Land-grant Universities Research Articles

Book Review: Land-grant Universities for the Future

Book Review: Land-grant Universities for the Future

Building a Sustainable Agricultural Career Pipeline: Effective Recruitment and Retention Practices Used by Colleges of Agriculture in the United States

This national study examined effective student recruitment and retention practices used by colleges of agriculture in the United States among 1862 land-grant, 1890 land-grant, and non-land-grant institutions. Respondents reported that faculty at colleges of agriculture were primarily white. Through the analysis of sub-group percentages, the researchers found that the ethnic makeup of faculty was not reflective of the general population. The researchers found that administrators from 1862 land-grant institutions reported statistically significant differences (p < .05) regarding the use of specific strategies to target underrepresented populations in student recruitment as compared to other institutional types. Further, 1862 land-grant institutions reported statistically significant differences in student retention strategies (p < .05) as compared to other institutional types regarding the delivery of programs that aimed to retain first-year students. Based on key findings from this investigation, the authors developed the agricultural student retention model (ASRM) to help guide colleges of agriculture in improving their holistic retention program as they navigate inclusive and diverse institutional contexts. Additionally, key recruitment strategies were identified as well, that could facilitate holistic student recruitment efforts. Perhaps more significant progress can be made toward creating a sustainable agricultural workforce that is more reflective of U.S. population demographics using this model.

The Desegregation of Land-grant Institutions in the 1950s: The First African American Students at NC State University and Virginia Tech

The Desegregation of Land-grant Institutions in the 1950s: The First African American Students at NC State University and Virginia Tech

Rethinking Service: Visual Arts at the Land-Grant University and in Extension Programming

In 2014, land-grant institutions observed the centenary of the Smith-Lever Act, which established the Cooperative Extension program. Traditionally, Cooperative Extension has engaged in and disseminated findings from research in areas such as agricultural sciences and public policy, but rarely the visual arts, despite the prevalence of visual arts departments at land-grant institutions. Faculty in the Department of Visual Arts at North Dakota State University (NDSU) desired to know whether there was potential for collaboration with NDSU Extension. This article addresses findings from the resulting survey-based study and the implications of those findings.

Examining Incoming Credit Differences Between First-Year and Transfer Students

In this study, the difference in the number of initial credits between incoming transfer and first-year students entering a land grant university in a professional education program was examined (N = 488). A multivariate analysis of variance revealed that transfer students transferred significantly more total credits and more credits that counted toward degree programs than did first-year students. Undergraduates who had graduated from small high schools transferred more credits and more credits that counted than did those from large high schools. However, first-year students transferred a significantly higher percentage of total credits that counted toward the degree programs than did transfer students. Implications for advisors, institutions, and policy makers are discussed.

Approaching a Tipping Point? A History and Prospectus of Funding for the University of California

Author(s): Douglass, John A.; Bleemer, Zachary | Abstract: This year marks the University of California’s (UC) 150th anniversary. In part to reflect on that history, and to provide a basis to peer into the future, the following report provides a history of the University of California’s revenue sources and expenditures. The purpose is to provide the University’s academic community, state policymakers, and Californians with a greater understanding of the University’s financial history, focusing in particular on the essential role of public funding.In its first four decades, UC depended largely on income generated by federal land grants and private philanthropy, and marginally on funding from the state. The year 1911 marked a major turning point: henceforth, state funding was linked to student enrollment workload. As a result, the University grew with California’s population in enrollment, academic programs, and new campuses. This historic commitment to systematically fund UC, the state’s sole land-grant university, helped create what is now considered the world’s premier public university system.However, beginning with cutbacks in the early 1990s UC’s state funding per student steadily declined. The pattern of state disinvestment increased markedly with the onset of the Great Recession. As chronicled in this report, the University diversified its sources of income and attempted to cut costs in response to this precipitous decline, while continuing to enroll more and more Californians. Even with the remarkable improvement in California’s economy, state funding per student remains significantly below what it was only a decade ago.Peering into the future, this study also provides a historically informed prospectus on the budget options available to UC. Individual campuses, such as Berkeley and UCLA, may be able to generate other income sources to maintain their quality and reputation. But there is no clear funding model or pathway for the system to grow with the needs of the people of California. UC may be approaching a tipping point in which it will need to decide whether to continue to grow in enrollment without adequate funding, or limit enrollment and program growth to focus on quality and productivity.Funding support was provided by the Center for Studies in Higher Education of the Goldman School of Public Policy, Speaker Emeritus John A. Perez, and UC Berkeley Deans Henry E. Brady and Bob Jacobsen. The views expressed are those of the authors.

