Some thoughts on teaching
September 28, 2015 jgerber123	Leave a comment
I believe a university education should prepare a student for both life and livelihood. My work is to create an educational environment in which students may acquire information, knowledge and wisdom toward this end. In addition to gaining basic subject matter knowledge, students in my courses are guided to clarify their core values, individually and collectively, and to examine their behavior in the context of these values. In this process students are challenged to discover their place as citizens of the world, by constructing a sense of self beyond the individual-self to include the family-self, community-self, and global-self. This approach seems to have made these courses attractive to many students who struggle to find personal meaning in their lives, their studies, and their intended careers.
I believe university education should be transformational. That is, education should not only provide a means to a career Continue reading Some thoughts on teaching →
A Declaration of Values – to guide our work as academics
May 10, 2015 jgerber123	Leave a comment
How often are those of us at the public university told that science must be “value-free”….. that is objective and impartial? I disagree…..
Rather, I suggest that we need to clarify the values that drive our work and make them transparent to the public. In fact, the so-called “value-free” university must be more influenced by values, public values such as; truth over objectivity, public service over selfishness, scholarship over politics, and compassion over competition. This blog presents a set of values and a belief Continue reading A Declaration of Values – to guide our work as academics →
Dialogue Education has come to Academia
March 22, 2015 jgerber123	Leave a comment
Re-posted from Global Learning Partners with permission of the author
Dr. Daniel S. Gerber, Associate Dean for Academic Affairs, School of Public Health and Health Sciences, University of Massachusetts, Amherst MA
At a recent visit to have dinner with my mentor and friend Dr. Jane Vella I said, “Dialogue Education has come to academia.” In my experience, Adult Learning Theory which includes Dialogue Education, has become the premier pedagogy in Higher Education. I asked, “Why else would UMass, Amherst recently build a new academic teaching building at the cost of one hundred and ten million dollars with mostly team-based learning classrooms?” These are classrooms, housed with ten to fifteen round tables and nine chairs at each table, where students work cooperatively – learning the material by problem-solving and participating in other student-centered active learning projects. At this point Karen Ridout, who came by Jane’s house to meet me, said, “Dan, would you be willing to write a blog about this?” I said “Sure”, thinking I have never written a blog before and I don’t have a clue as to the format. But, I am certainly willing to put my thoughts on paper.
I think the first thing I should do is introduce myself. I am Dr. Dan Gerber, ED.D., MPH, currently the Academic Dean in the Continue reading Dialogue Education has come to Academia →
Local Food Systems, Sustainability Education
Where will the agricultural college graduates work?
January 6, 2015 jgerber123	57 Comments
One of my most popular blog po sts has been “Sustainable agriculture jobs after college?” In this next essay, I share a few thoughts about the jobs situation in sustainable agriculture – based on my experience working with young women and men graduating college. My conclusion is that while there is much work that needs to be done, well-paying, meaningful “lifetime career” jobs that offer a sense of security are hard to find. It may be that getting hired for a lifetime job is an unrealistic expectation for recent college grads in our emerging “on-demand” economy. But that realization might be an opportunity!
Now, might be the time for young people to pursue their vision for a more just and equitable food system, driven by passion and grounded in pragmatism. This might be the time for more food and farming entrepreneurs to lead us to a sustainable food system.
A national news story about Sustainable Food Jobs for example, provides an outline of the many emerging opportunities in this area. Among the areas highlighted were:
Local and regional farming and marketing
Restaurants and food services
Law and public policy
Public health and nutrition
Advocacy and community development
Teaching – especially community-based education
Many of the students who have graduated from the UMass Bachelor of Sciences program in Sustainable Food and Farming and are doing well have created their own new work, rather than “landed a job” in the traditional sense. I encourage graduating seniors to search the job boards online, but mostly as a way of creating a vision or coming up with a new idea for a business or service that nobody has ever thought of before! A brainstorming session in one of my classes came up with a serious, lighthearted, earnest, and ingenious list of future jobs that included; permaculture consultants, rickshaw drivers, herbal landscapers, wood mill operators, biodiesel processors, vermiculturists, urban rooftop gardeners, microlenders, witch doctors, AAA bicycle workers, compost toilet janitors, alternate transport specialists, population controllers, seed bank managers, urban wildcrafters…
I try to be honest with students when they first arrive at UMass to study Sustainable Continue reading Where will the agricultural college graduates work? →
As the University of Massachusetts celebrates its 150th year (the “sesquicentennial” – a word I can’t pronounce) there have been speeches and events and lots of discussion about our heritage as a land grant university. This seems to me to be “all good.”
