Interest in a subject matter can be a powerful driving force in motivating students to be successful learners. Identifying, cultivating, and sustaining subject interest is particularly challenging in introductory classes because of their large size. Soil science is often a required subject for various disciplines. Harnessing students' interests is important in creating effective learning experiences in soil science education, especially at the introductory level. The objective of this study was to use "interest theory" to enhance the learning outcomes from an introductory soil science course. The study was conducted over a two-year period (2018-2019) with a total of 118 undergraduate students from various fields (forestry, wildlife biology, environmental science, etc.) who filled out a questionnaire (with 100% response rate) at the beginning of the introductory soil science course to identify their pre-existing interests in soil science, which were used to design various learning experiences (e.g., in-class demonstrations, games, etc.) tailored to their majors and interests. Detailed students' comments revealed a wide range of interest types: a required course (8%), prior experience (18%), personal interest (29%), utility value (15%), specific interest (26%), and no interest (4%). Interest types covered four phases of interest development (with no interest, 4%): triggered situational interest (65%), maintained situational interest (21%), emerging individual interest (9%), and welldeveloped individual interest (1%). Course evaluations and other metrics were used for assessing the students' interests in soil science. Empirical studies like this provide a unique insight on how to enhance course content with students' interests using various pedagogical innovations.