Scholarly Works, Agricultural, Leadership, and Community Education

Permanent URI for this collection

Research articles, presentations, and other scholarship

Browse

Recent Submissions

Now showing 1 - 20 of 368
  • The Forgotten Half of Team Science: Elevating Followership for Scientific Collaboration and Innovation
    Kaufman, Eric K. (International Network for the Science of Team Science (INSciTS), 2025-07-29)
    Scientific progress thrives on effective collaboration, yet much of the focus in team science remains on leadership, often overlooking the essential role of followership. This presentation will explore the critical yet underappreciated function of followership in team science, arguing that successful research collaborations require not only effective leadership but also engaged, adaptive, and proactive followership. The traditional paradigm of team science emphasizes principal investigators and research leads, positioning leadership as the primary driver of collaboration. However, emerging research suggests that followership is equally vital in shaping team dynamics, facilitating knowledge integration, and ensuring that collaborative efforts translate into meaningful scientific advancements. Followership is not a passive role but an active process of engagement, influencing team cohesion, research productivity, and innovation. Drawing from insights in followership theory, we will discuss key dimensions of followership, including co-creation, adaptability, and accountability—qualities that contribute to a team’s ability to navigate complex research environments. We will also explore the Möbius Strip metaphor, which depicts leadership and followership as fluid and interconnected rather than hierarchical, providing a more accurate representation of team science dynamics. This perspective shifts the conversation from an outdated leader-follower dichotomy to a more nuanced understanding of collaborative agency. Additionally, findings from recent studies suggest that strong followership is directly linked to improved knowledge sharing, conflict resolution, and shared decision-making in research teams. Yet, most training programs and institutional policies focus exclusively on leadership development, neglecting the equally important need to cultivate effective followership. By shifting this imbalance, institutions and funding agencies can foster a more holistic approach to team science training and capacity-building. The session will present three key strategies for integrating followership into team science frameworks: (1) Followership Training – Offering structured training modules that equip team members with the skills to engage in constructive dissent, support collaborative leadership, and take initiative in research processes. (2) Recognition and Reward Systems – Encouraging research institutions and funding agencies to recognize and incentivize followership contributions, through mentorship, collaboration, and cross-disciplinary integration. (3) Cultural Shift in Team Science – Promoting an organizational culture that values reciprocal leader-follower dynamics, enabling teams to harness the full potential of collective intelligence. In conclusion, advancing team science requires more than effective leadership—it demands a redefinition of what it means to contribute to scientific collaboration. Followership, when understood and cultivated, serves as the backbone of successful research teams. By fostering strong followership alongside leadership, the scientific community can unlock new levels of collaboration, creativity, and impact. This session aims to bridge the gap in current discourse, advocating for a model of team science that fully acknowledges and supports followership as a core component of research success.
  • A Closer Look at the End of Leadership: A Digital Followership Collection for Leadership Education
    Kaufman, Eric K.; Oyedare, Israel; Haugen, Inga (2025-07-15)
    Undoubtedly, the field of leadership has experienced a significant shift in recent years. As followership studies and research gain increasing attention, there is a growing call to prepare for its continued development. Thus, Virginia Tech, through a mini-grant and two years of research, is building a digital followership collection with the goal of supporting and advancing the field. This session will introduce participants to the platform, share its potential benefits across contexts, and demonstrate how artificial intelligence interfaces with the digital followership collection.
  • Building Leadership Capacity: Digital Badges as a Tool for Workforce Development
    Kaufman, Eric K.; Coartney, Jama S.; Westfall-Rudd, Donna M.; Seibel, Megan M.; Friedel, Curtis R.; Carmichael, Celeste; White, Amy; Oyedare, Israel (2025-07-13)
    Leadership education is evolving to meet the demands of an increasingly complex workforce. Digital badging presents an innovative approach to recognizing and assessing leadership competencies, providing students with verifiable credentials that demonstrate their readiness for professional roles. The Agriculture Workforce Training for Collaborative Leadership (AWT4CL) project has designed a digital badging system to enhance students’ employability skills in alignment with the competencies identified by the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities (APLU). These badges focus on key areas such as communication, decision-making, professionalism, and leadership. The AWT4CL badge structure integrates interactive learning activities with reflective assessments, equipping students with durable skills essential for career success. This poster will highlight the digital badge framework, share insights from pilot implementations with community college faculty, and discuss strategies for increasing industry recognition of these credentials. By engaging educators, administrators, and industry partners, this initiative aims to bridge the skills gap and support workforce readiness in agricultural careers.
