A rendering of Alief ISD’s new Agricultural Science Center
Alief ISD students who raise livestock will soon do it during the school day, not after it.
The district will officially open its new Alief Agricultural Science Center on Oct. 30, and students should be fully moved in by December.
The center replaces the district’s current agricultural facility off Schiller Road. Funded through Alief ISD’s 2021 bond program, it will serve FFA students and the district’s career and technical education program.
“It was part of the 2021 bond program to upgrade that current facility into a much nicer program,” said Glenn Jarrett, Alief ISD’s director of construction and maintenance. “Now students are able to raise a large animal and have their instruction over here during the day.”
The 32,682-square-foot center is estimated to cost $12.2 million, according to a state project filing. The filing describes it as a safe and engaging learning environment where students can explore agricultural sciences, including crop cultivation and farm animal care.
Science class, outdoors
The new center is built for learning that doesn’t fit inside four walls.
“Students will get to experience items here that they normally wouldn’t do in a traditional classroom,” Jarrett said. “They can get outdoors. They can do science experiments on site and also have more interaction with their animal during the day.”
That last part is a big change for families. Today, students wait until classes end and then often need a parent to drive them to the current facility to care for their animals. At the new center, that time is part of the school day.
Jarrett said the setup gives students more opportunities to learn and to take part in science-based projects outdoors.
Volunteers from Trees for Houston and CITGO plant trees at Alief ISD’s new Agricultural Science Center, which officially opens Oct. 30. Photo: Alief ISD
Not just for FFA
The center isn’t only for students in the agriculture program. Jarrett pointed to an outdoor barn on the site that any Alief ISD student or community member can use for a day project or a field trip.
It also has good neighbors. The center sits beside the Alief Community Garden, and SPARK Park is providing a walking trail behind it.
“We’re excited to be here,” Jarrett said.
Together, he said, the garden and the trail will “create a nature-based learning experience.”
A two-way street with the garden
Being next door to the community garden works in both directions.
“We can also help with the gardens as far as being able to provide fertilizer for them and also provide a space for them to sell their goods,” Jarrett said. Those goods include the vegetables the gardeners grow.
Students also get something out of it. Jarrett said they’ll be able to work with the community garden and possibly grow micro gardens of their own as school projects.
Nod from the past: An 1813 Ohio barn was reassembled at Alief ISD’s new Agricultural Science Center. Photos: Alief ISD and Bartlett Cocke General Contractors
A barn with 200 years of history
The site’s centerpiece is far older than the building around it.
Alief ISD bought a salvaged barn from Ohio, originally built in 1813, and reconstructed it as a hands-on learning space.
Bartlett Cocke General Contractors identified it in a LinkedIn post as the Historic Kurtz Stone Barn Frame, one of Ohio’s earliest barns. Ohio Valley Barn Salvage salvaged the frame, which was taken apart and moved to Houston.
“We are bridging centuries of tradition with the future of education,” the company wrote.
Built with classic mortise-and-tenon joinery, the frame will give students a place to explore traditional building techniques and agricultural history, according to the post.
Alief students also had a hand in the work. The district said its career and technical education construction students gained cross-curricular experience through construction, plumbing and more.
Keeping ag alive in the suburbs
Alief isn’t the only district investing in agriculture education.
As subdivisions have replaced prairies and rice farms across Greater Houston, several area school districts have kept up or expanded their livestock shows, FFA chapters and other agricultural programs, the Houston Chronicle reported recently.
“Everybody’s in a subdivision, and I think they’re missing that family-farm feel,” Josh Vodehnal, a Katy ISD high school agriculture teacher, told the Chronicle.
Alief’s new center is built to give its students that same hands-on experience.
Opening day is Oct. 30
Alief ISD broke ground on the center Oct. 27, 2025, and will officially open it Oct. 30, just over a year later.
From there, students will start transitioning over and should be fully in the space in December.
When they are, Alief will have what Jarrett called a place for students and the community “to grow and learn together.”
The district isn’t finished, either. Alief ISD said future additions include a livestock show barn and a new veterinary science facility.
An alum’s hope
At least one Alief graduate is already cheering the center on.
Responding to the district’s social media post about the groundbreaking, Kiowa Davis wrote, “As an alum who went on to college to get their animal science degree, this makes me excited! I always loved agriculture and found FFA by pure luck late in my high school experience.”
Davis added, “Hopefully, with a new facility, they will promote it to get these kids encouraged to pursue careers in the industry.”
— Dorothy Puch Lilli
