Expanding and Diversifying Farmer-Educator Capacity through Ambassador Academies

In September 2020, Tina Bakehouse led an online workshop for PFI staff. The workshop covered presentation and coaching skills for staff to use when preparing for presentations and public speaking engagements and while preparing farmers for events. The workshop outlined the importance of crafting a clear and compelling message, delivering it with confidence, and guidance for giving and receiving meaningful feedback. The 24 participating staff were asked to complete pre and post evaluations. The evaluation asked respondents, using a 1 to 5 agreement scale, to reflect on statements about their confidence constructing a presentation, delivering a presentation in front of a group, their flexibility to adapt the presentation to varying formats and audiences, and giving and receiving feedback. Overall, agreement scores increased by 13% in the post-training evaluation. In a separate scale question (1 to 10, 10 highest) about general comfort level around public speaking, the average response increased by 1.08 points following the training. As one staff included in the open comment of the post evaluation, “Some trainings are not worth doing. Tina's are very much worth the time, and good for getting the whole team on the same page.”

Nine separate trainings were conducted in response to the SARE-PDP project; three more than initially planned. In total 59 farmer-educators have participated. Each of the trainings, or academies, has been formatted to meet the needs at the time and make adjustments based on previous experiences. The first three academies were online and took over two mornings with farmers of similar operation types. The first academy in October included livestock farmers and the two January academies were largely row crop farmers and fruit and vegetable famers, respectively. Messages around conservation and diversity on the landscape were central to all academies.

On the first morning of each academy, participants learned the fundamentals of crafting and delivering compelling messages. In the afternoon following the first training session, each of the participants was given a personalized speaking scenario to reflect on prior to the workshop portion of the training the following morning. The scenarios outlined a topic, audience and format context, along with exercise instructions and were designed to be realistic while also challenging the participants to adapt to new audiences or contexts. On the second morning, participants were broken up into pairs or small groups to discuss their scenarios with one another before coming back to the larger group. Back in the larger group, the smaller groups shared back their ideas and challenges to receive feedback and guidance. At the conclusion of the second morning, participants were challenged to think about their speaking goals for the next year. Participants shared their goals with Maggie Norton, PFI’s farmer outreach coordinator, afterward. Maggie will check in with the participants at six months and a year to encourage and support their goal-reaching efforts. Feedback and evaluations have been positive and appreciative of the professional growth opportunity.

The following trainings were structured differently from the initial three both logistically and content framing. Two focused on the principles of good communication and how to apply them to media interactions. One emphasized storytelling through video and two others supported members preparing to tell personal stories to a live audience during the 2021 (vistual) and 2022 (in-person) annual conferences.

In November 2021, ten farmers arrived ahead of the annual Cover Crop Boot Camp in Ankeny, IA to learn more about communicating with the media. During the three-hour event, participants learned the basics of the media landscape, four keys to winning with the media, interview planning and preparation strategies, block and bridging techniques to stay on message and one-on-one interview practice in front of a camera. The farmers were able to ask questions about their messages, engaging with reporters, share previous experiences with media and received a set of talking points related to cover crops as a point of reference. The fundamental communications strategies covered in the training are applicable to any public speaking or education engagement.  As with the previous academies, participants set media and speaking goals for themselves to achieve over the next year. Feedback in evaluations remained positive and appreciative of the professional development opportunity despite a shift in format and focus. 

The next two academies took place in Blair, Nebraska and Oskaloosa, Iowa and were facilitated with the help of Dan Hartlage of Gurthrie Mayes Public Relations. Practical Farmers was approached by the Midwest Row Crop Collaborative (MRCC) early this year about coordinating media trainings for farmers implementing conservation practices and diverse rotations. MRCC offered to provide a trainer and we used this opportunity to rethink the academy structure. Primarily, realizing fewer is more in any communications trainings, only four farmers were set to attend each, however in both trainings, one farmer was unable to participate last minute. Fewer participants in a media-focused training allows the time and space to give each participant the attention they deserve, and, being in-person, the trainings had more value when discussing and practicing body language best practices.

The structure of these two trainings involved an initial interactive lecture that discussed the fundamentals of clear and compelling communication. Then participants completed either a mock TV or sit-down interview. The group then watched footage of the interviews together to discuss challenges and Dan was able to give constructuve feedback. Another segment of content was discussed before the group split to complete the opposite category of interview before once more watching and discussing the recording. The training ended with robust discussion between farmers and Dan that catered to their nuanced situations and previous media experiences if any. Hands-down, this was the most rewarding academy experience participants and for the farmer outreach coordinator, who was also able to participate.

For the communications training in support of the storytelling session at the 2021 and 2022 annual conferences. A diverse range of farmers were recruited in the previous fall to begin developing a story to share live in January. Tina Bakehouse (2021) and Mary Swander (2022) help one-on-one coaching sessions with the ten (five each year) farmers. Prior to working on their stories individually, each cohort met together for an initial kick-off training to get members on the same page and excited about the project. All participants flourished during the live event and remarked on their good fortune to work individually with an experienced coach.

The final training pivoted again to focus sharing stories and insights through video. With a group of five farmers, PFi staff covered best practices for being interviewed on camera, capturing your own narrative footage, tips for filming from a phone and provided a set for the farmers to discuss their operations and production strategies individually for practice and for future use in a PFI video series. The video series follows farmers in the training, among tohers, who are using cover crops and small grains in the corn belt as a means to diversify their operation, decrease input use and protect natural resources.

The SARE-PDP project opened the door to an exciting and rewarding experience allowing PFI staff to identify the various approaches to communications support that empower members to share their stories and perspectives in an effort to build momentum towards a more diverse and resilient landscape and food system. Across all trainings, it is clear that smaller groups with more focused feedback is preferred and allow richer experiences. Virtual and in-person each have their strengths and set-backs and neither should be touted as superior when the goals can shift group to group. The first three academies and storytelling were all virtual while the media and video-focused trainings were in-person. Based on observation and feedback, the most prevalent and beneficial insight for participants included an appreciation for the power of preparation! Given some basic framework for considering the audience and narrowing a message down to key points ahead of time increased a sense of confidence and more compelling and clear communication in practice