For nearly a decade, Brentsville District High School in Virginia has been leading the way in preparing high school students for possible careers in turfgrass management.
"We want to teach students the basics of turfgrass science and get them prepared to earn a degree," said Drew Miller, Ed.D. (right), director and founder of the Brentsville Turf Toro Grounds Academy in Nokesville, Virginia. "I don't want it to be like when I went to school where on the first day I was like 'What's a stolon?' "
The academy is now on a trajectory that Miller once could only dream about.
What started in 2017 with 63 students, has grown to 240 members with support from the school district as well as Toro and its Washington, D.C., area distributor Turf Equipment and Supply Co. In July, work began on a new 6,000-square foot building that will include lab space, workshops and multi-purpose areas. Construction is scheduled to be completed before the start of the 2026 school year. Also planned is a research putting green and trial plots for research projects in addition to the 30 acres of athletic fields and other grassed areas Brentsville students already maintain. The program has carried the Toro name since last year when the company and Turf Equipment and Supply stepped forward with support.
The new building was made possible by support from the school, Prince William County Public Schools Superintendent LaTanya McDade and school board members who put a capital-improvement project on the proposed budget, as well as school board members and local elected officials who approved the plan.
The school board approved the plan at its February meeting, and local government officials did the same in May.
"We spent a lot of time going to different people, companies and even hedge funds trying to find philanthropic dollars to fund the facility," Miller said.
"I was at the (2024) SFMA (Sports Field Management Association) conference in Daytona when I got the call from a school board rep that they were going to put it on the capital-improvement plan.
"It was a surreal moment. I thought 'This is really going to happen.' This is something before I never dreamed would happen."
The academy has a state-of-the-art equipment fleet thanks to Turf Equipment and Supply, and only a 26X26-foot steel shed in which to store it.
The program had outgrown its facilities in more ways than one.
"We had gotten to the point where people in the industry took notice of what we were doing," Miller said. "We have students who three years out of college are head golf course superintendents. Our graduates are working in Major League Soccer, the NFL and Major League Baseball."
Solar panels will be placed on the roof and the building will have a water-retention-and-filtration system that will be a source for everything from an equipment wash pad to flushing toilets. The program’s goal is to achieve LEED Platinum environmental certification while teaching students to become environmental stewards. It would be the first facility in Prince William County to attain LEED status.
The new building will help attract more students, and a shop with a lift, reel grinder and welding station will help expand the program to train future golf course and sports field equipment managers.
Multipurpose facilities in the building can be used to host field days and a variety of other events, Miller said.
Currently, all turf at Brentsville is one of several varieties of Bermudagrass. Research plots will offer the chance to grow cool-season grasses, as well, and Miller says plans will include partnering on university research trials. He already has sent out or received interest from Virginia Tech, Penn State, Ohio State and Tennessee.
"We've been in touch with Mike Goatley at Virginia Tech," Miller said. "We've heard from John Kaminski at Penn State, and we have reached out to John Sorochan at Tennessee, who is doing research for the World Cup. We would like to be involved in something like that."
"This will give our kids the opportunity to work with university professors and graduate students. We want to connect our students with the people who have seen the research in the field."