  • Collaborative Leadership for Poverty Reduction: How Does It Work?
    Poudel, Sonika; Kaufman, Eric K. (2025-07-15)
    Despite national efforts to address poverty, it remains a significant challenge in the United States. This study focuses on leadership strategies employed by civic organizations in a state in the southeastern United States to address poverty. Using a qualitative approach, the research explores how leadership influences poverty reduction. It studies the systemic barriers, organizational dynamics, and leadership approaches that can be most effective in addressing poverty within a state in the southeastern United States. Interviews with 14 representatives from various civic organizations reveal three key themes: poverty as a systemic challenge, participatory leadership, and humble leadership as a way forward. Findings suggest that effective poverty reduction requires collaborative efforts, active listening, selflessness, empathy, and community-driven leadership. These insights contribute to understanding how leadership can be leveraged to address complex social issues of poverty and provide a framework for applying these strategies in similar contexts.
  • Team Science: Fostering Collaboration Among Difference
    Kaufman, Eric K. (2025-06-30)
    Presentation for faculty collaboration workshop with the Tulane National Primate Research Center (TNPRC). Invited by Dr. Woong-Ki Kim, Associate Director for Research at TNPRC.
  • Leadership Strengths Escape Room [2025 Virginia 4-H Congress]
    Kaufman, Eric K.; Oyedare, Israel (2025-06-26)
    Leadership requires collective problem-solving, leveraging the potential of individuals’ strengths. This workshop will introduce participants to the strengths-based leadership framework and allow them to experience the concepts through an escape room activity. Participants must crack codes and solve puzzles to successfully access a lockbox of prizes. Get ready; the clock is ticking!
  • Storying the FEW Nexus: A Framework for Cultivating Place-Based Integrated STEM Education in Rural Schools
    Scherer, Hannah H.; Azano, Amy Price (MDPI, 2025-06-13)
    When education in STEM, social science, and the humanities are disconnected from each other and from place, it is inauthentic and nonresponsive to the lived experiences of people and communities. In rural spaces, the Food–Energy–Water (FEW) Nexus, a framework for problem solving and decision-making around these central resources, is salient because of the concentration of FEW resource production and extraction present. Storying the FEW Nexus is an interdisciplinary pedagogical framework that is theoretically rooted in a critical pedagogy of place and socio-ecological systems. Storying the FEW Nexus brings together these two related but distinct frameworks, calling attention to the need for relevant, place-based, and rural-focused narratives within STEM instruction. Developed for K-12 learners in rural places, Storying the FEW Nexus positions STEM knowledge and skills as resources that, alongside local narratives, are vital to the sustainability and viability of communities with unique and intertwined environmental justice histories and current realities. The FEW Nexus is leveraged to support rural learners in developing sustainable solutions to local socio-ecological systems issues. In this conceptual paper, we review the literature base supporting this integrated approach, describe the framework within the context of these aims, and make suggestions for researchers and practitioners.
