School Visits Program at the National Western Stock Show

4-H Impact Highlight

Colorado 4-H Youth Development

It’s January in Denver and thousands of school-age students are getting up-close to the cattle that make hamburgers and steaks – and learning about how corn and potatoes grow – at the National Western Stock Show.   

The School Visits program is an annual effort in which Colorado State University Extension is a key partner. Of the more than 14,000 students who participated in School Visits in 2026, more than 8 in 10 come from urban and suburban Denver metro area.   

For the students, it’s a powerful way to see agriculture, and learn about where their food comes from, right in the middle of Denver, at the National Western Complex. 

“I think it’s important that we build our children’s self-sufficiency and that they learn where their food comes from,” said Kieshon Davis, one of the parent chaperones from Eagleton Elementary in Denver, where her son is a student. 

“I think he’s learning a lot about how things actually work. We had a conversation when we came in because everyone was like ‘Oh my gosh, there’s so much poop,’ and I’m like, “well, animals poop.’ And they’re like, ‘they do?!?’ So, I think they’re learning a lot about natural things and how we get our resources.”   

Logistics with a Valuable Purpose 

It’s mid-morning on Jan. 16 – the annual 4-H Day at the Stock Show – and Josey Pukrop is sorting through check-in sheets and catching her breath after wrangling 2,500 students as they arrive in a fleet of yellow school buses from more than 60 school districts.  

“We’re able to offer free admission to all teachers and their kids, as well as chaperones, so that they can come in and experience this for free. Schools just need to provide their own transportation,” says Pukrop, who organizes the School Visits in her role as 4-H Youth Development Specialist for CSU Extension in nearby Jefferson County. 

Pukrop says most of the young people coming to School Visits are from urban areas of Colorado – about 4,000 (35%) are from Denver County, while another 7,000 (50%) are from Adams, Arapahoe, and Jefferson Counties. For many, it’s their first real exposure to farm animals and agriculture. 

CSU organizes and co-sponsors School Visits along with Oxy, Colorado Beef and National Western Stock Show, making possible the free field trips on eight sponsored days. CSU Extension staff welcome students and their teachers, providing all the information they need to have a smooth, education-filled day.

The Teaching Starts Before Field Trip Day 

A group of students gathers around a hand-on table in the CSU 4-H Ag Adventure area, learning about agriculture while they play and explore. Alicyn Roley is one of four teachers from Eaton Elementary School who brought the entire first grade, along with a handful of parent volunteers to help wrangle 80 first graders in the busy Hall of Education.   

Roley says one her students is absent from the field trip because she’s participating in the Stock Show, showing cows. That’s not so surprising considering that this group comes from a more agricultural community compared to the schools in Denver – so this field trip builds on the food production they see around them every day living in Weld County.  

“The really cool part is there are a lot of things here that connect to a lot of our [learning] standards, so we do a lot of activities prior to coming here that align educationally with the standards and skills that we’re working on in first grade.” 

In the months leading up to the National Western Stock Show, educators from CSU Extension and from the CSU Spur campus visited schools, engaging with more than 2,500 students prior to the Stock Show, to begin cultivating the learning with classroom lessons related to what students would be seeing at the Stock Show. 

So, the School Visit becomes one day in a series of connected lessons.   

“One of the things we did was we worked with CSU Spur and they came in and did a lesson about eggs – the weight and the strength, and the architectural build of eggs and how much weight an egg can hold,” Roley said. “It was really cool because they all got to walk on eggs and it was super fun – a lot of science.” 

Throughout the School Visit day, students also get to meet youth leaders from Colorado 4-H, and learn about opportunities to participate in 4-H youth development activities in local 4-H clubs across Colorado.  

Thousands of Students. Countless Lessons. 

Back at the check-in table, Extension Specialist Josey Pukrop says when she surveys teachers after their visits, 85% respond that they either agree or strongly agree that Extension’s Stock Show field trip is a wonderful way for students to make the connection between Colorado agriculture and the food on their dinner table.  

 “It fits in really nicely with their curriculum,” Pukrop said, “but it also helps to spur the conversation of where their food is coming from and what they’re seeing in the days after their classroom visits the Stock Show. Teachers say that there’s just a lot of really wonderful conversation that happens as a result of them coming out here.”