The National Institute of Food and Agriculture within the U.S. Department of Agriculture provides leadership, capacity, and funds to support the continuing development of a safe and competitive agricultural system. Many of the agency's educational programs are led by the Division of Community and Education (DOCE). These programs span agricultural education, enhancing agricultural literacy throu...

The National Research Council’s Committee on Agricultural Education in Secondary Schools recognized the value of supervised experience and recommended that all students participate in worthwhile supervised agricultural experience (SAE) programs (Committee on Agricultural Education in Secondary Schools, 1988). The committee indicated that these programs should include experience in land laborato...

In Illinois, agricultural education programs at the secondary level continue to experience enrollment declines (Craft, 1991). Data compiled between 1977 and 1986 by the Illinois Association of Vocational Agricultural Teachers (Witt. 1987) and the Illinois Board of Higher Education (Databook on Illinois Higher Education, 1986) from 1977 to 1986, showed declining numbers as high as 54 and 22 perc...

Numerous public and private organizations and agencies conduct adult agricultural education programs. Many of the public sector programs can be traced to the Smith-Lever and Smith-Hughes Acts enacted in 1914 and 1917, respectively, that created the Cooperative Extension System and provided federal funds for vocational-technical education in agriculture. Adult agricultural education programs tha...

Historically, the economic cycles in Brazil were, in many ways, taking advantage of the existing abundant natural resources. Vast territory, tropical climate, sunshine, and a relatively good amount of rainfall also contributed for the existence of a complex cosystem indicating an important agricultural potential. First, the use of Brazil trees for dying purposes, then sugarcane plantations alon...

The role of teacher education programs and the demand placed upon those programs is changing. This study sought to synthesize research related to pre-service agricultural teacher education programs in the following areas: (1) demographics of teacher educators, (2) demographics of teacher education programs, (3) responsibilities of teacher education programs, (4) student selection, (5) preservic...

The National FFA AgriScience Teacher of the Year Award Program was instituted in 1988 to recognize outstanding agricultural educators who emphasized agriscience technology in their curriculum. This study sought to determine selected characteristics of the National FFA AgriScience Teacher of the Year Award winners and their programs from the years 1988 1995 (N = 253). A purposive sample of 187 a...

This national study of post-secondary departments of agricultural education examined leadership and human resource management/development course offerings, course characteristics, future department plans, backgrounds of faculty, and related outreach activities. The majority of the courses were offered for undergraduate credit and were predominately required courses for agricultural education de...