Factors related to the attitude toward the FFA of eastern region secondary agricultural teachers

The purpose of the study was to determine the attitude of eastern region secondary agricultural teachers toward the Future Farmers of America (FFA) and the relationship of selected factors to that attitude. To accomplish this purpose the following factors were examined: (a) years of vocational agriculture teaching experience; (b) number of teachers in the vocational agriculture department; (c) length of the annual teaching contract; (d) area of primary teaching assignment; (e) previous length of active FFA/NFA membership; (f) highest educational level attained; (g) undergraduate college degree major; (h) number of duties performed; and (i) location of the school community (rural or urban/suburban).

The population for the study consisted of 2,966 agricultural teachers who were employed in the FFA Eastern Region during the 1978-79 school year. A modified stratified random sampling technique was used to select a sample of 425 teachers for the study. Three hundred and seven (72.23 percent) of the teachers in the sample responded to the survey instrument.

The two-section instrument used in the study was developed by the researcher. The first section of the instrument consisted of ten questions designed to obtain personal and departmental information about the respondents. The second part of the instrument consisted of 37 attitudinal statements which were developed from information obtained from vocational agriculture teachers, a review of the literature, and the FFA aims and purposes. Each statement had six Likert-Scale type choices. Respondents were instructed to circle the response which corresponded the closest to their true feelings.

The Pearson product-moment correlation and the Chi-square test of independence were used to determine if a relationship existed between the variables selected for the study and the agricultural teachers' attitude toward the FFA. A significant relationship was found between the agricultural teachers' attitude toward the FFA and the number of years of agricultural teaching experience, the location of the school community, the length of agricultural teachers' contract, the previous length of agricultural teachers' active FFA/NFA membership, and the agricultural teachers' undergraduate college degree major. It was concluded that based on the scores obtained on the FFAA attitudinal Scale, the agricultural teachers of the FFA Eastern Region had a positive attitude toward the FFA.