Call it a drone. Call it a UAV. Call it what you want; it’s here to stay.

Southern Illinois University at Carbondale is incorporating them into the agricultural curriculum. Chris Clemons is one of the instructors and says, “The idea of not only presenting to our students that this is the technology, but, really, it’s the application of the technology, when students have that first job out of college, they can speak to this. They know the science that is behind this, and they can explain that science to a potential employer.”

The people who sell the UAV to farmers say, if you have a GPS on your tractor, you need one of these, too. The Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International says 80 percent of the drones’ commercial market will eventually be agricultural.