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By JOYANNA LOVE/ Senior Staff Writer

Although agriscience classes are out for the rest of the school year, at Chilton County High School teacher Marlon Harton is already looking toward next year with a fundraiser on DonorsChoose.org.

“We are looking to get some hand tools that could be used for welding, for metal fabrication,” Harton said. “There are even some tools there … for basic residential wiring, and all three of those are units that we cover in our Fundamentals of Agriscience classes.”

The funds will allow Harton to replace equipment that has become worn with age and use.

A portion of the funds will also be used to purchase safety glasses for students.

The project “Tools to Tighten Project Based Learning” received a few donations during Teacher Appreciation Week, which was May 4-8. However, an additional $299.20 is needed before June 2 in order to receive the funding. On DonorsChoose, teachers only receive funds if the project is fully funded.

He typically teaches six fundamentals classes with 28 to 30 students each. He estimates that the tools purchased with the funds would benefit 154 students each year.

The online giving platform makes giving while social distancing easy. The giving page can be accessed on the DonorsChoose website. 

This is Harton’s first time using the crowd-funding platform specifically for teachers. He heard about the opportunity from his wife, Monique, who is a reading coach at Clanton Elementary School.

Harton has been successful in securing local grants for his classroom in the past and said he appreciates the communities’ support for the program

In his 21 years of teaching at CCHS, Harton said he enjoys “watching the students take theory and apply it hands-on to complete a task, to be introduced to areas of education and the workforce that they may not have been aware of before getting into agriscience.” He commented that he also enjoyed seeing when his classes spark an interest that leads a student to pursue in-depth study of a particular aspect of agriscience at LeCroy Career Technical Center.

“We try to do our best to encourage the students, if you see something here in agriscience — there is a process, using the equipment and tools that you enjoy that you want to continue your experience in — we try to encourage them to go on and take a look at that over at the career tech center, and they do that a lot of times,” Harton said.

However, he said seeing students move on is also “bittersweet” because it means they are no longer in his classes.