We recently had a groundbreaking ceremony establishing a new Agricultural Learning Center for example, within walking distance of the dorms and classrooms of campus, with the intention of providing students experience growing their own food. There are lots of changes at “Mass Aggie” of late!
Again…. all good!
And yet, I wonder how many faculty, students and administrators are truly committed (or even understand) our land grant heritage. This post explores our heritage and the commitment of the public land grant university to serve its public mission.
First, “land grant” is not about land….. or at least, not in the way that many people associate the words “land grant” with farming. While it is true that most of the original land grant universities were committed to scientific education for rural America and therefore developed agricultural research and education programs, “land grant” in fact, refers to the means of funding those universities. Grants of federal land (mostly in the western United States), were made available to each state to sell in order to establish the first public colleges, the University of Vermont, and Kansas State University (which was the first public university established under the Morrill Act of 1862), and the University of Massachusetts.
According to the UMass webpage…. “UMass Amherst was born in 1863 as a land-grant agricultural college set on 310 rural acres with four faculty members, four wooden buildings, 56 students and a curriculum combining modern farming, science, technical courses, and liberal arts.”
Agriculture was indeed important to these public universities, primarily because while the urban areas of the nation were experiencing rapid growth and the beginning of prosperity, the rural areas were being left behind. As a service to the larger public good, universities were established to help those in most need…. who happened to live in rural America and of course earned their livelihood farming.
Today, if we celebrate our land grant heritage as a commitment to farming, we are missing a deeper understanding of the mission of the public university to serve the public good (including farming, of course). My concern is that after all of the celebrations of our agricultural heritage are over, the general public may be left with a question – so why are we still investing in a public university if their mission is to serve such a small percentage of the population (the farming community)?
Please don’t get me wrong….. I think it is important for the university to be proud of its heritage and continue to support agricultural research and education. But I think the rationale for this support must be deeper than nostalgia for a time gone by.
We must recommit to serving the public good and in doing so continue to grow 21st century agricultural programs focused on the three sustainability objectives of economic vitality, environmental integrity, and social equity. It is only by clearly articulating a commitment to a more sustainable agriculture that we may continue to expect public support!
There are many forms of agriculture in the world. The dominant form is “industrial” in the sense that it is economically efficient and highly technical, and leaks toxins from their point of application, uses natural resources such as fossil fuel and water at rates greater than replacement, puts farmers and ranchers off the land, and results in an overfed but poorly nourished citizenry. I believe we must be clear with the citizens of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts that this is NOT the sort of agriculture we support at the land grant university.
This is about the public good!
A clear understanding of how the land grant organization serves American citizens, those today and those yet to be born, is key to the future of the institution. Most people agree that the system has an obligation to serve the public. But we have difficulty talking about “who is the public ‑‑ and what is the public good?”
Many of our research and education programs are designed not to serve “the public” but to serve particular publics, or special interest groups. I propose that there are interests, common to all people which we might call “basic human needs” such as:
affordable and nutritionally adequate food;
adequate clothing and shelter;
a healthy, livable environment free of violence;
opportunities to provide for one’s livelihood; and
accessible educational opportunities.
Our teaching, research and outreach should serve these larger public goods by working with the farmers, consumers and communities dedicated to building a more local food production and distribution system. This is truly “public work” and is consistent with a commitment to a more sustainable agriculture.
Students seem to have noticed the change at the University of Massachusetts, as the enrollment in our Sustainable Food and Farming major has grown from 5 students in 2013 to about 85 today. Things are changing at UMass, and I’m hopeful that our commitment to our public mission will be sustained.
It’s that time at universities when faculty have the privilege of meeting the families of students we have known for several years. It’s a time of celebration, transition, and that “dreaded” question from family members….. “so now that you have a college degree, what are you planning to do with it?” The implication of course, is that the primary purpose of a college degree is for “job preparation.”