  • Boosting Workforce Readiness: Employability Skills Through Digital Learning Badges
    Coartney, Jama S.; Kaufman, Eric K.; Westfall-Rudd, Donna M.; Seibel, Megan M.; Friedel, Curtis R.; White, Amy; Carmichael, Celeste (North American Colleges and Teachers of Agriculture (NACTA), 2025-06-03)
    In an evolving agricultural industry, students must be equipped with critical professional and employability skills to thrive in the modern workforce. The Agriculture Workforce Training for Collaborative Leadership (AWT4CL) project has developed a suite of digital learning badges to help students build competencies in these essential areas. The badges are grounded in research from the Association of Public and Land Grant Universities (APLU), which identified 11 key employability skills with significant gaps in workforce readiness. By earning badges such as “Communicate Effectively,” “Analyze Problems,” and “Navigate Change and Ambiguity,” learners are better positioned to meet employer expectations. Each badge requires learners to meet specific learning outcomes through practical application and reflection. The two-part learning modules involve both an interactive activity and a written reflection. The modules are flexible, allowing instructors to adjust specific activities to meet the needs of their course or program while upholding the core badge objectives. Early adopters of the AWT4CL badging system have noted that digital learning badges can help students recognize the value of life experiences. One faculty member noted the gamification used in combination with reflective practice helps students look for real-life experiences that exemplify what they are learning in the classroom. The idea of bridging experiences and acknowledging the reflections with a badge helps students gain confidence, build competence, and recognize workforce skills development. This conference presentation will introduce attendees to these digital learning badges, designed to promote critical skills such as communication, decision-making, leadership, and professionalism. The presentation will address how instructors can integrate these badges into curricula using game-based learning approaches to foster student engagement and skill development. Educators can adopt this freely available tool to improve student workforce readiness, increasing their awareness of professional competencies critical to success in agricultural careers.
  • Engaging Stakeholders Through Inquiry, Story, & Presence [DSPG 2025]
    Kaufman, Eric K. (2025-06-23)
    Workshop for summer interns with Virginia Tech's Data Science for the Public Good Program.
  • Investigating the Perceived Link Between Intercultural Mentoring and Cultural Competence Among Graduate Students and Faculty
    Adebayo, Bolanle; Sunderman, Hannah M. (Wiley, 2025-06)
    Intercultural mentoring relationships, which are increasing in higher education, require cultural competence to be effective and successful. Therefore, the current study focused on perceptions of cultural competence and intercultural mentoring effectiveness among graduate students and faculty in departments of Agricultural Leadership, Communication, Education, and Extension (ALCEE) and leadership educators in the United States. Using an online survey, 32 participants shared their perceptions of mentoring effectiveness and cultural competence. The findings from the thematic analysis revealed a perception of intercultural mentoring as aiding the development of cultural competence by providing an experiential learning platform where participants learned intercultural relationship skills (e.g., how to deal with cultural differences). In addition, lessons learned through intercultural mentoring were perceived as transferable to other intercultural relationships. Our findings inform specific recommendations for intercultural mentoring training.
  • Elements of Leadership: Considerations for "Citizenship"
    Kaufman, Eric K. (2025-06-07)
    Opening seminar for 2025 TYIL Fellowship Program, an an initiative of the Teens and Youths in Leadership (TYIL) in Nigeria.
  • How Do We Retain and Promote Followership Scholarship and Discourse? Opportunities with a Digital Followership Collection
    Oyedare, Israel; Kaufman, Eric K. (2025-05-29)
    While followership research is increasingly becoming popular, its literature is thinly dispersed, making it difficult to find. Thus, Virginia Tech, through a mini-grant and two years of research, is building a digital followership collection with the goal of supporting and advancing the field. This session will introduce participants to the platform, share its potential benefits across contexts, and demonstrate the prospect of artificial intelligence for sustaining the field of followership.
  • Everyday Followership: How We Lead by Following in Life’s Most Personal Arenas
    Kaufman, Eric K. (2025-05-30)
    Followership is often framed in workplace and organizational contexts, but its impact extends far beyond professional settings. This facilitated session explores followership in deeply personal aspects of life, including healthcare, fitness, religion, and civic engagement. Participants will engage in discussions about how individuals navigate power, responsibility, and decision-making as followers in these areas. The session will examine how effective followership contributes to well-being, ethical decision-making, and social cohesion. Through interactive exercises and shared experiences, attendees will identify strategies for enhancing their followership in ways that support personal growth and community development.
  • The Role of Leadership in Poverty Reduction: What Works?
