Stakeholders’ perspectives of the essential skills for beginning agricultural science teachers: A delphi approach

Date
2014-12
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Abstract

Agriscience teachers face requirements that are unique to their profession. In fact, agriscience teachers even need a distinct set of competencies which researchers, professional organizations, and state associations have grouped into a variety of categories. All these competencies can make the secondary agricultural profession distinctly challenging, which has led to an increased burnout in the profession across the nation.

The numerous roles and responsibilities of the agricultural science teacher can often compete with agriscience teachers’ abilities to provide effective classroom instruction. Given this, the purpose of study was to identify the essential skills related to Texas agricultural science teachers’ roles as classroom teachers.

This study utilized the Delphi technique, which consisted of three consecutive survey rounds. Members of the Vocational Agricultural Teacher’s Association of Texas (VATAT) Board of Directors were used as this study’s panel of experts. Panelist were asked to identify the essential skills related to the roles of classroom teachers needed by program graduates today. The results of this study reviled 106 essential classroom skills, which were grouped into 11 skill categories. In conclusion, beginning agricultural educators need to focus their attention on the skills addressed within these 11 skill categories.

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Keywords
Vocational Agricultural Teacher’s Association of Texas (VATAT), Delphi, Agriscience teachers, Classroom skills
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