Keith M. MooreDirector, InnovATE/Virginia Techkeithm@vt.edu

MEAS SymposiumStrengthening Extension and Advisory Services for Lasting Impacts3-5 June 2015Washington, D.C.

Confronting the Challenge of Agricultural Education and Training

innovATE Theory of Change

•Missions ready to invest in AET institutions

•We can meet need

Assumptions

• Scoping• Research

Needs assessments

•Recommendations•Priorities•Opportunities• Implementation plans

innovATE strategies

•CoP/Sharing•Publications/Tools•Workshops•Self-assessments

innovATE activities

• Improved AET systems & institutions

•Effective value chains

Impact

LEARN DESIGN TRAIN

Distribution

Short-termEducationInstitution

Supply

Processing Harvesting ProductionInputs

Workforce Development

University

University

Labor Market

Primary School

Vocational/Technical

School

Demand

Secondary School

Youth

What we have accomplished

Assessed AET institutions and systems and the labor markets they serve

Identified appropriate knowledge, skills, and tools

Disseminated the knowledge, skills and tools developed

• Held workshops, a symposia, training sessions• Published thematic and good practice papers• Conducted 8 AET scoping assessments• Earned an associate award in a non-FtF country

Gender in AET Workforce Development Pedagogy and Curriculum

• Gender, Higher Ed, and AET• Gender Roadmap

Educational Pipeline• Muslim Women in AET• Gender issues and

recommendations for encouraging women in higher education AET programs

• Supporting female faculty members in the agricultural sciences

• Careers along the horticulture value chain

• Gender Training module

• Youth entrepreneurship in agriculture

• RWFD/Value Chain case studies

• Employment and Workforce Development for Rural and Food-based Economies

• Role of Agricultural Technical and Vocational Education and Training in Developing Countries

• Current WFD themes and change pathways

• ATVET Training module

• Degree training and curriculum development to support HICD

• Challenges and Opportunities for AET in Post-Conflict Sub-Saharan Africa

• Gender, Agriculture and Nutrition Symposium

• Linking Transformative Teaching with Sustainable Workforce Development

• Community Participatory Curriculum Development

• Good Practices: Mentoring New Faculty; Elements of Reasoning; ICT in AET

Unskilled labor

Skilled workers with job specific

training

Short-termEducationInstitution

Youth

Primary School Lower Secondary Tertiary education

Skilled workers

Technical/Vocational Secondary

General Secondary

Semi-skilled workers

Workers with basic skills

Highly skilled professionals

Educational Pipeline

Agricultural education and training faces two challenges

An unbalanced institutional culture in which

• Education is seen as transferring knowledge created elsewhere• Research is seen as creating that knowledge• Learning is not perceived as a creative activity

An dynamic institutional context in which

• Change is endemic, involving climate change and volatile markets• Innovation, adaptive management and entrepreneurship are

required

The Educational ChallengeInstructional quality is characterized by:

• Professor reading from the notes he took as a student• Science taught as the memorization of facts• A lack of syllabi and student oriented learning• A lack of coherence between learning objectives, pedagogical practices, and

assessment

Although experiential learning is valued and emphasized by faculty and administrators, the tradition of memorization is profoundly engrained.

Underfunding agricultural education leads to low morale and rent-seeking behaviors of talented faculty members.

There is a lack of incentives for quality (student-oriented) teaching suggesting that even minimal rewards may help to re-focus efforts.

Changes in the Underlying Paradigm

From knowledge as dependent on externally fixed science

• Farming Systems Research and Extension (FSR/E)• Agricultural Knowledge and Information Systems (AKIS)

To a learning paradigm for managing complex adaptive systems

• Agricultural Innovation Systems (AIS) (Annor-Frempong and Jones, 2014)

A shift from research to learning

Learning is not something we do apart from the world we live in

Knowledge and action are simultaneous

Fostering Technical Change in Agriculture

How does adaptive management change agricultural education and training?

What is the role of learning in

the process of innovation?Is learning a matter of information transfer resulting in adoption of innovations?Or, is learning a matter of

developing capacities for on-going adaptation?

Whose capacities should be developed?

Where does innovation occur?

Research

Regulators

Wholesalers

Processors

Production Ecology

ProducerOrganizationsCredit system

Input suppliers Transporters

Retailers

Input producers

GovernmentCivil Society

Local MarketsExtension

Producers

Consumers

Export Markets

An Agricultural Innovation System (AIS)

Innovation Brokers

Main Functions of Innovation Brokers:Facilitating social learningRelationship building and brokeringAnalyzing the context and articulating demandLobbying and translating innovation resultsFacilitating interaction between organizations

Challenges include:• Formal education still reinforces top-down approaches • Acquiring and maintaining funding• Maintaining neutrality

Questions for moving forward

Who is our audience?

Should we focus on ministries of education?

Should we focus on private sector schools and training institutes?

Is the donor community the a key target for our messages?

How does one assess capacity development for agricultural innovation systems?

How does one target changes in organizational culture?

How can we measure changes in organizational culture?

Vernon Ruttan in 1991 – author of “Induced Innovation”

“The thing that bothers me is that the donors have consistently tried to avoid the issue of institution-building in Africa. In South and Southeast Asia in the 1950s, the donors were building the institutional capacity it took to create the growth that began in the 1960s. In the 1970s, we didn’t do it in Africa because we were on the basic needs and rural development kick. An agronomist was viewed as doing elite stuff. A plant breeder was even more elite. I think it’s time that the donors begin to take the issue of institution-building seriously or in 2010 we are going to be having this same conversation.”

Statement presented at a Seminar on African development: Lessons from Asia. Winrock International: Morrilton, Arkansas

InnovATE is supported by a grant from USAID and managed by Virginia Tech’s Office of International Research, Education, and Development (OIRED). This project was made possible by the United States Agency for International Development and the generous support of the American people through USAID Cooperative Agreement No. AID-OAA-L-12-00002

Thank you

Visit our website at:

www.oired.vt.edu/innovate