    Poudel, Sonika; Kaufman, Eric K. (American Assocaition for Agricultural Education, 2025-05-22)
    Leadership plays a crucial role in addressing poverty and promoting sustainable development (Chanda & Chitondo, 2024). Collective leadership can strengthen community resilience and enhance organizational performance (Arkedis et al., 2023). Through this research, we have identified the leadership characteristics and strategies that can be most effective in tackling the system of poverty. In our research, humble leadership stands out as an important leadership framework in poverty reduction efforts. Humble leadership has been found to build trust between leaders and their followers in an organizational setting (Cho et al., 2021). Our research emphasizes how it can be leveraged by the organizations and leaders working to address poverty
  • Building the future: A practice-based approach to youth leadership development
    Oyedare, Israel; Kaufman, Eric K.; Council, Austin (Emerald, 2025-05-06)
    Purpose: While leadership is a popular field of research and practice, there is a need for more studies emphasizing youth leadership development. The importance of youth leadership development in solving complex societal and organizational problems cannot be overemphasized. The purpose of this teaching tool is, first, to contribute to the field of youth leadership development. Secondly, gleaning from nonprofit work in Africa, this article aims to explore emerging leadership education approaches for developing young leaders. Design/methodology/approach: This research maximizes a recent evaluation of the Teens and Youth in Leadership (TYIL) Fellowship program, conducted using a focus group interview with previous participants and assessing the impact and relevance of TYIL’s model for the leadership development among youth. Findings: Participants believed that the model adopted by the TYIL Fellowship for youth leadership development is relevant for their personal leadership successes and can be adopted by other youth leadership programs. Originality/value: The featured program is novel, with potential for broad application. Youth program leaders, faculty members and practitioners can utilize this teaching tool research for developing young leaders in their various contexts.
  • Exploring the Applicability of KAI in Evalpreneurship: A Pilot Study with Evaluation Consultants and Evalpreneurs
    Uwitonze, Nicolas; Archibald, Thomas G.; Friedel, Curtis R. (2025-04-07)
    As a pilot study contributing to a dissertation study, this poster explored the applicability of Kirton’s A-I in evalpreneurship with Intention2Impact (I2I)’s, where a purposive sample from I2I's evalpreneurs (owners or co-owners of evaluation business) and their team of 4 evaluation consultants were select for this pilot study. This qualitative pilot study informed by quantitative data (demographic survey and KAI data) took place during the Summer & Fall of 2024 and explored the preferred problem-solving styles and how preferred & coping behaviors are evidenced in their evaluation consulting practice.
  • Strengthening the Voice: A Program for Local Farm Bureau Leaders
    Carter, Hannah S.; Kaufman, Eric K.; Rudd, Rick D. (2007-07-12)
  • Got Followership? Rethinking Leadership from the Other Side
    Kaufman, Eric K. (2025-03-04)
    90-second presentation for Virginia Tech's 2025 Faculty Nutshell Talks.
  • Courageous Followership Amid Uncertainty
    Kaufman, Eric K.; Oyedare, Israel; Olowoyo, Olamide (2025-03-25)
    Guest lecture on courageous followership for Virginia Tech's undergraduate course on "Toxic Leadership." Guiding Questions: How do we view leadership? What are the priorities with followership? When might courage be necessary?
  • Am I maintaining, reforming, or transforming the status quo? Exploring the role of followership in leading change
    Oyedare, Israel; Kaufman, Eric K. (2025-02-14)
    This paper aims to uncover emerging followership discourses and themes. Additionally, this study examines how current and historic trends have shaped the direction of followership research and studies. The research utilizes the World Café approach in collecting data from participants of three professional conferences: the Global Followership Conference, the Association of Leadership Educators conference, and the International Leadership Association global conference. Artifacts from the sessions were analyzed thematically by manual sorting. The findings reveal three followership discourses — Maintaining, Reframing, and Transforming discourses. Furthermore, the study highlights the influence of social media, the COVID-19 pandemic, power relations, etc. on followership discourses. The fluid and dynamic nature of World Café increases the risk of different interpretations and misconstruals of participants’ contributions. Further research is needed to confirm the findings and advance the understanding of followership discourses. This paper will be beneficial to scholars and practitioners who are seeking understanding on how to build, recognize and appreciate a followership culture within their environment, including management development and related educational programs. This study adopts the World Café approach, an unconventional qualitative data collection method for followership research and studies, highlighting its potential within participatory research. Additionally, the research presents a novel effort to explore the influence of historical and current trends in followership discourses.