Nuffield Scholar looks for ways to boost ag degree enrolment

Karen Daynard was awarded the Canadian Nuffield Farming Scholarship for 2009, and she's researching ways to attract more people into plant breeding, food science, land resource science and animal science programs at Canadian universities.

"I'm involved with the Ontario Agricultural College (OAC) at the University of Guelph and we're concerned about a drop in numbers of kids taking the core ag science programs. At the same time as numbers are dropping, we're also seeing unprecedented numbers of employers looking for grads," she writes.

It would be a good time for anyone to enter one of these fields — and not just farm kids.

For her research, she's visiting recruitment and communications people at other ag institutions to see what they're doing in terms of attracting students. So far she has visited Florida State, Texas A&M, University of California - Davis, Fresno State, California Polytechnic, Mississippi State, Royal Agricultural College and Harper Adams University (England), Scottish Agricultural College, Wageningen University (Holland) and Le Nivot (college in Brittany, France). 

"I'm also trying to hook up with people in non-traditional agricultural careers in an effort to document "cool careers,"" she says. "I've spent some time with the head animal nutritionist at Disney's Animal Kingdom who is an OAC grad, as well as a girl who is in charge of restoring the historical gardens on Alcatraz."

To follow Karen on her journeys, read her blog at www.agiscool.blogspot.com.

Karen runs KD Communications in Guelph, and has done work for many of Ontario farm associations including 4-H Ontario, the Advanced Agricultural Leadership Program (AALP), Ontario’s Outstanding Young Farmers’ Program, ACC Farmers’ Financial, AgCare, the Ontario Farm Animal Council, the Agricultural Adaptation Council and Ontario Pork. She herself is an animal science graduate of OAC.

For more about Nuffield scholarships, visit the website.