Building the Capacity of ANNIES Educators to Help Women Farmers and Ranchers Improve Agricultural Sustainability

Participants:

The surveys were utilized in 2014 and 2015. There were 112 conference attendees: 54 people in 2014 and 57 people in 2015. Since some people attended more than one conference, there were 92 unique individuals. The participants traveled from 26 states. About 60% of participants were from the North Central SARE states of Iowa, Illinois, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, North Dakota, Nebraska, Ohio, South Dakota, and Wisconsin. About 40% of participants were from states outside the North Central SARE region: Alabama, Arkansas, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Maryland, Mississippi, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Texas, and Wyoming.

The majority of participants, 67%, were from university Extension systems. Other program supporters and educators included the following.

• 10%       Farm Credit System educators and partners
• 9%          Farm/ranch women
• 7%          USDA staff (RMA, RME, FSA, NRCS)
• 5%          Non-profit organization leaders
• 2%          Iowa State University students

Of these conference participants, 32 completed surveys in 2014 and 25 completed surveys in 2015. The results of the two conferences and 57 surveys are analyzed and reported together.

Overall Quality of the Professional Development:

For a grouping of eight questions about the overall quality of the conference, the overall mean was 3.5 on a 4.0 scale. Scoring categories included poor, below average, above average, and excellent. Responses indicated 98% of participants rated the overall quality of the professional development as above average or excellent. Item means ranged from 3.70 for ‘Interaction with ANNIE’S staff,’ and 3.65 for ‘Organization of the conference’ to 3.27 for ‘Selection of topics.’

How Well Professional Development Met Educator Needs:

Respondents indicated how well the professional development provided them with opportunities to meet programming goals, enhance professional networks, and increase understanding of risk management and agricultural sustainability topics. The scoring categories included none, a little, some, and a great deal. Over three-fourths of respondents felt the conferences contributed ‘A great deal’ or ‘Some’ to achievement of each of these goals.

 Survey respondents provided explanations for their responses:

• “Annie’s Project is the keystone of my educational program. It is essential and helps support the other programs I offer.”
• “What a great opportunity to meet the people behind the project, and also those with the program knowledge and experience.”
• “It helped me see the bigger picture on how sustainability encompasses nearly every management decision that farmers/ranchers make on a daily basis.”
• “I already had a good knowledge base of risk management topics, but I am always learning more.”

Preparedness to Offer Annie’s Project and Similar Courses: Participants indicated how well they felt the conference prepared them to deliver Annie’s Project, Managing for Today and Tomorrow, and Moving Beyond the Basics courses designed for farm/ranch women.  Eighty percent of respondents reported they felt well prepared or prepared. 

Respondents’ explanations for their feelings of preparedness included the following representative comments:

• “Every time I attend an Annie’s Project professional development opportunity, I feel more connected with the program and better able to facilitate it. I really enjoyed the Annie’s traditions session. The panel with [the farmers], my gosh that was so powerful.”
• “Not enough detailed information given on the content [curriculum] for offering a quality Annie’s Project course.”
• “I was unsure of how the Managing for Today and Tomorrow curriculum went and I learned a lot and feel comfortable offering this program.”

Plans for Accessing On-going Support Survey respondents also indicated interest in networking resources. Most would access newsletters (91%) additional national or regional meetings 74%), teleconferences (66%), and educator contact lists (64%).

Survey respondents provided explanations for their responses:

• “Since the meeting, I have become more aware of additional outreach resources and ways to connect and learn from other educators.”
• “The discussion with peers throughout the conference was very helpful and encouraging.”

In addition, survey respondents were well informed of the Annie’s Project websites: 95% knew about available online resources for the public and for educators. When rating the educator website, 56% found it very useful; 27% said it was useful; 4% found it somewhat useful; and none indicated it was not useful (mean of 3.8 out of 4.0). When asked to gauge the usefulness of various marketing materials that currently are or could be provided to the network of educators, 76% of survey respondents said they want to use templates for customizing print materials and 71% said they want examples for writing news releases. About half were interested in videos (53%) and logos and graphics (49%). About one-third of survey respondents were interested in radio announcement examples, fliers, display materials, photos/images, banners and posters. 

About half or more of survey respondents are willing to increase interaction with their peers in the following ways: share state results/impact reports with others (72%), help with future train-the-trainer programs (68%), collaborate on grant projects with one or more states (48%), and participate in online social networks (46%). About one-third of survey respondents indicated a willingness to write newsletter articles (32%), present a webinar on a teaching topic (36%), be part of a national evaluation team (34%), be part of a national course development team (30%), develop website content (30%),  or serve on a national leadership team (28%). Being part of a communications team was of less interest (18%).

