- Author: Stacey AMPARANO
Community Education Specialist (CES) from across the state of California came together on January 24-25, 2018 at the UC Desert Research and Extension Center in Holtville, CA. There are 9 Research and Extension Centers (REC) throughout the state, all under the University of California division of Agriculture and Natural Resources. These annual meetings have been an opportunity to strengthen the CES network within the RECs and surrounding county programs and broaden our platform in which we bring extension activities to our individual RECs; creating awareness and providing education to youth and adults. In addition to sharing our personal experience and ideas, we strive to bring in guest speakers to enhance the experience.
This years' meeting featured topics such as:
- Developing a funding strategy
- Maximizing funding success
- Connecting with our community
- Reaching underserved communities
This successful CES workshop was made possible through funding from the University of California Agriculture and Natural Resources (UCANR), UCANR Contracts and Grants staff, UCANR Development Services staff, UCCE Riverside 4-H Advisor, Claudia Diaz, and the wonderful community panel comprised of the friends of Farm Smart, including USDA Resource Center director Rosa Singh, IV Food Bank Nutrition Education Program Manager Mireya Diaz, UC CalFresh Program Manager Paul Tabarez, McCabe School teacher Bonnie Jones, Girl Scouts volunteer Kay Hodges, and USDA internship participant Malei Tipton.
- Author: Stacey Wills
Resources and Lesson Plans and Farm Tours…OH MY!
FARM SMART had the opportunity to participate in the 2017 California Ag in the Classroom conference in Visalia, CA in July. This was a wonderful opportunity for FARM SMART to share resources and ideas with California educators, as well as gain new ideas and resources to incorporate into FARM SMART programming. Over 200 educators from across California learned about the importance of educating our youth about food and fiber through all subject areas. Agriculture is everywhere and in everything we do! Activities included farm tours, workshops, a farmer panel, hands on activities and free resources centered around agriculture and education.
This conference is open to all educators interested in learning and sharing their knowledge of incorporating agriculture in the classroom. Grants to cover the conference are available to teachers at: https://learnaboutag.org/grants/index.cfm
To learn more about the CA Ag in the Classroom conference and get free lesson plans, visit: https://www.learnaboutag.org
IN THE NEWS:
Coverage BY abc30 news ON THE EVENT:
You can also hear California Ag Today Radio discussing this wonderful conference:
https://soundcloud.com/california-ag-today/lori-taylor-the-produce-mom
- Author: Stephanie Collins
- Author: Stacey Wills
- Author: Jairo Diaz
UCDREC/FARM SMART collaborated with the United States Department of Agriculture - USDA to host the 2017 USDA Food and AgScience Summer Program. Out of 22 applications, 4 high school students were selected to participate in the 40-hour program. This was the third year FARM SMART has hosted the program designed to address the need to increase the number of experiential learning opportunities for students hoping to engage in agriculture and enter into agriculture related careers.
Students had the opportunity to expand their knowledge of agriculture beyond the classroom through hands-on, real world experiences within the field of agriculture. The mission of the internship program is to build an experience that fosters an awareness of agriculture related careers, broadens the student experience within the agriculture industry, determines their level of interest in ag related careers, as well as serving as a platform for making key contacts in the local agriculture community.
Students began the program with “A Day in the Life of DREC!” Students were in the field and the labs of DREC with plant, soil, water and weed advisors.
Over the next 2 weeks there were daily field trips to discover all about Imperial Valley agriculture. Visits were made to 14 agriculture businesses from bees, cattle, dates, seed, ag finance, hay pressing, organics and more!
The students also visited the USDA Service Center, the Imperial Irrigation System and the Ag Commissioner office in Imperial County, and the Arizona Western College and the University of Arizona in Yuma, AZ.
The program concluded with a luncheon where student created videos were presented about their intern experience. Click here to see student videos:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLrFfqpzwk6yCAwJYWoa_OxKhikcYgayOv
A special thank you to the USDA Office of Advocacy and Outreach Hispanic-Serving Institutions National Program for funding the program!