Earning Professional Legitimacy: Challenges Faced by Women, Underrepresented Minority, and Non-Tenure-Track Faculty

Background and Context Little research has focused on how legitimacy is understood and conveyed through interactions between faculty colleagues, despite its importance to faculty careers. Not all faculty experience an even playing field in trying to access professional legitimacy. This is especially true for women, underrepresented minority (URM), and nontenure-track (NTT) faculty. These groups experience common dilemmas in their pursuit of professional legitimacy in research university environments, though each group also faces distinct challenges of its own. An ideal place to understand experiences of faculty trying to earn professional legitimacy are faculty learning communities. Purpose The purpose of this study was to analyze how women, URM, and NTT faculty understand and describe professional legitimacy in one research university. We sought to understand the challenges these groups experienced in trying to obtain legitimacy from colleagues that they attributed to their gender, race, or appointment type. Through this study, we hope to provide an understanding of and recommendations for creating inclusive academic work environments for all three groups. Setting The study took place at Land Grant University (LGU), a research-intensive institution. LGU received a National Science Foundation ADVANCE grant to focus on issues of equity in the retention and advancement of women and URM faculty. Out of recognition that the institution faced challenges in retaining and/or advancing women, URM, and NTT faculty, LGU's ADVANCE program created faculty learning communities. Research Design A qualitative case study approach was used to understand how women, URM, and NTT faculty interpreted institutional scripts of legitimacy within their academic departments. Data Collection and Analysis Data were collected using semistructured participant observations of five faculty learning communities, which were formed to support the retention and advancement of women, URM, and NTT faculty over five years. Findings/Results Women, URM, and NTT faculty participating in faculty learning communities understood professional legitimacy as associated with belonging, merit, autonomy, and voice in decision making. Participants described multiple ways in which they felt their gender, race, and/or appointment type constrained their ability to achieve legitimacy. Conclusions and Recommendations In this study, we used our findings to “mark” how inequality is maintained through professional interactions with colleagues. Implicit bias influenced several of the inequalities and barriers to earning legitimacy noted in the study. One recommendation, therefore, is to raise awareness of implicit bias and provide department-wide trainings on how to address it. This study also supports the use of faculty learning communities as a place of restoration for faculty seeking professional legitimacy and as a tool to create inclusive academic environments.

Novel Clinical Needs Finding Course Brings Biomedical Engineering Students Together with Regional Medical Campus Students, Residents, and Faculty to Solve Real-World Problems

Biomedical engineering is the fastest growing engineering field in the United States, preparing a generation of skilled problem-solvers who, together with healthcare professionals, drive the momentum of novel technologies for prevention, detection, treatment, and monitoring of disease. It is important to the education of biomedical engineers that the dialogue between healthcare professionals and schools of engineering is seamless, constant, and interactive. Lack of sustainable discourse between those who produce technologies and those who use them could reduce the applicability and relevance of the biomedical engineering education1,2. Reciprocally, for healthcare professionals to optimally harness the expertise of their engineering colleagues, a direct interaction is required.&#x0D; The department of Biomedical Engineering (BMEG) is one of the largest departments within the College of Engineering at the University of Arkansas, with approximately 70 students graduating annually. Established in 2012, as the first and only biomedical engineering program in the state of Arkansas, the department is establishing itself as one of the premier research departments on campus. The department prides itself in its commitment to diversity and has been successful in attracting diverse groups of students to enter the field of science and engineering. In the spring of 2018, the BMEG undergraduate student body had the highest percentage of female and underrepresented minorities within the college of engineering—53% female and 37% minority.&#x0D; The University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS) is the only allopathic medical school in the state of Arkansas. In 2007, UAMS established UAMS-Northwest as a regional campus in Fayetteville. UAMS-Northwest extends UAMS’ medical education, research, and clinical mission. UAMS-Northwest has ~250 students in the colleges of medicine, nursing, pharmacy, and health professions, as well as 48 family medicine and internal medicine residents. UAMS-Northwest is located more than 200 miles from the main UAMS campus in Little Rock but is only one mile from Arkansas’ land grant university, the University of Arkansas. This proximity of the regional medical campus to the land grant university provides opportunities for collaboration that can benefit the students of both institutions.&#x0D; This article provides an overview of the implementation and preliminary assessment of a novel Clinical Needs Finding course that was recently instituted as a collaboration between the Department of Biomedical Engineering and the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences– Northwest Campus.

