In NC, hundreds of plant and soil scientists are now at work far removed from university departments or consulting practices. This cohort is a generation of youth studying plant and soil science in grades K - 12. Most of the students are from urban non-farm backgrounds and have had few institutionalized encounters with plants and soils in the field. NC's Department of Public Instruction created an encounter mechanism by adopting soils as a formal part of the Standard Course of Study for elementary schools. To facilitate instruction in soils, soil scientists and agronomists were incorporated as content experts helping teach school teachers.

This sharing of professional resources began in 2002 as part of an NSF-funded program. The Burroughs Wellcome Fund, the NC Science, Mathematics, and Technology Education Center, Sigma Xi and NC Professional Soil Scientists used soils and plants as inquiry-based tools to improve science teaching in NC schools. The scientists helped teachers develop new hands-on exercises, graphic materials, and “teaching kits”. These kits enable students to explore the properties of soils, soil formation, the role of soils in plant growth and to experience and model water movement and landform evolution. In NC, soil science is thus becoming a vehicle for personal growth while introducing the joys and methods of natural science. Not only are cooperating scientists having a positive, immediate impact in classrooms in NC, the long term consequences of creating a scientifically literate citizenry likely bode well for our profession.