portraits

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The spotlight on careers in science, 
technology, engineering and math,
 

the 

STEM careers, has never been brighter. Graduates 
with STEM degrees make more money and will 
have a lifetime of open doors on their career path. 

“Th

 e careers in science, technology, engineering 

and math are the number one growing fi elds in the 
nation. Th

 ere are so many jobs out there without 

the qualifi ed workers needed,” says Bonham 
Middle School science teacher Kimberly Irving. 
In fact, millions of STEM jobs will go unfi lled this 
year, some of them even locally. “Our hope is if we 
can get students interested in STEM now, they’ll 
be the ones who can fi ll those jobs.”

From “makerspace” labs in elementary schools 

to middle school classes designing problem-
solving projects for 3D printing to our high school 
career and technical education opportunities, 
STEM education is a priority in AISD. 

Portraits found some of the District’s STEM 

superstars at work, investigating ink chemistry, 
engineering complex structures and farming 
without soil. Th

 ese are the jobs—and the 

experts—of the future. 

In a quiet lab at the Amarillo 

Center for Advanced Learning, a 

trio of students are growing lettuce. 

There is no soil and no sun. The 

plants’ environment, built by the 

students, is controlled by a com-

puter. Robotic systems control and 

monitor temperature, humidity, 

gasses and plant growth.

“It’s like our little child that we grew,” laughs 

AACAL engineering student Luis Contreras. 

When Principal Jay Barrett asked for 

student volunteers to take on a futuristic 
farming project, three students jumped at the 
opportunity. 

“We heard ‘food computer’ and we thought, 

‘Sure, let’s do it,’” shrugs Luis.  

Th

 at’s how the “Nerd Farmers of AACAL,” 

as they like to call themselves, began. Th

 e 

three seniors, Luis, Bay Tompkins and Allton 
Montano, spent much of last fall assembling 
the plywood and plexi-glass to house their 
crops and coding the soft ware that would 
control the climate inside. 

Th

 ere’s a mystique to the project and how it 

found a home at AACAL. 

“It is kind of weird,” says Jay, remembering 

how the idea of the food computer kept coming 
up. Jay fi rst heard of the project last spring when 
he saw a 60 Minutes segment featuring the MIT 
Media Lab. MIT researchers have been farming 
indoors for years. Using climate data from around 
the world, they’re able to simulate crop-friendly 
environments anywhere, even in the Sahara 
Desert. MIT was looking for others to join in and 
build their own Personal Food Computer. Th

 e 

thought piqued Jay’s interest. 

Around the same time, Jay attended an event 

at the WT Enterprise Center and a conversation 
with local farmer Chuck Dooley brought the 
subject up again. Not long aft er, he found himself 
meeting with Chuck and entrepreneur Tracy 
Shea to talk more about bringing the project to 
AACAL. Someone else sent Jay a video about the 
MIT food computer. “It just kept coming up,” says 
Jay. “It seemed like we’d be missing out on a great 
opportunity.”

Soon, Jay was looking for students to lead 

the project. Plains Land Bank donated $500 
for supplies. Jay donated a GoPro camera to