Class Size, Course Spacing, and Academic Outcomes

Using administrative data from a land-grant university, we estimate how class size and waiting longer between courses impact student grades using paired prerequisite and follow-up courses. We find that students in larger prerequisite classes earn lower grades in follow-up courses, although this effect is mitigated as the time between the two courses increases. This finding is consistent with the hypothesis that students learn less in larger class sections, leaving them with less knowledge to decay and that any increase in student maturity may more than make up for the forgotten material.

Was higher education a major channel through which the US became an economic superpower in the 20th century?

This paper offers a thesis for why the US overtook the UK and other European countries in the 20th century in both aggregate and per capita GDP as a case study of recent models of endogenous growth, where ‘human capital’ is the engine of growth. By human capital we mean an intangible asset, best thought of as a stock of embodied and disembodied knowledge comprising education, information, entrepreneurship, and productive and innovative skills, which is formed through investments in schooling, job training, and health as well as through research and development projects and informal knowledge transfers (cf. Ehrlich and Murphy 2007). The conjecture is that the ascendancy of the US as an economic superpower in the 20th century owes considerably to its faster human capital formation relative to that of the UK and ‘old Europe.’ This paper assesses whether the thesis has legs to stand on through both stylized facts and a supplementary quasi-experimental empirical analysis. The stylized facts indicate that the US led other major developed countries in schooling attainments per adult population member, beginning in the latter part of the 19th century and lasting throughout the 20th century, especially at the secondary and tertiary levels. The quasi-experimental analysis constitutes the first attempt to test the hypothesis that the US’s ascendancy to a major economic power stems largely from the impact of the first Morrill Act of 1862, which launched the public higher education movement in the US through the establishment of land grant colleges and universities across the nation during the latter part of the 19th century. The higher education movement appears to have spearheaded a higher long-term rate of growth in per capita income in the US relative to the UK and other major European countries.

Early College Credit Programs Positively Impact Student Success

This article presents an exploratory case study examining the effects of different early college credit programs on time to baccalaureate degree attainment at a metropolitan Midwestern United States land grant university. We developed a Cox proportional hazards regression model of a students’ time to degree attainment as a function of their participation in different early college credit programs while controlling for each student’s preenrollment grade point average (GPA), American College Test (ACT) test score, gender, part or full-time enrollment status, ethnicity, and seasonal (Fall, Spring, or Summer) semester of initial matriculation. The most noteworthy finding of our analysis was that each early college credit program appeared to have a positive and statistically significant impact on reducing the time to degree attainment with all other factors being equal. However, the mechanisms through which these programs affect the time to degree attainment appeared to be differentiated by program.

Native and Adapted Plant Introduction for Low-water Landscaping

In response to a perceived need for the development and introduction of superior plant accessions for use in sustainable, low-water landscaping, land-grant universities in Colorado, Idaho, and Utah, have supported plant development programs. Each of these programs has unique characteristics and protocols for releasing plant materials and obtaining royalties to further support research and development. Colorado State University (CSU) is part of the Plant Select program, which evaluates and promotes native and non-native plants for use in low-water landscapes. Selected plants are released to commercial members who pay a membership fee and royalties for access to the selected plants. The University of Idaho focuses on selecting and evaluating native herbaceous perennials, which are then released through a contract and royalty program with a local nursery. Utah State University uses the Sego Supreme program to select, propagate, and evaluate native plants. Selected plants are released to interested growers who pay a royalty for production rights.

The Role of Extension in a University's Response to a Natural Disaster

In 2014, a mudslide devastated a small community in rural northwestern Washington State, taking 43 lives. The disaster created ripple effects that affected families, economies, transportation, and employment in neighboring communities. This article provides details of the state land-grant university's efforts to help affected communities recover. Aspects of this response readily replicable by other land-grant universities include outreach leadership provided by local/county-based Extension faculty; creation of a response team with depth and breadth of expertise and skills; engagement of campus-based colleges, colleagues, and students; and delivery of youth development programs in affected communities. Meaningful outcomes have been achieved, and the outreach continues

Murmurations

Point of view: I am a cisgender white male in my mid-fifties. I have spent most of my life in higher education in engineering departments. My experiences have included undergraduate and graduate education at a private, research-intensive institution, postdoc and faculty at a land-grant institution, serving for several years as a program officer at the National Science Foundation (NSF), and most recently as chair of the Electrical and Computer Engineering department at a private, liberal arts, predominantly undergraduate institution. This article draws on all these experiences, but particularly from my time serving at NSF and in the years since. I am also one of the founders of Murmurations: Equity, Emergence, and Education and represent my own perspective on what I hope this experimental journal can contribute to the larger education ecosystem.&#x0D; Value: This article outlines my rationale in partnering with others to start a dialogue journal. I believe education is one of the best ways to address systemic inequities, but education systems in the US seem to be increasingly subject to criticism that they are unable to change and promote equity. This article hypothesizes that resistance to change is structurally built into the system through the mental models held by the system’s participants. These models can be broadly classified as oriented towards identifying problems rather than proposing solutions. While such approaches work in simple systems, they often backfire in complex systems that have multiple and often competing impacts. For meaningful change to occur we ourselves must seek to expand our perspectives and change our mental model of education to one of a complex ecosystem. Changing mental models is hypothesized to occur by engaging in meaningful dialogues with others who have experiences different than our own. By providing a forum for these conversations my hope is that Murmurations will serve as a vehicle to share perspectives from different niches within the larger ecosystem, which in turn can shift mental models. Since Murmurations is an experiment, an additional intent is to encourage voices from across the education ecosystem to make contributions.

