Land-Based Learning Centers: A multi-generational educational approach to promoting on-farm sustainable agriculture

Our food system is increasingly vulnerable. Although modern technology has substantially elevated food security and material wealth among most, this has occurred at the expense of natural resources upon which humans ultimately depend. We now have a significantly degraded resource base in which the availability of quality soils, water resources, and other essential inputs is threatened. Agriculture must, therefore, be sustainable and able to address environmental, social, cultural and economic complexity, while being alert to unintended consequences.

The most successful producers utilize a sustainable approach that optimizes agricultural resources using a basis of ecological and social principles, with the intention of satisfying human food needs while also enhancing ecosystem services. Such practices acknowledge the complexity in the system and build capacity to respond to shocks, be they environmental, economic or social. Overall, sustainable practices create ecologically sound, socially responsible, and economically viable agricultural activities. There is a growing body of science supporting efficacy of holistic, sustainable agricultural practices with a corresponding increase in farmers who have successfully implemented these practices (Teague et al., 2016). A primary barrier to scaling up sustainable agriculture is a lack of experiential education opportunities, preventing the adoption of land management practices documented to have a positive effect on natural resource permanence. Education of both current producers and new agrarians is needed. This is especially the case in the Upper Peninsula (U.P).

The U.P. has only one state-recognized agriculture, food, and natural resource education (AFNRE) program. The result is a lost generation of U.P. students without access to educational opportunities in agriculture and natural resources – limiting knowledge, awareness, skills and aspirations for careers in these fields. Against this backdrop is the continual rise of farmers’ and ranchers’ age in Michigan. The 2012 Census reported the mean age of producers in Michigan is 55.5 years of age with 79% of all producers being 45 or older. Just 1.6% of producers in Michigan are under 25 years of age. Furthermore, the northern latitude of the U.P. presents challenges for agriculture and related food systems – significant regions of the peninsula are “food deserts” as defined by the USDA. The combination of being rural, remote, and food insecure has led several communities to establish school farms and hoop houses; however, teachers lack adequate knowledge and skills, especially in sustainable agriculture practices, to fully utilize these facilities.

There is compelling evidence of the demand for AFNRE curriculum in U.P. schools. Most recently, a survey of assets within the farm-to-school community and associated stakeholders showed that while there are only two certified AFNRE teachers in the U.P., there are eight school hoophouses, 10 school gardens, and two school forestry projects in multiple counties across the U.P., few of which are connected to certified AFNRE teachers. In addition, fewer than half of the teachers responsible for the agricultural infrastructure in U.P. schools indicated their projects were supported by strong community partnerships. These ongoing, school-led projects would have a greater career readiness efficacy if they were linked to strong partnerships with local farmers and Michigan State University Extension (MSUE) educators. Additionally, preliminary survey results of a current USDA NIFA funded project support the need for increased AFNRE investment in schools (Raven, McFarland, & Palmer, 2017). 

In addition, the U.P. Food Exchange, MSUE, and FoodCorps conducted a survey of U.P. teachers who attended a school garden conference in 2013. Three-quarters of the teachers indicated interest in developing some type of school farm, but 42% indicated limited experience with these systems. Teachers stated training was a top need and that training should be “on designing, teaching with, and hands-on experience” for agriculture projects. The logistical factor that most affected their ability to participate in trainings was cost (O’Donnell & Walk, 2014). Furthermore, these teachers lack knowledge, awareness, and skills about sustainable agriculture practices.

The interest in making agriculture part of the school career readiness landscape is evidenced by the degree of interest among teachers and administrators. However, these school agriculture projects are constrained by a lack of expert advice and facilities. In an attempt to train teachers not accredited to teach AFNRE, teacher training conferences began in the area in 2013. Since then, these trainings have become a touchstone for new interest in school agriculture projects. The MSU North Farm receives calls from teachers each week and has ongoing relationships with eight schools. The benefit of broadening student exposure to include sustainable local farm businesses creates a case for pursuing agriculture as a career, while improving local farms with new and sustainable practices.

These nascent endeavors are a step in the right direction. However, there is a need for more synergetic efforts leveraging existing resources to coalesce educator and producer knowledge into an innovative, experiential learning environment in which student-farmers, educators, and producers learn how food and agricultural systems can be environmentally, economically, and socially sustainable. This project proposes for the MSU North Farm to facilitate the development of land-based learning centers (LBLC) located at cooperating farms that connect producers, teachers and MSUE educators resulting in a Sustainable Agriculture Experience (SAE) team at each center. The goal is to have one LBLC for each of the seven intermediate school districts (ISD) in the U.P. SAE teams will advise student-farmers in the development of an SAE project that implements a sustainable practice at the cooperating farm. The MSU North Farm personnel will provide coordination and oversight for each of the LBLCs.

The suitability of the approach is inspired by the employer/employee and mentor/mentee relationships that form naturally between community-oriented, experienced farmers and interested young people. Observations have shown that young people who begin farming in the U.P. do so after working with a farm business as a volunteer or employee for several seasons before renting land from that employer. Famers in the U.P. are cognizant of the need to educate the next generation of producers and have been a vocal proponent of increased educational programming in food and agricultural systems. Two primary goals of the Growing U.P. Agricultural Association (GUPAA), an NGO representing farmers in the U.P., are to attract youth to agricultural careers and educate beginning farmers. GUPAA members have been working closely with the development of the North Farm as a teaching and learning center to facilitate agriculture and food education both in formal and non-formal learning environments. Increased knowledge in our youth population has the potential to enhance the quality of life in these rural communities by preparing a much more informed consumer base and potential workforce. 

