Scholarly Works, Agricultural, Leadership, and Community Education
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Browsing Scholarly Works, Agricultural, Leadership, and Community Education by Department "Agricultural, Leadership, and Community Education"
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- Accessing Virginia Market Sectors: Establishing a Market PerspectiveVallotton, Amber; Battah, Alexandra; Knox, Ryan; Vargo, Adrianna; Archibald, Thomas G.; Boyer, Renee R.; Cook, Natalie E.; Drape, Tiffany A. (Virginia Cooperative Extension, 2017-11-27)Discusses marketing perspective, and emphasizes the importance of understanding the market, before investing lots of time, effort and money.
- Accessing Virginia's College & University Market Sector: Fresh Produce Food Safety ConsiderationsVallotton, Amber; Battah, Alexandra; Knox, Ryan; Vargo, Adrianna; Archibald, Thomas G.; Boyer, Renee R.; Cook, Natalie E.; Drape, Tiffany A. (Virginia Cooperative Extension, 2017-11-27)Highlights from a 2015-2016 market assessment survey are discussed in this document.
- Accessing Virginia's Hospital Market Sector: Fresh Produce Food Safety ConsiderationsVallotton, Amber; Battah, Alexandra; Knox, Ryan; Vargo, Adrianna; Archibald, Thomas G.; Boyer, Renee R.; Cook, Natalie E.; Drape, Tiffany A. (Virginia Cooperative Extension, 2017-11-27)Discusses hospitals as a potential market for locally grown foods and products. Identifies school purchasing priorities, and some of the likely barriers to purchasing.
- Accessing Virginia's Market Sectors: Fresh Produce Purchasing ConsiderationsVallotton, Amber; Battah, Alexandra; Knox, Ryan; Vargo, Adrianna; Archibald, Thomas G.; Boyer, Renee R.; Cook, Natalie E.; Drape, Tiffany A. (Virginia Cooperative Extension, 2017-11-17)Discusses the results of a survey of colleges and universities, direct-to-consumer markets, hospitals, public schools, restaurants, retailers and regional wholesalers.
- Accessing Virginia's Public School (K-12) Market Sector: Fresh Produce Safety ConsiderationsVallotton, Amber; Battah, Alexandra; Knox, Ryan; Vargo, Adrianna; Archibald, Thomas G.; Boyer, Renee R.; Cook, Natalie E.; Drape, Tiffany A. (Virginia Cooperative Extension, 2017-11-27)Discusses public schools as a potential market for locally grown foods and products. Identifies school purchasing priorities, and some of the likely barriers to purchasing.
- Accessing Virginia's Regional Wholesale Market Sector: Fresh Produce Safety ConsiderationsVallotton, Amber; Battah, Alexandra; Knox, Ryan; Vargo, Adrianna; Archibald, Thomas G.; Boyer, Renee R.; Cook, Natalie E.; Drape, Tiffany A. (Virginia Cooperative Extension, 2017-11-17)Discusses wholesale market distributors and regional food hubs, and how to market locally grown food crops to them. Also notes the results of a 2015-2016 a Virginia statewide market assessment survey.
- Accessing Virginia’s Restaurant Market Sector: Fresh Produce Food Safety ConsiderationsVallotton, Amber D.; Battah, Alexandra; Knox, Ryan; Vargo, Adrianna; Archibald, Thomas G.; Boyer, Renee R.; Cook, Natalie E.; Drape, Tiffany A. (Virginia Cooperative Extension, 2017-11-17)Despite the growing demand and support for local food, there can often be significant barriers for growers trying to tap into new markets, given specific food safety expectations, policies, and requirements. This trend is particularly true for institutional buyers, who are often constrained by far-reaching institutional and/or corporate policies. While there are lots of market opportunities in Virginia, navigating the landscape for growers can be daunting, since buyer food safety requirements are not a “one size fits all” standard for all markets. To better understand current expectations and perceptions across multiple market sectors in Virginia, and help producers better align their on-farm practices with these marketplaces, the Fresh Produce Food Safety Team conducted a state-wide market assessment survey in 2015-2016. The purpose of this factsheet is to provide you with the results of that work, especially if you are considering selling produce to restaurants.
- Adaptive Leadership: How to Prioritize and Align Emerging IssuesKaufman, Eric K. (2017-02-08)Adaptive leadership focuses on the adaptations required in response to changing environments, which essentially describes the role of the 21st Century Extension professional. This workshop will outline the model of adaptive leadership and introduce the leader behaviors associated with adaptive work. Participants will practice categorizing issues as either technical or adaptive challenges, and they will explore appropriate strategies for responding to both.
