University of Illinois popcorn breeder Tony Studer (pictured) received a USDA grant to develop 4-H and high school curricula using popcorn to teach science topics such as genomics, machine learning, and plant science. Creidt: Lauren D. Quinn, University of Illinois
Key points:
- The USDA has awarded a crop scientist a grant to further his popcorn-based curriculum.
- A popcorn-based curriculum helps reinforce concepts around agricultural science, artificial intelligence, biotechnology, computer science, genomics, research methods, and more.
- The grant will expand the curriculum to include hands-on lessons on machine learning and artificial intelligence.
A new grant from the USDA is supporting a University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign crop scientist’s “pop-omics” curriculum.
For nearly a decade, professor Tony Studer has proselytized the power of popcorn to engage the younger generation.
“Everybody knows popcorn, but students don’t typically think about where it comes from or how science is used to improve the food we eat,” said Studer. “Using popcorn to scaffold more complex science concepts keeps students more engaged because it’s already something they’re familiar with.”
Early versions of his curriculum had students popping kernels from Studer’s popcorn breeding program, taking data and notes to link the appearance of unpopped and popped kernels. By tracking popping quality in the context of the popcorn’s genetic makeup, the students learned about genes, inheritance, and agronomic properties. And Studer obtained valuable data, which he used to inform his breeding program and develop even better popcorn.
This grant will expand the curriculum to include hands-on lessons on machine learning and artificial intelligence designed to meet next-generation science standards.
“AI is the big thing. This would be a way for students to interact with an AI model in a very tangible way. And it will also change our internal breeding program. If I can throw down 10,000 kernels and have it pick the top 10% before I even grow them, that'd be amazing. It would change the way we do things,” Studer said. “But we don’t know yet if the AI can beat students in the more labor-intensive process of evaluating kernels by hand. We’re excited to find out.”
The grant is also partnering with the Illinois Farm Bureau and the Illinois Agriculture in the Classroom (AITC) program to create learning materials for elementary and middle school classrooms, with the hope of connecting with the national AITC program one day.
Studer has already worked with teachers to implement programs in three Illinois high schools, and he intends to expand to 10 or more by the end of the three-year grant period. But he sees the program taking off statewide and nationally—in due time.
“The curriculum we're writing will be open source, and we expect it to go national. I can only be in so many high schools, so we’re building in scalability,” he said. “We’re asking ourselves what experiences we can include so that more kids can be involved.”
The overall goal of the grant is to increase science literacy, critical thinking, and acceptance of technology in today’s youth. But it’s also about protecting food security in an uncertain future.