- Author: Jairo Diaz
- Contact: milt.mcgiffen@ucr.edu
University of California, Riverside researchers are testing soil amendments (biochar) to improve soil health and crop water usage in arid and hot ecosystems. This study will determine if various formulations of biocarbon can improve the agricultural productivity or remediate marginal land located at DREC facilities.
Marginal land makes up a large portion of California land area. Making this land productive could greatly increase food production and agriculture many parts of California. Researchers would expect to obtain a deeper understanding of what happens with increases in the carbon content of marginal lands in general and desert soils in particular. If this proves to be an effective reclamation method it could represent a real advance, considering the increasingly large acreage of marginal land worldwide
more info at: http://ucanr.edu/blogs/blogcore/postdetail.cfm?postnum=24627
- Contributor: Stacey Wills
- Author: Natalie Gonzalez
Imperial Valley youth aged 9-12 assembled at the UC Desert Research and Extension Center once again for the third annual Sustainable You! camp. Sustainable You! is a youth-led education enrichment camp that is planned and delivered by senior 4-H members. With this being its third year, the camp staff worked to plan activities that differed from those of previous years. The 27 campers learned about land, food, water, air, and energy over the course of the week with different youth-led hands-on activities tied to each theme. With the generous support of the Vesper society and partnership of FARM SMART with UC CalFresh and 4-H, campers were able to experience quality learning about sustainability and healthy communities.
Day one of the camp focused on land. The kids learned about trash and where it goes when thrown “away”. They learned that “away” is actually to a landfill where human waste piles up by the ton. They were presented with questions on how waste can be minimized. Staff members taught the kids about different types of waste and what can be reused and recycled and what cannot. They also learned how to reduce the amount of waste that they produce. They were taught about materials that can neither be reused or recycled but could be kept out of landfills by being composted. They were presented with three bins labeled “recycle”, “landfill” and “compost” so that they could separate their waste into the proper bin each day. Their major project for the day was to make new paper from used paper. A mixture of blended, used paper and water was given to the kids so that they could color it, flatten it out, and allow it to dry. They were able to take their paper home once it fully dried.
The second day of the camp focused on the theme of food. The youth learned about where food comes from and how far it travels. They played a game which required them to act as each ingredient that is in a chocolate bar. Stations were set up as countries and the task was to travel from the country in which the ingredient is produced and then back to the U.S. The kids enjoyed this activity because it involved running between different stations, but they also realized how much energy is used to transport food through how much of their own energy was spent during the activity. They learned about the importance of locally grown food. The kids were able to harvest their own zucchinis. Many of the kids went home to bake zucchini bread with their parents and brought it in the next day!
The third day revolved around water. This was also field trip day! We loaded up a bus and traveled to the New River Wetlands. Their first activity was a scavenger hunt which allowed them to become familiar with the wetlands. The game took them on a search for various types of animals and plants. They were able to witness the state of the water when it enters the wetlands vs. when it leaves. The counselors later broke the kids up into groups and facilitated water quality testing in each group. The kids were excited to read the results and compared them with other groups. They tested water at both the beginning point of the wetlands and the end and when comparing their results, many kids were surprised to see a change in water quality.
The next day was Air Day. Not only did they learn about air pollution and what actions can be taken to minimize it, but they got to paint a picture of what they imagine a city with no air pollution would look like. The art of each student showed their understanding of what pollutes the air and what cleans it. All 26 paintings were beautiful, colorful displays of a city filled with trees, animals, and people.
Our final day was a day that challenged the campers to utilize their engineering skills. Within a small group, they put their brains to work to assemble a hydroelectric turbine. They had to do this using only paper, tape, and foil around a 2-litre bottle. Their challenge was to produce a model that would spin faster than their peer's projects when water was applied to the turbine. Each turbine was unique and the youth discovered that each design delivered a different amount of kinetic energy. This activity taught them that renewable energy can be used rather than non-renewable energy sources. Through this, we can conserve our non-renewable sources of energy.
Each day the kids were presented with journal questions that focused on the topic of the day. They answered these questions at both the beginning each morning and again in the afternoon, before leaving. The changes in their answers showed what they learned throughout the day. Their growth over the course of the week was rewarded on the last day as they walked through a graduation ceremony and received a certificate for completing the camp.
Natalie Gonzalez