Yesterday, we hosted thirteen horticulture students, a teacher, and an assistant teacher from West Johnson High School in Benson on a field trip to learn about the landscaping industry. This was our first time hosting such an event, but we were excited to share our facilities, our experiences, and our knowledge with young people, and encourage them to consider careers in the industry in the future. Everyone had a blast, and we hope they left with a better understanding of the diverse roles and partnerships that are essential in leading a landscape company to success.
The tour started off with short talks from Scott Myatt, company founder and president; Ryan Kimbro, Maintenance Division Manager; and Herbie Champion, Install Division Manager. They shared the history of the company as well their own professional development through the years, and talked about some interesting facets of their jobs (while the students enjoyed coffee and doughnuts from Krispy Kreme!).
Scott Myatt talks about the importance of standing behind your work.
Next, Blake Bennett led a tour of our facilities, introducing all of our support staff and explaining many of our organizational processes. Many other staff joined the tour and answered questions from the students.
Zach Daigle explains how plant deliveries are organized.
Blake Bennett talks about why sorting our landscape and construction waste is important.
Blake shows the students our on-site fueling area.
Herbie Champion talks about our different types of trucks and how we customize them.
After the tour, we had some activities with a competitive edge planned--a plant ID quiz and a paver challenge where student teams had to fill a grid with a certain pattern correctly, the fastest team earning t-shirts with our logo. The students also designed their own planters with fall flowers to take home.
The students participated in a plant ID quiz (with no multiple choice!).
After the quiz, Caitlin Clineff shared some ID tips and tricks for each plant.
Each student designed their own planter to take home, with guidance from Myatt Staff.
We love sparking creativity with hands-on learning.
Everyone enjoyed getting their hands dirty!
Herbie demonstrates the use of a laser level prior to starting the paver challenge.
The two teams set up for the paver challenge.
Every person engaged in teamwork and problem-solving.
Matching the pattern was harder than it looked!
Just a few errors to correct... ;-)
Pausing for a team discussion.
Both teams did a great job, and exercised their teamwork, problem-solving, decision-making, and spacial reasoning skills.
The students were treated to gigantic sandwiches and salads from Bagels Plus, the local deli.
Winners of the plant ID and paver challenges were given their choice of Myatt t-shirt, and everyone received a Myatt Landscaping frisbee!
We had such a great time interacting with this fantastic group of young people, and we hope that they were inspired to learn more about the myriad of unique opportunities the landscape and horticulture industries have to offer. This class was a real pleasure to host--they asked great questions and engaged fully in all of the activities. We look forward to hosting students from West Johnson and other schools in the future!
If you would like to arrange a tour of Myatt Landscaping Concepts for your class, 4-H club, FFA chapter, Boy/Girl Scout troop, etc., please contact Caitlin@myattlandscaping.com.