August 6, 2024

While most teachers would prefer to spend their summers away from the classroom, a group of educators and counselors from schools across Philadelphia came to Drexel to enhance their knowledge about career options in food and agriculture. The group of 23 men and women took part in a four-week program to understand the many diverse careers in food and agricultural sciences and how to incorporate Food Science, Urban Agriculture, Nutrition, and Culinary Arts into their classrooms. While the participants spent some time in class hearing presentations from faculty from the School of Education and the College of Nursing and Health professions, the real learning happened in the field, literally. The teachers and counselors spent time at the Drexel Garden to see how plants grow in an urban environment and get tips on how to create gardens at their schools. The learning did not stop there. The group also went on field trips to food productions facilities and other places across Philadelphia to learn about all the different types of careers available in the industry.

Why is this so important? According to a 2020 report published by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, there is a lack of diversity in the workforce when it comes to food, nutrition, and agriculture. Among agricultural and food scientists in the U.S. in 2019, only about 12% were Black, 6% were Asian, and about 21% identified as another non-white race. According to USDA research, the biggest barriers to students of color pursuing careers in this field are misconceptions about what types of jobs are available and that most schools do not include agriculture in their curriculum.

That's where Drexel comes in. Led by School of Education clinical professor Vera Lee, EdD, and funded through a grant from the USDA, teachers learn how to build lesson plans around food and agriculture, while counselors learn about the different majors and college options they can share with students who are exploring these careers.

Nannette Thornton is a special education teacher at Ben Franklin High School. She says, “This project has been wonderful, its informative, we learned a lot last week about the science of food.” She says that learning about the different ingredients in food and the processes behind making food has been “eye opening” and she is excited to take this knowledge and relay it back to her students, “With me being a special education teacher, hopefully I can use the information that I learned to encourage my students to go on to further their education. It’s definitely rewarding.”

Brad Latimer, a Drexel graduate and high school mathematics teacher at Science Leadership Academy, shared that he plans to incorporate food production into his math curriculum. “Kids will look at recipes and then be looking into large scaling them up and different types of ratios and proportions, and how to think about that on a larger scale,” he said. Latimer also says the “hands on” aspect of this process is what got him the most engaged in wanting to do it himself, as well as figuring out “how can I have these experiences but then also have some time and space to think about how to tailor them to bring back to my school and my students.”

The program plans to recruit new cohorts of teachers and counselor each year to broaden the reach of food and agricultural education across Philadelphia. Dr. Lee shares that Drexel is unique in how it is reaching students in urban schools. At a recent USDA Program Director meeting held in Kansas City, MO this past April, Dr. Lee noted that “Drexel was one of the only urban universities that got a grant like this,” adding, “we have about a dozen high schools that are represented in this cohort.” Lee stresses the importance of showing students in urban areas all the different career and major options there are in the food science and agriculture realms, as they haven’t grown up around farms and food production hubs. The hope is that by integrating food and agricultural science topics and activities into to their curriculum, teachers will be able to show students what careers are out there in these fields, and when it comes time for students to explore colleges and career pathways, counselors will have the materials available to show students opportunities in food and agricultural sciences.