- Adjust your own oxygen mask before helping those around you: an autoethnography of participatory researchSteketee, Abby M.; Archibald, Thomas G.; Harden, Samantha M. (2020-09-03)Background There is a need to unpack the empirical, practical, and personal challenges within participatory approaches advocated to optimize implementation. The unpredictable, chaotic nature of participatory approaches complicates application of implementation theories, methods, and strategies which do not address researchers’ situatedness within participatory processes. As an implementation scientist, addressing one’s own situatedness through critical reflection is important to unearth how conscious and unconscious approaches, including ontological and epistemological underpinnings, influence the participatory context, process, and outcomes. Therefore, the aim of this exploratory work is to investigate the heretofore blind spot toward the lived experience of implementation researchers within the participatory process. Methods We developed an integrated research-practice partnership (IRPP) to inform the implementation of a gestational weight gain (GWG) control program. Within this IRPP, one investigator conducted a 12-month autoethnography. Data collection and triangulation included field notes, cultural artifacts, and systematic timeline tracking. Data analysis included ethnographic-theoretical dialogue and restorying to synthesize key events and epiphanies into a narrative. Results Analysis revealed the unpredicted evolution of the GWG program into a maternal health fair and three themes within the researchers’ lived experience: (1) permeable work boundaries, (2) individual and collective blind spots toward the ontological and epistemological underpinnings of implementation paradigms, and (3) maladaptive behaviors seemingly reinforced by the research culture. These themes contributed to the chaos of implementation and to researchers’ experience of inadequate recovery from cognitive, emotional, and practical demands. These themes also demonstrated the importance of contextual factors, subjectivity, and value-based judgments within implementation research. Conclusion Building on extant qualitative research guidelines, we suggest that researchers anchor their approach to implementation in reflexivity, intentionally and iteratively reflecting on their own situatedness. Through this autoethnography, we have elucidated several strategies based on critical reflection including examining philosophical underpinnings of research, adopting restorative practices that align with one’s values, and embracing personal presence as a foundation of scientific productivity. Within the predominant (post-) positivism paradigms, autoethnography may be criticized as unscientifically subjective or self-indulgent. However, this work demonstrates that autoethnography is a vehicle for third-person observation and first-person critical reflection that is transformative in understanding and optimizing implementation contexts, processes, and outcomes.
- Administrator’s Perspectives on the Environmental Factors Facing Cooperative ExtensionElliott-Engel, Jeremy; Westfall-Rudd, Donna M.; Seibel, Megan M.; Kaufman, Eric K.; Radhakrishna, Rama (American Association for Agricultural Education, 2020-02-02)Extension is a complex organization with a mission to deliver research from the Land-Grant University to all U.S. communities. Extension administrator perspectives of the environmental factor changes that are facing the organization were investigated in this qualitative study to inform the direction for organization adaptation. Extension needs to respond to: shifts in funding and clientele demographics. Organization adaptation can cause long-term stakeholders to fear loss and therefore can act against the organization. Administrators need to be responsive to traditional stakeholder concerns to reduce shifting focus friction and achieve organization adaptation, and further survival.
- Aligning the residential college model with priorities of large institutionsKaufman, Eric K. (2017-09-25)The Gallup-Purdue Index gives us valuable insight into the experiences in college that improve well-being in life after college, specifically highlighting things such as mentoring relationships, caring professors, and enthusiasm for learning. However, many colleges and universities struggle to create the environment for these high impact experiences to flourish. Some have suggested that small, liberal arts institutions are the answer, but what does that mean for large, public research universities? The “Oxbridge” residential college model provides an answer. Much of the literature on the residential college model is in the context of a “liberal arts” education, which emphasizes specific disciplines (e.g., the humanities), but the residential college model is more appropriately aligned with a “liberal education,” which the Association of American Colleges & Universities (AAC&U) describes as “an approach to college learning that empowers individuals and prepares them to deal with complexity, diversity, and change.” The AAC&U goes on to explain that a liberal education “helps students develop a sense of social responsibility; strong intellectual and practical skills that span all major fields of study, such as communication, analytical, and problem-solving skills; and the demonstrated ability to apply knowledge and skills in real-world settings.” While some have reduced the residential college model to a liberal arts perspective, the model directly aligns with Abraham Lincoln’s priorities for public higher education that produced our nation’s land grant universities. The residential college model supports growth and development of the whole student, and it enhances and it expands the potential for learning and career preparation beyond conventional living-learning programs. This session will highlight key components of the residential college model, offer examples of implementation at large, public research universities, and connect the model to priorities for improving higher education as a whole. Participants will be able to: (1) align the residential college model with priorities identified by the Association of American Colleges & Universities (AAC&U); (2) identify marketing messages that resonate with key stakeholders for large, public institutions; and (3) discuss specific strategies for expanding the breadth of support for the residential college model.
