This Week In Ag 0034 - What is the Food, and Agricultural Education Information System?

Show notes

Conversation with Food, and Agricultural Education Information System (FAEIS).

• Can you start by sharing what the Food, and Agricultural Education Information System is focused on and what its core missions are? 
• Why was FAEIS started? 
• What is the size and scope of the FAEIS (employees and budget)? Under what part of USDA is FAEIS located?
• Like other USDA information services, Virginia Tech is the lead institution. Can you share with us how that relationship came about?
• Can you share what the state of agricultural education is today and what direction it is going in the next few years? 
• Using 2008 data, Ag % of total undergrad enrollment was 1.49%. In 2009 the percentage looks closer to 1%. The population of the USA involved in agriculture (as a business) is less than 2%. Do you see any trends in those wanting to get into agriculture as a career/profession?
• When asked about agricultural education, many people will either think of animal science (vets), agronomy, or agricultural economics. Yet there are many more ag degrees out there. What are some of the ways you see colleges changing their programs to get more people interested in agriculture? Are there any institutions that are dropping agriculture programs and, if there are, why do you think that is happening?
• Can you see FAEIS as also a way for individuals looking at agriculture as a field to obtain information on the types of disciplines in agriculture?
• How are people using the FAEIS services? What have been some of the interesting questions or uses of the data?
• What kind of research is being conducted around the data collected? What kinds of data do you wish you had?
• Currently it looks like the data is inputed manually. Is this correct? If so, has there been any discussions on looking at some sort of integration with the educational institutions?
• Which international institutions is FAEIS currently working with?

Reference links: 

• FAEIS Home page
• USDA Education and Outreach

website pick of the week/Ag information we all need to know about

• Feedstuff's Live stock maps, using USDA ag census data
• http://compfight.com - A tool that allows you to search Flickr based on text or tags.

Where can we find you?

• Dr. Jolene Hamm, FAEIS@vt.edu
• Dr. Mary Marchant, FAEIS@vt.edu
• Nate J Taylor is on Twitter at natejtaylor
• John Blue is on Twitter at TruffleMedia