Jonesboro community an opportunity to purchase homegrown blooms and garden staples.
For both programs, it is a time for students to reflect on lessons learned after working for months to take life from seed to sale. Such projects are steeped in problem-solving opportunities as students themselves ensure appropriate soil types, watering needs and fertilizing practices lead to healthy plants.
Valley View plant sciences teacher Anthony Sanders sees the project as a great agricultural entry point for junior high students and a way to show students the basics of food production.
“The work in here with our eighth and ninth grade is to get them interested,” Sanders said. “They see where their food actually comes from. When you go into an elementary class, and you ask them, ‘Where does your food come from?’ ‘The grocery store.’ That’s the answer you get … even in some of my eighth grade kids, I get that. They come out here and they’re like ‘Wait a minute. That’s where tomatoes come from?’ Because they’ve never seen it before.”
It’s also an opportunity for students to extend learning beyond plant sciences.
Chelsea Ballard, agriculture teacher and Future Farmers of America (FFA) sponsor for Nettleton Public Schools, uses the project to highlight realistic business considerations like product availability, budgeting and logistics.
“How long does this [seed] take until it germinates? When do we need to plant this to be able to sell it by this day? Then figuring out … what does this cost us? What can we sell it for to make a profit?” Ballard said.
Once Ballard and the students set their plant prices, the profit goes into the FFA activity account. This helps Nettleton agriculture students pay for travel expenses related to state-level FFA convention and other competitions.
It’s also chance for students to take ownership of a real item that has an impact outside of the greenhouse.
“We teach them how to take care of them [plants],” Sanders said. “They’ll go in the store, and they’ll come back and say, ‘Why do our plants look so much better than the ones we saw at the store?’ We take care of them.”
Sanders said he uses the project to show students the benefits of taking care of their community. The plants are priced to cover costs with a goal to provide quality, affordable plants for their customers who are on fixed incomes. Once sales are over, any remaining food-producing plants make their way to the program’s community garden, which also helps to feed those in need.
Valley View currently has tomato varieties like Better Boy, Celebrity, Arkansas Traveler and Cherokee Purple. Peppers and several varieties of petunias and begonias are also in stock and ready for purchase.
After-school sales are at the greenhouse on the junior high campus, located at 2118 Valley View Drive. Check their Facebook page for specific dates and times.
Nettleton will continue to sell individual plants and hanging baskets of flowers such as petunias and impatiens, along with jalapenos and tomato varieties such as beefsteak and Brandywine, while in stock. Contact chelsea.ballard@nettletonschools.net for availability and times.