- Assessing the Role of Cyberbiosecurity in Agriculture: A Case StudyDrape, Tiffany A.; Magerkorth, Noah; Sen, Anuradha; Simpson, Joseph; Seibel, Megan M.; Murch, Randall Steven; Duncan, Susan E. (Frontiers, 2021-08-19)Agriculture has adopted the use of smart technology to help meet growing food demands. This increased automation and associated connectivity increases the risk of farms being targeted by cyber-attacks. Increasing frequency of cybersecurity breaches in many industries illustrates the need for securing our food supply chain. The uniqueness of biological data, the complexity of integration across the food and agricultural system, and the importance of this system to the U.S. bioeconomy and public welfare suggests an urgency as well as unique challenges that are not common across all industries. To identify and address the gaps in awareness and knowledge as well as encourage collaborations, Virginia Tech hosted a virtual workshop consisting of professionals from agriculture, cybersecurity, government, and academia. During the workshop, thought leaders and influencers discussed 1) common food and agricultural system challenges, scenarios, outcomes and risks to various sectors of the system; 2) cyberbiosecurity strategies for the system, gaps in workforce and training, and research and policy needs. The meeting sessions were transcribed and analyzed using qualitative methodology. The most common themes that emerged were challenges, solutions, viewpoints, common vocabulary. From the results of the analysis, it is evident that none of the participating groups had available cybersecurity training and resources. Participants were uncertain about future pathways for training, implementation, and outreach related to cyberbiosecurity. Recommendations include creating training and education, continued interdisciplinary collaboration, and recruiting government involvement to speed up better security practices related to cyberbiosecurity.
- Balancing the Work / Life Equation: Enjoying the Merits of a Marginal LifeKaufman, Eric K. (2019-02-19)Guest lecture for ALCE 4044.
- Balancing the Work / Life Equation: Loving Who You Are and Who You Are WithKaufman, Eric K. (2017-02-01)Presentation for the ALCE Graduate Student assembly.
- Better meetings through guerilla facilitation and humble inquiryI survived another meeting that should have been an email. You too?!? If you are tired of meetings that are simply reporting sessions or, worse yet, seem to have no point at all, this workshop is for you. We will apply Ed Schein's wisdom of "humble inquiry" to meeting planning and facilitation. While this session will explore considerations with simple strategies, like purpose-driven meeting agendas, we will also tackle the challenge of keeping a meeting on track when someone else is in charge.
- Boundary politics and the social imaginary for sustainable food systemsNiewolny, Kimberly L. (2021-05-02)In this essay, Kim Niewolny, current President of AFHVS, responds to the 2020 AFHVS Presidential Address given by Molly Anderson. Niewolny is encouraged by Anderson's message of moving "beyond the boundaries" by focusing our gaze on the insurmountable un-sustainability of the globalized food system. Anderson recommends three ways forward to address current challenges. Niewolny argues that building solidarity with social justice movements and engendering anti-racist praxis take precedence. This work includes but is not limited to dismantling the predominance of neoliberal-fueled technocratic productivism in agricultural science and policy while firmly centering civil society collective action and human rights frameworks as our guiding imaginary for racial, gender, environmental, and climate justice possibilities for sustainable food systems praxis. She concludes by exploring the epistemic assertion to push beyond our professional and political imaginaries to build a more fair, just, and humanizing food system.
- Brain-based learning: A synthesis of researchBellah, Kimberly; Robinson, J. Shane; Kaufman, Eric K.; Akers, Cindy; Haase-Wittler, Penny; Martindale, Lynn (North American Colleges and Teachers of Agriculture, 2008-06-01)The purpose of this study was to synthesize research as it relates to brain-based learning and its relevance to the agricultural education profession. Through a comprehensive literature review, brainbased studies were analyzed to create a historical timeline of the discipline, investigate teaching principles, articulate relevance, and identify potential future implications for agricultural education. The holistic approach to learning in agricultural education programs presents a ripe environment for action research with brain-based learning practices. Professional development with agricultural educators may be needed to further encourage and support comprehensive studies that investigate the precepts of brain-based learning.
- Building a Leader-Follower Culture: The Nexus Between Transformational Leadership and Effective Followership BehaviorsAlegbeleye, Ibukun Dami; Kaufman, Eric K. (Association of Leadership Educators, 2019-07-08)Leadership scholars have often used the catchphrase ‘he who must be a good leader must first be a good follower’ to a great extent, and in so doing, have suggested a positive relationship between leadership and followership behaviors. This assumption remains untested. In this session, we will present findings from 100 middle managers across the US.
- Building leaders using centers for instructional leadership: Coaching model provides support for allSchiavino-Narvaez, Beth; Kaufman, Eric K.; Schuermann, Patrick J.; Cannon, Mark D. (National Association of Secondary School Principals, 2020-04-01)
- Coaching for Improvement: Developing the DoDEA Coaching ModelKaufman, Eric K.; Schuermann, Patrick J.; Cannon, Mark; Coartney, Jama S.; Mitra, Shreya; Anderson, James (2019-07-09)The International Coach Federation defines coaching as “partnering with clients in a thought provoking and creative process that inspires them to maximize their personal and professional potential.” While the concept of coaching is nothing new, it is gaining ground in new settings, including educational leadership. As a practical illustration, we highlight the transformative approach of Department of Defense Education Activity (DoDEA) towards restructuring its worldwide school system. DoDEA’s approach included formation of Centers for Instructional Leadership, and the work of those centers depends upon effective coaching. This paper describes the professional learning that contributed to emergence of the DoDEA Coaching Model.