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The Nebraska Indiana Community College campuses at Macy and Santee recently expanded their greenhouse to make room for hydroponic capabilities. 

The Nebraska Indiana Community College campuses at Macy and Santee recently expanded their greenhouse to make room for hydroponic capabilities. 

MACY, NEB. — Students at Nebraska Indian Community College now have new opportunities to indulge their green thumbs. 

The school's Macy and Santee campuses recently expanded their greenhouses by adding hydroponic capabilities. The latter campus already had an outdoor plot used by NICC and Iowa State University for agricultural research.

According to a press release from NICC, the hydroponics system at Macy was completed in the past few weeks, and the system in Santee is already growing peppers and tomatoes. Hydroponics is a way of growing plants without needing soil. 

To oversee the growing greenhouse operations, the community college added Russel Montgomery to its staff.  Montgomery has experience in agricultural economics and will teach greenhouse-related classes at both campuses, according to the press release.

"First and foremost, I’d like to provide an environment for the NICC in which the students can learn about these different growing systems and take that knowledge into the community," Montgomery said.

Originally published on siouxcityjournal.com, part of the TownNews Content Exchange.