Barriers and Solutions to Recruitment Strategies of Students into Post-Secondary Agricultural Education Programs: A Focus Group Approach

This qualitative study utilized focus group interviews of secondary Illinois agricultural education teachers to investigate the continuing problem of student recruitment into teacher preparation pro-grams of agricultural education. Using signal theory, image theory and person-organization fit theory, the researchers identified five themes relating to recruitment issues: time, the economy, family, technology and image. Each theme is described through the words of the participants and solutions are suggested for improving recruitment

Teaching Control Programming Using Programmable Automation Controllers

Introductory control programming was included as a required course for agricultural systems students. A programmable automation controller (PAC) was programmed with a flowchart paradigm to monitor and control applications. An ex post facto research design was used, with a questionnaire to obtain student feedback. The PAC instructional unit and student feedback are described. Ninety‐two percent of students agreed the PAC unit of the course helped improve their problem‐solving skills

Assessing Extension Education Efforts in Afghanistan through the Eyes of U.S. Agricultural Support Personnel

Assessment of agricultural extension education efforts in Afghanistan was conducted through a qualitative case study of eight U.S. support personnel serving in the country. Security & access and provincial diversity were two overriding factors which determined how the three key attributes of assessment, content and process (Barrick et al., 2009) were able to function in an Afghan agricultural extension education program. Respondents indicated training should focus on young farmers and local farm demonstration sites should be essential program components. Respondents stressed recruitment of agents from local districts when this would not imperil the agents or their families. Respondents also insisted education should be the primary role of the Afghan extension agent, and networking to facilitate an interchange of ideas among Afghan professionals should be encouraged

A fully coupled damage-plasticity model for unsaturated geomaterials accounting for the ductile-brittle transition in drying clayey soils

International audienceThis paper presents a hydro-mechanical constitutive model for clayey soils accounting for damage-plasticity couplings. Specific features of unsaturated clays such as confining pressure and suction effects on elastic domain and plastic strains are accounted for. A double effective stress incorporating both the effect of suction and damage is defined based on thermodynamical considerations, which results in a unique stress variable being thermodynamically conjugated to elastic strain. Coupling between damage and plasticity phenomena is achieved by following the principle of strain equivalence and incorporating the double effective stress into plasticity equations. Two distinct criteria are defined for damage and plasticity, which can be activated either independently or simultaneously. Their formulation in terms of effective stress and suction allows them to evolve in the total stress space with suction and damage changes. This leads to a direct coupling between damage and plasticity and allows the model to capture the ductile/brittle behaviour transition occurring when clays are drying. Model predictions are compared with experimental data on Boom Clay, and the flexibility of the model is illustrated by presenting results of simulations in which either damage or plasticity dominates the coupled behaviour

A Descriptive Study on the Preparation of Student Teachers to Work with Diverse Populations

If the agricultural education profession is to attract a more diverse audience to pursue agriculture as a viable career path, the secondary teacher education pathway must be reevaluated. The purpose of the study was to describe the degree to which the involved agricultural education programs prepared their students to work with diverse populations. The study also examined attitudes and beliefs of the student teachers regarding diversity. The results of the study suggest that this group of student teachers was not adequately exposed to diversity neither in their student teaching experience nor in their university preparation. To assist the national agricultural education goal of diversity in agriculture, a national study should be conducted to determine if there is a correlation between minority enrollment in agriculture and the race and gender of the teacher educator