Leading the safety landscape

The American Chemical Society has long advocated for best practices for laboratory chemical safety in academic institutions. Since its creation in 1963, the ACS Committee on Chemical Safety (CCS) has served as a resource to other ACS units on matters related to chemical safety and health. CCS has, for example, produced a number of safety guidance resources, which are available at www.acs.org/safety. The committee also works with other organizations to promote safety. CCS contributed to the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering & Medicine report “Safe Science: Promoting a Culture of Safety in Academic Chemical Research” and the Association of Public & Land-grant Universities’ “Guide to Implementing a Safety Culture.” The committee exceeded expectations in response to the U.S. Chemical Safety Board’s recommendation to develop guidance to support risk assessment in chemical research labs. In 2015, the committee’s Hazard Identification & Evaluation Task Force published the guide “Identifying and Evaluat...

Troubleshooting personnel's satisfaction with software tools

An exploratory survey of midsize land-grant institutions in 2016 investigated factors that were potentially correlated with how satisfied library personnel were with the software tools they used in electronic-resource troubleshooting. Although the study was very small in scale, it found that troubleshooting personnel at responding libraries are generally satisfied with the tools they use, with no apparent correlation with the area of troubleshooting activity to which the tool is applied, whether the tool is also used by non-troubleshooting personnel at the institution, or whether the tool was evaluated prior to implementation. The data weakly suggested that satisfaction was positively correlated with whether troubleshooting personnel were involved in the decision to implement the tool and negatively correlated with the length of time the tool has been in use.

P118 - Cooperative Extension as a Model for Sustainable Dissemination of the Diabetes Prevention Program

Objective: To demonstrate how Cooperative Extension (CE) can be used to successfully disseminate the National Diabetes Prevention Program (DPP). Target Audience: Adults at risk for type 2 diabetes. Theory, Prior Research, Rationale: In the U.S., 30.3 million have diabetes, 84.1 million have prediabetes. The impact of diabetes is most strongly felt in medically underserved areas (MUAs), where healthcare access is limited. DPP has robust research supporting its success in reducing or delaying the onset of type 2 diabetes. However, the program's dissemination to MUAs is constrained by lack of trained personnel and access. The CE System addresses these constraints. CE has offices in most counties across the U.S., staffed with trained educators. Additionally, other Extension programming may complement and enhance the lifestyle outcomes encouraged in the DPP. The CE National Framework highlights chronic disease prevention and management as a priority. Thus, CE is an excellent fit for DPP to achieve a broader impact. Description: DPP is a group, lifestyle-based intervention offered over a year's time, with 16 weekly/bi-weekly/hour-long sessions in months 1–6, followed by 6–10 sessions during months 7–12. The evidence-based CDC curriculum, PreventT2, promotes healthy eating, physical activity, and modest weight loss. Evaluation: A study, through pre/post surveys, showed those receiving counseling and motivational support on diet, exercise, and behavior modification by attending DPP—reduced their risk of diabetes by 58%. Lifestyle changes for participants aged 60 + , reduced their risk by 71%. Program success is evaluated by measuring primary outcomes determined by the CDC: change in body weight and increase in weekly minutes of physical activity. Conclusions and Implications: Nationally, process evaluation results optimize DPP participant retention and success. The CDC DPP Impact Toolkit is used to show health and economic effects of CE-DPP. Combined, the strategies shared by this university's CE will be useful to other land-grant universities wishing to implement a CE-DPP. Funding: University of Arizona, Cooperative Extension Funds.

