What happened to the ag trip? Reintroducing field trips in the agricultural curriculum

As a professional who hesitantly left the fields of agricultural education and youth development to pursue graduate studies, I vowed to build upon my personal experiences, as well as my colleagues' experiences in the field, to enhance the opportunities for youth in agriculture education. My first

job as a professional was teaching agricultural sciences at a small high school in rural west Texas. In preparation for the upcoming school year, I planned field trips to local production farms, processing and storage sites, and other support businesses. Surprisingly, the local agriculturalists expressed a concern for a recent lack of school district interest in the agricultural community. They noted that most elementary field trips were being conducted to larger towns a short distance away. Implementation of science and technology based curriculum into agricultural sciences, along with time constraints put on highly diversified FFA chapters, have hindered the interaction between the local agricultural industry and local agricultural science programs.

In order to understand our current status of secondary agricultural science programs, we must obtain a historical perspective. Youth vocational agricultural education has experienced many changes since its beginning in 1917 with the passage of the Smith-Hughes act. In the past century, the scope of agriculture has been transformed from that of the family farm to a multi-leveled industry dominated by science and technology. In order to mirror the advances in agriculture, vocational agriculture has been forced to modify the curriculum, and in many cases, restructure entire state programs.

With this needed change in curriculum and structure of agricultural science programs comes a wide range of new topics for instructors of agricultural sciences to teach. The new curriculum didn't necessarily push the original "production agriculture" topics to the side, it made available new and exciting opportunities for agricultural science teachers to expand their programs. Material is now available to attract "non-traditional agriculture students" previously trained in business and science, into the agricultural science program. A surge of new and relevant leadership development and career development events appeared to support this new era of agriculture as well.

The embracement of this new technology and the new scope of agriculture have opened new doors for vocational agriculture, as well as many facets of the industry. Because agricultural education is now focusing on the incorporation of science-based topics, such as biotechnology and food safety, many students are not learning production agriculture as students did in former years. Production agriculture is still the foundation of American agriculture. We realize that larger farmers, partnerships, and corporations are pushing out small, individual family farming practices, but that does not mean that we should ignore our local agriculture production in rural communities.

The transformation of rural agriculture has brought about change in small schools as well. Rural education is experiencing major difficulties as America becomes more and more urban. There are benefits to a rural or small school education, but these benefits come with sacrifices as well. Small schools have difficulty running as efficiently as larger schools. A majority of the financial resources are often spent on teacher and support staff salaries, limiting many opportunities for youth enrolled in rural and small schools. Facilities in these schools are often outdated, uncomfortable, and limited in technology capabilities.

As many of our agricultural science and FFA programs move into urban settings, funding is more easily secured to build on-site laboratories that can serve these urban programs in a more timely and efficient manner. The success of the "school farm" has spread to even the rural schools. An agricultural science teacher can now take the class to one convenient and central location to cover many aspects of agriculture.

For these reasons, I believe that the traditional "Ag Trip" has disappeared from our rural agricultural education courses. If time is to be spent away from the school facilities, it is usually in an urban setting touring a large processing plant, agricultural service business, or technology and machinery production unit. Agricultural science teachers now feel that the production agriculture scope of our programs can be served in the curriculum, local laboratory settings, or through supervised agricultural experience programs rather than by viewing onsite production.

Most rural communities are still hanging on to the thread of production agriculture for their survival; therefore, production agriculture tour opportunities are plentiful for rural agricultural science programs. The resource is local and available, therefore, local field trips can easily be scheduled. Because of the diversification and consolidation of production agriculture, a greater opportunity has emerged for teachers to successfully set up a worthwhile experience for their students.

The benefits of experiential learning, through SAE in agricultural sciences, have long been the highlight and strong point of our program. Field trips and other methods of visual learning are a second choice in cognitive value. We, who in earlier years had the chance to visit a working farm, can all vividly remember some aspect of those field trips. Students today are missing out on the tremendous educational benefits of participating in a field experience trip. Also, children today, even in our most rural communities, are far removed from the farm. Agricultural illiteracy does exist in small town USA.

"Back to the basics" production agriculture is something everyone could use.

A benefit often overlooked is simple community relations. Expressing interest in a local community member's operation can spur greater support for your program. Put yourself in the producer's or local businessperson's shoes. It may seem awkward to them if the agricultural science program expresses no interest in the local economy. Remember, most of these individuals experienced secondary vocational agriculture a few years ago. They may not realize the change or understand the new direction of curriculum. Although many rural agriculturalists obviously see the change of the agricultural scope, they may not appreciate it because of the current effects on them.

Often times, we use our community resources for monetary solicitations only. Money is needed to insure successful programs; however, an imbalance is created when we ask these individuals for monetary assistance, but show no interest in their production farm. Because most community members of a rural community are so agriculturally inclined, assistance on career and leadership development events, guest lecturing, and simple advice are all good examples of using community resources in a rural community. The main rural community resource we suggest should be to use local producers, agriculture sales and service vendors, and processors for tours when dealing with production topics.

After experiencing the benefits of local field trips in my introductory class, I implemented them into my other classes. Certainly, students are fortunate to have Scientific based resources. We can consider ourselves fortunate to have production agriculture to show our students as well.

The decline in use of "Ag Trips" is as apparent as the benefits. We must continue to not only reflect upon production agriculture, but also embrace it, especially in our rural communities and small schools. Remember, the basics of production agriculture will be as relevant and timely as the advances in technology to our children. We can touch upon both aspects by simply using our community resources wisely.

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Chad S. Davis is a Graduate Teaching Assistant in the Department of Agricultural Education and Communication at Texas Tech University.

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James H. Smith is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Agricultural Education and Communication at Texas Tech University.