Farmers in the U.P. have shown great interest in providing new learning opportunities for students around food and agriculture, for example, Ben Bartlett’s involvement with the development of facilities at Superior Central High School. Bartlett worked with community members and teachers to build a hoophouse on school grounds. He continues to serve as a resource for Superior Central and was one of the first producers to come forward and volunteer his farm to serve as an LBLC for this project. This example, and others, provided the impetus to design the LBLC model and associated SAE team as a way to provide more structured active learning opportunities contextualized by sustainable agriculture practices.

The LBLC model builds from the concept of place-based learning. Place-based learning has its roots in environmental education, conservation, and community development. Educational programs utilizing place-based learning approaches leverage learners’ connections to their communities to achieve a wide range of conservation, community stewardship, ecological as well as cultural literacy objectives (Center for Place-based Learning and Community Engagement, 2008). We propose to apply the principles of place-based learning through the development of the LBLCs in the U.P. with a focus on sustainable agriculture practices.

There is precedence for using placed-based learning in an agricultural context. For example, the Center for Land-Based Learning, an NGO based in California, uses local farms as educational laboratories for urban, suburban, and rural high school students. This proposal plans to build on their results by utilizing private land to augment school facilities. Additionally, service-learning will be a fundamental strategy used by the LBLCs to link sustainable agriculture principles to educational program objectives. A mindful and purposeful intent is to create a collaborative environment in the U.P. connecting student-farmers, farm cooperators, educators and other community members through the creation of LBLCs for the expressed purpose of increasing the knowledge, awareness, skills and aspirations of student-farmers and current producers about sustainable agriculture.

The proposed model of LBLCs with the associated SAE team is an innovative approach to create a unique experiential learning environment for teaching student-farmers sustainable agriculture practices. By incorporating farm cooperators into the SAE team, teachers have access to practitioners knowledgeable about food and agriculture systems. The inclusion of MSUE educators gives farmers an opportunity to learn and implement the most up-to-date sustainable agriculture practices into their operations, ultimately supporting a SARE desired outcome of improving the natural resource base through sustainable farming practices, eventually leading to improved farm profitability. Having teachers on the SAE team complete the triumvirate, providing pedagogical expertise to ensure projects are educationally sound and outcomes are connected to classroom objectives. Furthermore, the MSU North Farm will provide coordination to the seven LBLCs, ensuring cohesion and uniformity to the effort.

Even though the LBLCs proposed in this project are located in the U.P. of Michigan, the development and validation of this innovative experiential learning model emphasizing active and engaged learning has implications for the NCR-SARE region. Given the latitude of the U.P., this is especially true for states in the northern climates similar to the U.P. that possess the same resources as this project – experiment stations to provide regional coordination and the teachers, farmers and Extension educators with which to form the SAE team and establish the LBLCs. Execution of this project will identify best practices in developing and implementing LBLCs focused on sustainable agriculture practices. Conversely, this project will identify what did not work and make recommendations for avoiding potential challenges.

As stated earlier, clear evidence supports teacher interest in this type of program. A key assumption is that administrators will also support their participation and that school boards will be responsive to increased student interest and be supportive of potential new AFNRE programming. Another key assumption is farm LBLC cooperators will desire to remain in the program beyond funding. Additionally, potential limitations of the proposed methods include an inability to actualize an unrealistic on-farm SAE. Proposed SAE projects will be vetted by the entire team, which in addition to the farm cooperators and student-farmers, includes the students’ teacher, MSUE educators, and other agricultural professionals.

The identified challenges are a common theme throughout the rural, upper Great Lakes region. Developing a strategic approach to the revitalization of AFNRE programming is necessary to assure food security and a willing generation of farmers educated in sustainable agricultural practices.  Knowledge transfer through each SAE provides a local context and benefits both existing and future farmers.

A MySARE database search yielded few projects addressing similar needs in the past ten years within the NCR region. Some projects were somewhat similar (LNC09-315, LNC14-359, LNC11-335, LNC08-301), but they addressed very specific topics, and did not take the student interaction with the farms to the degree we strive to with this project.  None of these projects had both placed-based learning in conjunction with a collaborative team comprised of teachers, Extension educators, and producers. In addition, many of these occurred in areas already served by formal AFNRE programs.   

References

Center for Place-Based Education and Community Engagement (2017). What is place-based education? Available online at http://promiseofplace.org/what_is_pbe.

O’Donnell, K. & Walk, M. (2014). Upper Peninsula farm to school survey.  FoodCorps school gardening conference survey.

Raven, M.R., McFarland, A., and Palmer, A. (2016). United States Department of Agriculture, National Institute for Food and Agriculture, Secondary Education, Two-Year Postsecondary Education and Agriculture.

Teague, W. R., Apfelbaum, S., Lal, R., Kreuter, U. P., Rowntree, J., Davies, C. A. & Wang, F. (2016). The role of ruminants in reducing agriculture’s carbon footprint in North America. Journal of Soil and Water Conservation, 71(2), 156-164.