Although post-secondary school agricultural education degree programs strive to meet the need of supplying agriculture teachers, the gap between teacher demand and supply continues to exist. The Teach Ag Campaign is a joint effort of the agricultural education profession to recruit and retain agricultural educators and encourage students to pursue…

School-Based agricultural education increasingly depends upon alternatively certified (AC) teachers to teach agriculture across the United States. Understanding why these individuals become teachers is an important step to better recruit and retain educators who do not complete traditional preparation programs. The purpose of our study was to…

A nationwide standardized curricular resource does not exist for school-based agricultural education. Teachers rely on several resources to develop instruction for students. Pedagogical Design Capacity (PDC) examines teachers' capacity to perceive and mobilize existing resources to develop instructional episodes. The purpose of the study was to…

Agriculture organization (AO) members are key stakeholders within the agriculture and natural resources (ANR) sector, and their engagement in policy decisions can help direct future policy formulation and implementation. Such policies and regulations are often determined by and voted upon by elected officials, and, therefore, the decisions made by…

Faculty at universities must prepare students to successfully enter the workforce. Preparing students requires effective teaching, but excellence in teaching is complex and can be difficult to achieve. To capitalize on excellent and effective teaching, a teaching philosophy is necessary to embody the teaching faculty members' personal philosophy…

The social aspects of faculty instructional development programs are increasingly recognized because the programs' impact is greatly influenced by social interactions among faculty participants. These interactions allow faculty members to reflect on and improve their teaching practices. Although the literature has shown that effective…

Massive open online courses (MOOCs) offer a unique platform through which Extension can provide valuable education. We explored The Meat We Eat, a MOOC designed to create a more informed meat consumer and increase perceptions of transparency surrounding meat production. Compared to pretest respondents (n = 490), students who completed the posttest…

Students coming to university agricultural education programs have less agricultural experience than in the past. Teacher educators are limited to the experiences they can facilitate. Universities have graduated qualified agricultural teacher candidates who do not have experiences in content area skills required of them to teacher. This study…

A labor force of migrant farmworkers, mostly of Latino origin, largely support the agriculture industry in the US. While migrant labor is essential in the modern food system, food insecurity remains high among migrant farmworkers. Presented are the results from a survey on food insecurity, access, and farm to preschool involving 32 farmworker…

Contextualizing science and STEM learning through agriculture can bring both science and agriculture to new audiences, and improve understanding of both fields. Such agriscience education benefits from informal education resources to support classroom work, but teachers may struggle to locate cost-effective free-choice learning resources in their…

Principals have traditionally served as the instructional leader in a school, significantly impacting school culture and effectiveness. Despite this importance, little work has been conducted to examine how administrators view and impact school-based agricultural education programs. The purpose of this qualitative study was to examine how the…

The importance of honey bees to global agriculture is largely undisputed (Calderone, 2012; Southwick & Southwick, 1992). Simultaneously, commercial beekeeping operations face tremendous industry stressors that have led to increased management requirements and elevated colony losses in Florida and around the United States. in recent decades…

In order to fill the need in the agriscience teacher shortage, preservice agriscience teacher education needs to seek preservice teachers who may not have had a traditional school-based agriculture background. The influx of new teachers without a school-based agricultural education background brings both opportunities and challenges. Gaps in needs…

The demand for sustainable agriculture has increased, and many institutions, including the University of Florida, have adopted agricultural sustainability as a major goal. Extension has been identified as a critical information source, important in disseminating sustainable agricultural growing techniques. However, research has demonstrated that…

The National Research Council (NRC) has indicated that effective instruction in colleges of agriculture should prepare students to enter a dynamically changing workplace by helping students learn to be proficient in 21st century skills. The NRC suggested that effective instruction in colleges of agriculture should encompass a hospitable learning…