An agriculture teacher sick of seeing the topic gradually disappear from South Australian school curriculums has embarked on a 12-month mission to support the state’s “food and fibre” educators.

Key points:

  • A new role has been created to reinvigorate SA agriculture education after years of decline
  • Sue Pratt has been appointed to the role after 30 years’ experience teaching agriculture
  • Many schools had retained the topic in their curriculum but very few were teaching it

Sue Pratt began teaching at Balaklava High School in SA’s mid-north during 1987 and has headed up the school’s agricultural program since 2007.

“There’s nothing more important than knowing where your food comes from, and we find that a lot of kids are disconnected from that process,” Ms Pratt said.

“Because they are all going to become consumers and make choices about what they buy, we want them to make those choices from an educated point of view.”

Sue Pratt is working to reinvigorate agricultural education in SA schools.(Supplied)

A chance to give back

Ms Pratt said she had been lucky to have contacts and be supported by the farming community when she began teaching at Balaklava, but many agriculture teachers did not have the same support.

“If a school hasn’t got anybody who is interested or experienced in food and fibre production, it’s a difficult thing to actually get it into your curriculum.

“We would love to expand that and make sure that every school in SA is teaching food and fibre content.”

New approach to education

Ms Pratt has been lobbying to create a role that would support agriculture teachers in SA after she attended a national educators conference in Tasmania in 2018.

School students in northern Victoria learning to lead a steer.(ABC Rural: Warwick Long)

“They had a lead teacher of agriculture and it was quite inspiring to see what he was achieving and the way he’d been able to reinvigorate education around agriculture,” she said.

The new role is being funded by the SA Grains Industry Trust for an initial 12-month period.

It will involve Ms Pratt travelling across SA to share her expertise in agriculture education with schools.

NSW’s Yanco Agricultural High School (YAHS) is one of many still specialising in agriculture.(Supplied: YAHS)

“Our main focus is to make sure people are hitting those SACE standards for our ag subjects in year 11 and 12,” Ms Pratt said.

“Because most ag teachers are the only ones in their school, they don’t often have that academic support around them to make sure they are achieving the rigour that they need to at that level.

“There are incredible opportunities within the agriculture sector at the moment.

“I would really love kids to be aware of the career pathways they could take — from the agribusiness side of things through to academic life.”

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