As a parent of a recent college grad, I can certainly relate to the relief (the kid finished!) and the anxiety (now what?) that parents experience. Most of us parents with recent grads are smart enough not to ask the “now what” question on graduation day. We know that we will have other opportunities to explore this sensitive issue, especially since most college grads end up living back home for a while. It is often the uncles and aunts (who don’t see the grad very often) who ask the dreaded question. This can be a moment of tension and awkwardness, since most graduates really don’t know!
The “now what” question is especially difficult for my students. I am the faculty adviser for the Sustainable Food and Farming major at the University of Massachusetts. My students feel called to grow food or be involved in some aspect of the local and regional food system, but often have not yet clearly identified a particular career. Our recent graduates generally find themselves working on local farms, managing community markets, or interning with non-profit advocacy or community development organizations, while they explore opportunities in the local food system (here are a few examples). It can be rich and rewarding work – but really difficult to explain to “Uncle Robert and Aunt Sue.”
Inevitably, when Uncle Robert learns that our student transferred from her original major of Biology or Environmental Science into Sustainable Food and Farming, he will look at the graduate with a confused look on his face, and say something like “so you want to be a farmer?” After a short pause, he then says “Can you make any money doing that?” And finally, “isn’t farming hard work?”
Of course, this uncomfortable experience is not unique to agriculture majors. Any recent graduate who is not a business major or pre-med may be able to relate.
“So you want to be an anthropologist? ….a writer? ….a community organizer? ….an artist? ….a philosopher?” — “Can you make any money doing that?”
Many people have a relatively shallow understanding of the purpose of higher education. Certainly we should expect college to prepare students to be employable. But we should expect much more from a college education than simply to be prepared for an entry level job in some corporation or business. College should help prepare students for both a livelihood AND a rich and satisfying life.
The questions, “what will you do with your college degree?” and “can you make any money doing that?” are the wrong questions to ask a recent grad. While certainly understandable, a thoughtful uncle or aunt might consider trying to start a more meaningful conversation with a different question. Here is the one I suggest…
“So, how do you plan to be of service to your friends, family and community or perhaps the larger world?”
Yes, I suggest Uncle Robert ask his big question not about career or money but about service. There is plenty of sociological research, native wisdom, and just plain common sense that support the basic fact that people who live for service have more fulfilling lives than those who live their lives to accumulate consumer goods. This is such a fundamental truth of human existence that the bible quote (Timothy 6:10) “the love of money is the root of all evil” is a cliche. We all know this to be true, yet Uncle Robert still feels compelled to ask “any money in that field?”
So I ask all the “uncles and aunts” and other family members of recent grads to please try to “raise the bar” and challenge the recent grad to be more than just a money earner. This is your chance to join Plato and Aristotle (really) in placing the human experience within a larger context, which the ancients called The Great Chain of Being. The chain starts with the divine (God) and progresses downward to the angels, stars, moon, kings, princes, nobles, humans, wild animals, domesticated animals, trees, other plants, precious stones, precious metals, and other minerals. Get it? — This 16th century picture depicts the Great Chain.
Today we understand that The Great Chain of Being as a rough approximation of a natural hierarchy (which I’ve written about here earlier). The lesson we can take from this powerful visual metaphor that goes back over 2500 years is that all aspects of the universe are interrelated in a specific way. The short version of the interrelationship rule is “we look up for purpose and down for function.”
That is, the “lower” levels find purpose in the “higher” levels of the hierarchy – but the “higher” levels are dependent on the “lower” levels for function. As a human, I look for function at the “lower” levels (animals, trees, other plants, precious stones, precious metals, and other minerals). AND (this is the critical lesson)….. as a human, I look for purpose and meaning in my life at levels of complexity “greater than myself.” That might be in friendships, family, community, Mother Nature, or perhaps the divine.
This is where Uncle Robert’s big question comes in…… “So, how do you plan to be of service to your friends, family and community – or the larger world?” This is a question rooted in a deep understanding of human experience (going back to Plato and Aristotle). It is challenging and respectful….. and much more interesting than “any money in that field?”
Why not give it a try with a recent grad?