This set of inquiry lessons is adaptable for middle school through high school life science or biology classrooms and will help meet the NSTA scientific inquiry position statement (2004) and the AAAS benchmarks (1993) and NRC standards (1996; 2000) related to health and food literacy. The standards require adolescents to examine their own diet and…

Background: "Healthy People 2010" identified community partnership as one of the most effective strategies in eliminating health disparities and considered it a critical element in improving an individual's quality of life. To be effective at engaging communities in partnerships, an initial community based needs assessment is…

Reading the Farm is a 2- to 3-day professional development program that brings together agricultural service providers from a range of agencies, with various expertise and levels of experience, to explore whole-farm systems and sustainability through in-depth study of two case-study farms. Over 90% of past participants reported that the program…

This qualitative study used a narrative design to explore the perceptions, background and experiences of Mexican Americans who completed their bachelor's degree as adult learners. The study focuses in particular on their experiences of learning to be bicultural. A "Borderlands" framework whereby Mexican American adult learners negotiated…

Purpose: This paper examines new coalitions for knowledge diffusion and innovations of young farmers. Understanding their patterns and the factors influencing their cooperative and innovating norms is crucial in improving these young farmers' positioning in the agricultural knowledge and information system. Design/methodology/approach: Drawing on…

Urban agriculture initiatives are on the rise, providing healthy food while teaching a land ethic to youth. In parallel, increasing numbers of university graduates are obtaining Extension work requiring the effective communication of science in a diverse, urban, low-income setting. This study evaluates a pilot service-learning program, the…

This paper argues that conflicting results from previous literature--related to the effect of economic conditions on child labor--derive from different income and substitution effects implicit in different types of income variation. We use agricultural shocks to local economic activity in Brazil (coffee production) to distinguish between increases…

Louisiana's land, coast, and inland waterways are home to many natural resources such as seafood, petroleum, natural gas, and timber--and freshwater crawfish, or "mudbugs" as the locals like to call them. These natural resources are vital to Louisiana's economy. The author describes a unit of study on economics in which a teacher taught…

This study examined the relationship between programs in Career Technology and Agriculture Education (CTAE) utilized by a school district in northern Georgia and the relative effect the programs had on high school graduation. Career technology and agriculture education (CTAE) programs engage students and prepare them for college or career…

The primary objective of this dissertation is to reconstruct the history of the Omotic societies of southwestern Ethiopia. Although historical, anthropological, and linguistic studies exist for this region, the gaps in our knowledge are great. Information on the history of Omotic people, their economic and political systems, beliefs and values,…

Modern agriculture poses ecological problems and opportunities, which defy simple democratic reform without an educated citizenry. Developing an educated citizenry can be accomplished by further developing agricultural literacy in elementary education. While benchmarks for agricultural literacy have been produced, relatively little attention has…

The Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) is a global network of 15 specialized centers employing around 2,000 international scientists and 6,000 national staff in over 100 countries. CGIAR educational approaches to environmental issues have varied amid conflicting perspectives. Inadequate policies, learning resources,…

Alternative food networks (AFNs) are commonly defined by attributes such as the spatial proximity between farmers and consumers, the existence of retail venues such as farmers markets, community supported agriculture (CSA) and a commitment to sustainable food production and consumption. Focusing upon processes rather than attributes, this paper…

This study investigates the links between community contexts/factors and rural 11th-grade agricultural science students' choice of careers in agriculture. A logistic regression model was developed and tested to examine the extent to which nine measures of community contexts (i.e., membership in FFA, membership in 4-H, community attachment,…

The trend towards demand-driven agricultural research has focused attention on the inclusion of farmers in research planning. Theoretically, this should enhance ownership and increase the applicability of research. However, in practice, several tensions emerge with regard to the operationalization of such "user-driven research planning…