Use of Nationally Available Evaluation Instruments: Annie’s Project – Education for Farm Women currently partners with Iowa State University to offer standard survey instruments, data compilation and reports to all trained educators for Annie’s Project courses. The survey asked how educators anticipated using these nationally available evaluation instruments. There were 31% of survey respondents who said they would use the online surveys with their course participants; 24% would use the paper surveys, 39% will use both, and 6% do not plan to use them.

Survey participants also indicated how they plan to use the evaluation results that would be provided to them.

• 94% will compare the pre-course and post-course reports to identify changes in participant knowledge and actions.
• 81% will use reports to improve future courses.
• 78% will share results with their supervisor/institution.
• 76% will use the pre-course reports to tailor the course/speakers to meet audience needs
• 67% will share results with sponsors.
• 33% will compare reports to state or national reports.

A few respondents indicated they planned to develop their own evaluation instruments and/or publish posters/papers.  

Accessing Program Partners: Survey respondents also told us about the partners they intend to utilize in offering programs to farm/ranch women.

• USDA: 78% plan to access Farm Service Agency, 56% - Natural Resources Conservation Service, 56% - regional Extension Risk Management Education centers, and 49% - Risk Management Agency. Others noted they would utilize conservation districts, SARE and NIFA.
• Farmer/Rancher Membership organizations: 85% plan to access Farm Bureau, 27% - commodity groups, and 10% - Farmers Union.
• Educational Institutions: 74% plan to access 1862 Land-Grant universities, 35% 1890 Land-Grant universities, 28% community colleges.
• No respondents indicated they would access Hispanic serving institutions or Federally Recognized Tribal Extension Partners/1994 institutions.
• Farm Credit System: 94% plan to access this partnering resource.
• Respondents listed numerous other partners such as local banks and farming organizations/groups, attorneys, implement dealers – other ag supply vendors, crop improvement associations, state departments of agriculture and workforce development offices.

Plans for Programming in the Next 18 Months: Survey respondents indicated how many courses they planned to offer to farm/ranch women in the next 18-months. Participants intended to offer 82 Annie’s Project courses, 26 Managing for Today and Tomorrow courses, and 16 Moving Beyond the Basics courses. In addition, they indicated the number of other  conferences, courses, workshops or tours they planned to offer including  human resource, crop insurance, and succession/estate planning topics: statewide conferences, webinars, and discussion/peer groups. As for target audiences educators planned to recruit and deliver programs to: 91% plan to serve farm/ranch women, 76% small/niche farmers/ranchers, 76% beginning farmers/ranchers, 44% socially disadvantaged/minority farmers/ranchers, and 41% limited resource farmers/ranchers.

Top Goals for Using Conference Information:

Of the 29 responses to the question about the top three ways they will use information from the conference, 18 included specific intentions to deliver Annie’s Project, Managing for Today and Tomorrow, or Moving Beyond the Basics courses. Another 12 mentioned communications, such as social media, recruiting, branding, newsletters, and displays. Nine included statements about increased confidence and using what they now know to improve programming. Responses included 7 statements about statewide program coordination and sharing information with colleagues. Another 7 talked about increasing use of the Annie’s Project websites and materials. There were 5 statements about utilizing expanded networks to learn from others and 5 statements about working with speakers and partners.

Representative comments included:

• “1) New brand guidelines will help with a consistent experience, 2) I’m less wary of partnering with government entities after hearing about the USDA partnerships, and 3) the activities and exercises described in the designing curricula segment were very interesting.”
• “1) Use the information to work more closely with guest speakers, 2) have more confidence in teaching the areas I teach, and 3) be able to talk about national efforts when recruiting participants.”

Additional Suggestions and Comments:

Participants were given the opportunity to offer any additional suggestions or comments. Representative responses included:

• “Continue to offer annual conferences, continue the newsletters, and expand the use of social media for educators throughout the country.”
• “I would have liked more opportunity to speak with other state program coordinators on how they collaborate with the trained educators in their state.”
• “More video of Annie’s Project courses so I could get the feel for the classroom environment.”
• “I very much enjoyed the fellowship and felt supported by the national team which inspired me to go home and do a good job for my farmers. I also really like the new promotional materials.”
• “I had a great time and feel like it was an efficient use of my time. The extra tours were nice. I also enjoyed the panels.”
• “Thank you for hosting this and for your attention to detail. ISU was a fun place to be, too!”