Essays on the College of Agriculture's History

A 20-Year Agricultural Education Outreach Initiative: Transferring Science and Technology to Iowa Schools

By Eldon Weber and David Williams, agricultural education and studies

Editor’s note:
Eldon Weber served Iowa State University for 14 years working with both the agricultural education and studies department and the agronomy department from 1987-2001.

David Williams spent 27 years at Iowa State University serving as a faculty member and department head of the agricultural education and studies department and secondary education program.

Williams and Weber write about the partnership formed between Iowa State and the United States Soil Conservation Service that would provide new materials and information regarding soil conservation to high school teachers and students.

Mutual goals of the U. S. Soil Conservation Service (SCS, now called U. S. Natural Resources Conservation Service) and the Department of Agricultural Education and Studies resulted in a long-term Iowa State University outreach initiative.

The Food Security Act (Farm Bill) of 1985 included provisions that would have denied federal farm payments to landowners who crop highly erodible lands without an active conservation plan, and SCS was looking for help in providing related education. One alternative in Iowa was to include conservation planning in the high school agricultural education curriculum with transfer of the information from students to their parents. With the department’s goal of helping improve high school programs through curriculum materials development and teacher update, a partnership was formed with SCS. Eldon Weber, an SCS employee at the time, was stationed at Iowa State to work with David Williams, department head of agricultural education and studies at the time, in developing a conservation education program that focused on transferring science and technology to Iowa schools. In 1987, Weber joined the department faculty as an affiliated instructor to coordinate the program.

The program was not only guided by mutual goals of ISU and SCS, but also assisted in implementing the educational provisions of the 1987 Iowa Groundwater Protection Act (IGPA). We also provided leadership in partnering with a number of other agencies to enhance education related to soil and water conservation and protection. Other partners included: Iowa Department of Natural Resources, Iowa Department of Education, Iowa FFA, Iowa Association of Soil and Water Conservation District Commissioners, Leopold Center, National Soil Tilth Laboratory, Monsanto, Iowa Farm Bureau Federation, Iowa Soybean Association, Junior Achievement of Central Iowa, Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship, Pioneer Hi Bred International, Happy Joe's Pizza and Quaker Oats. Weber served as coordinator for the "1997 Year of Water" program, recognizing the 10th anniversary of IGPA. 

Our goal was to get new materials and new content into the school curriculum; thus, transferring information to a new generation of people so they can more readily deal with some of the issues facing society, including sustainable agriculture. Educational materials developed and teacher updates that were conducted impacted the curriculum in many schools in Iowa and other states.

Educational tools such as a computer program titled “Sustainable Agriculture Manager” and a groundwater flow model have been widely used. Student-centered educational approaches made the curriculum come alive and helped to get students interested in science and technology. For example, the students could use the groundwater flow model to learn how water moves within the soil and how it can become polluted. After such learning, student could use the model in demonstrating groundwater concepts through FFA activities to inform others in the community.

Educational materials on soil biology also were developed, helping students understand the makeup of the soil and appreciate it as living matter. Teaching sustainable agriculture facilitated concurrent learning about economic, environmental and social aspects that provided a multidisciplinary approach to learning that parallel emerging developments in the agricultural industry.

A recent outgrowth of this program was the ISUGlobal Pizz-A-Thon Program, which links K-12 students with the food and fiber industry. It’s a cross-disciplinary program, adapted to a wide range of student achievement levels and provides for cross-disciplinary teaching in science, math, art, language arts, health, family and consumer science, natural resources and agriculture. Students learn while doing hands-on activities and having fun. In the classroom, teams of students develop the best pizza for the future, trace ingredients back to their origin (farm, greenhouse, soil), experiment in growing seeds in topsoil compared to subsoil and develop marketing reports to sell their product. In team competition between schools, students learn where their food comes from and the many careers available in the food and fiber industry. This agriculture literacy educational program continues today in some Iowa and Illinois elementary schools. The program was originally initiated with funding from the ISU Vision 2020 Program.

This 20-year outreach initiative has helped to integrated content related to soil and water conservation into the curriculum of Iowa schools, facilitated the transfer of science and technology to Iowa schools, expanded the teaching of sustainable agriculture in the high school agricultural education curriculum, provided a hands-on agricultural literacy program to help students better appreciate the food and fiber industry and encouraged multi-disciplinary learning in the schools.

The project also impacted teaching and learning in the agricultural education and studies department by providing up-to-date content for courses and involving undergraduate and graduate students in helping to conduct outreach activities. It also facilitated faculty and graduate students’ research related to soil and water conservation and sustainable agriculture education.

Even though we have retired from ISU, the impact of this outreach initiative can still be found in Iowa schools, and hopefully in the lives of people as they deal with issues facing agriculture.

College of Agriculture and Life Sciences
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