P173 - How Students View Food Security: Results From Cognitive Interviews With Undergraduates at a Land-Grant University

Background (Background, Rationale, Prior Research, and/or Theory): In the U.S., food insecurity (FI) affects one in eight households, putting individuals at greater risks for compromised mental and physical wellbeing. Recent evidence suggests that post-secondary (i.e. college) students are at an increased risk of FI. However, little is known about how students interpret established FI questionnaire items. Objective: The current study aims to understand how students think about FI questionnaire items and compare their response choices to their experiences. Study Design, Setting, Participants, Intervention: Thirty-three undergraduate students, aged 18- to 24-years old and fluent in English were recruited. Students completed the 10-item USDA Adult Food Security Survey Module (AFSSM) in-person, and then were cognitively interviewed to understand how they perceived questionnaire items and to explore their personal experiences with FI. Interviews were recorded and transcribed verbatim. Two researchers used inductive open coding procedures to analyze interviews. Qualitative responses were compared to FI classifications derived from the questionnaire. Results: Participants, on average, were 19.5 years old (±1.2), predominantly female (70%), and 67% were classified as food insecure with the AFSSM. College students' interpretations of questionnaire items reflected their diverse personal experiences (familiarity with FI, familial economic hardships, etc). Confidence in response choices were complicated for students given the range of both formal and informal food and financial resources they had access to (university meal plans, support from social circles, savings, etc.). Among those reporting FI, consequences of and coping responses to perceived shortcomings in food were widely heterogeneous. Conclusions and Implications: The results of this qualitative study provide indications that university students' perceptions of traditional FI assessment questions are influenced by their personal experiences and resources. Results indicate that future work should investigate modified FI classifications and assessment methods among university students to account for the nuanced perspectives in this sample. Funding: USDA.

Interest in and Awareness of French President Emmanuel Macron’s “Make our Planet Great Again” Initiative

President Donald Trump’s withdrawal from the Paris Agreement served as an impetus for the French President to enact “Make our Planet Great Again”, an initiative aimed at attracting international scientists to study climate change. In the current study, we evaluated the extent of interest and awareness towards this initiative. Our goal was to determine factors that impacted awareness and interest, with the hypothesis that political views and beliefs towards climate change would be strong influencers. We also predicted that there would be a greater number of scientists among the aware and interested participants. To test these hypotheses, we distributed anonymous online surveys during October–November 2017 to multiple academic departments within the University of Florida, a land grant institution with top ranking programs in environmental sciences, agriculture, biodiversity conservation, and horticulture. We recruited 185 participants. Approximately 45% of the participants were aware of French President Macron’s initiative; of those aware, 51.8% expressed interest. We found a moderate influence of political party on awareness and interest. Nearly all of the participants that were aware and interested in the initiative agreed that climate change was a real event. Slightly lower agreement was reported by the unaware and uninterested. Surprisingly, there were fewer scientists among the aware and interested participants compared to those that were unaware and uninterested participants. These findings highlight that both political party and belief towards climate change influenced interest and awareness in President Emmanuel Macron’s initiative. Thus, employing strategies that engage all political parties, as well as educating individuals on climate change, might result in more effective future global initiatives.

Promoting Physical Activity Via Cooperative Extension

PURPOSE: The aim of this study was to evaluate factors associated with physical activity (PA) promotion efforts via the cooperative extension (CE) system. METHODS: Cross-sectional survey distributed to Family and Consumer Science listservs across land grant institutions from all 50 states. RESULTS: Among responders (N=806), 625 (77.5%) completed > 95% of survey questions and are included in this analysis. Respondents span the age categories of 18-29 (14.4%); 30-39 (18%); 40-49 (19.5%); 50-59 (27.9%); > 60 (20.2%) and have been working with CE for 10.7 + 9.5 years, and most (64.1%) spend > 20% of their time working with government nutrition assistance education programs (SNAP-Ed and/or EFNEP). Most are county-based (73.2%) and work predominately in rural areas (60.1%). All agree or strongly agree that engaging in PA is important, however, only 40.5% and 50.6% personally meet or exceed the PA recommendations for muscle strengthening or aerobic activity, respectively. Forty-five percent implement PA as part of nutrition education lessons for youth or adult audiences, while 8.3% and 19.8% lead stand-alone youth or adult PA programs, respectively. Nearly 60% are engaged in PA promotion efforts in school and community settings. Only 50.6% have attended trainings related to PA promotion and (43.6%) agree or strongly agree that CE leaders provide support for PA training opportunities. While 63.7% agree or strongly agree that CE leaders endorse PA promotion as a role and responsibility of CE personnel, only 44% and 40% respectively, report PA promotion efforts are a component of outcome and impact reports, or a documented expectation in extension position descriptions. CONCLUSIONS: A majority of CE personnel across the U.S. engage in a variety of PA promotion and programming efforts, but gaps exist in training and administrative support or documentation of these efforts. Trainings to address PA promotion efforts and impact/outcome assessment are needed.