Author: Daniel Douglas Foster

Hello, I am a currently a teacher educator at Penn State University where I help prepare future secondary agricultural educators/FFA Advisors. I am a passionate individual looking to make a positive difference in the world around me. Before working at the University, I had the best time of my life teaching high school agriculture and helping students realize their potential in Willcox, Arizona.

We are back! Fulfilling our Professional Responsibilities- Moving from Digital Citizens to Digital Leaders

Daniel Douglas FosterIn-Country Sharing

We are back! The #AgEd2Malaysia group had a great experience for the past 5 days at the FELDA Ayer Hitam; however, due to connectivity availability, they took their “blogging” offline.  They are excited to share some of their observations from the past few days.

As Fulbright Scholars [Learn more about the Fulbright Program], we are asking a great deal of our of participants on the #AgEd2Malaysia experience to move beyond digital citizenship and move confidently into the role of digital leaders exerting a positive influence on the dispositions of the profession as a whole!

We are doing this through daily blogging and the strong development/extension of the professional community of learners utilizing the hashtag #AgEd2Malaysia across multiple social media platforms, but primarily, Twitter.

But Why?

  1. For Yourself as a Professional.
    • Moving into digital leadership pushes you as an individual to not just “experience” something awesome, but to crystallize into actionable thoughts to advance professional goals developed as individuals on this journey.
  2. For Your Students (both current and future).
    • Being able to effectively engage/share in digital space is a necessity that is only projected to grow in the future, not decline! When we ask our students to do tasks, it is also wise to engage and serve as role models in those actions.
  3. For Your Profession.
    • We need strong advocates for education and for school-based agricultural education. This focused sharing allows us to increase awareness of secondary school-based agricultural education as well as share this transformative learning experience for a potential exponential impact with our colleagues across the world. Together, we can do anything and collectively we must work together to ensure a bright future.

We do hope you will actively engage with us! Do not hesitate to leave a comment on a blog or ask a question for us to answer! Share your thoughts and feelings on Twitter. Let us know that someone is reading, learning, and enjoying the effort being expended to share.

We are entering the third of four phases of our experience in the next week as we travel to Sabah and visit two rural agricultural education programs (Taman Tun Fuad National High School; Mat Salleh National High School) and the Kinabalu National Park. We look forward to sharing with you as we continue to grow and learn!

Daniel D. Foster (@FosterDanielD)
is an agricultural teacher educator
at Penn State University (@TeachAgPSU).

 

#AgEd2Malaysia Status Update – A New Phase (July 18th-22nd)

Daniel Douglas FosterIn-Country Sharing

Thank you so much for following along on our adventures! For the next 4 or 5 days, we will be traveling to a location where connectivity is not as accessible. We will be traveling to the FELDA Air Hitam Community and will be staying with host families.  FELDA stands for Federal Land Development Authority. They were created in 1956 as a government initiative for human settlement and land development. [Here is a 1995 journal article describing more detail about the Air Hitam]

In addition to the powerful learning experience of a “home stay” with a host family for four nights, our adventurous learners will be:

  • Conducting Agriculturally oriented industry visits including:
    • a Fish Farm
    • the Veterinary Institute of Malaysia
    • the Agriculture Institute of Ayer Hitam
    • Food Industry Tour with Kluang Coffee Power Factory
    • Touring a Palm Oil Plantation
  • Engaging in Cultural Events like:
    • UK Farm Evening
    • Cultural Show with FELDA Community
    • Community Zumba
    • Trading Game Evening
    • Zapin Dancing
    • Teaching an Agriculture Day at SMK Seri Lalang

Be sure to subscribe to the blog so that you can see all the updates from these experiences when the new blog posts come out!

Landed: Let the adventure of learning commence!

Daniel Douglas FosterIn-Country Sharing

After 4 years of focused effort and borrowing a popular phrase from one of my childhood favorite shows, The A-Team, with Colonel John “Hannibal” Smith, I LOVE IT SEEING A PLAN COME TOGETHER!

We are so thankful to have the support of the USDE Fulbright-Hayes to be able to offer this specialized transformative learning immersion for agricultural teacher candidates and agriculture teachers from Indiana, Iowa, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan and of course Malaysia.

Most people do not realize the tireless effort and planning that was required to reach this the point!  An experience like this does not just happen by jumping on an airplane. In 2014 (in-route to #AgEd2Korea), Melanie Miller Foster (@GlobalMelanie) complete the scoping trip to Malaysia that helped solidify the grant application submitted in Fall 2014. The application was rejected at that time, but great feedback was given! In 2016, we resubmitted and were awarded to conduct the experience in Summer 2018.

As soon as we learned of acceptance in early 2017, work began with the Global Teach Ag! Consortium from the learning design team of the Penn State Global Teach Ag! Initiative (@GlobalTeachAg) and Hawkeye Community College Global Agriculture Learning Center (@GALC_Hawkeye) to the host team of the University Technology Malaysia, (@UTMeduc) much much work has been done.

Because of all that work (and after 2.5 days of traveling with 20+ flying hours traversing nearly 10,000), this great photo of 30 passionate, positive agents of change for food, fiber, and natural resources through youth agriculture development is possible!

This is a learning journey we are super excited to share with you. We really hope that we can be ambassadors for goodwill through agricultural education. To do this, we believe open conversations are critical. We strongly encourage you to subscribe to the blog, feel confident in posting comments/questions on anything we share, and maybe (just maybe) even engage with us on Twitter at #AgEd2Malaysia!