Texas State to lead effort to recruit non-traditional audiences to agricultural careers

Research & Innovation

Jayme Blaschke | July 20, 2023

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) has awarded Texas State University a $5 million grant to encourage non-traditional agricultural audiences to consider potential careers in the agricultural, natural resources and human sciences (FANH) workforce.

The five-year grant will support the Research Through Agriculture Internships, Scholarships and Experiential Learning (RAISE) program, overseen by project director Doug Morrish, a professor in the Department of Agricultural Sciences. Eryn Pierdolla, a lecturer in the Department of Agricultural Sciences, Nicole Wagner, an assistant professor in the Department of Agricultural Sciences, and Pratheesh Omana Sudhakaran, an assistant professor in the Department of Agricultural Sciences, will serve as co-PDs.

Texas A&M University AgriLife Extension, Houston Community College, Palo Alto College, Laredo College and Austin Community College are partner institutions on the project. 

The program will address the challenge by creating a one-of-a-kind internship hub to annually provide 55 paid internships for the fall, spring and summer semesters. These internships will partner students with the USDA, Texas A&M AgriLife Extension and Texas State’s Bobcat Farm. RAISE will specifically target urban counties to raise awareness of USDA opportunities among a wider, non-traditional agriculture audience that may not otherwise consider a FANH career due to lack of exposure.

Community college students participating in RAISE will directly benefit by being enrolled in the courses “Careers in Agriculture” and “Ag Internship,” both counting toward their four-year degree upon transfer to Texas State. The revised curriculum for “Careers in Agriculture” will help develop the career and leadership skills of more than 1,500 students. 

RAISE will also utilize a number of other strategies to reach the program’s goals. RAISE will provide an on-boarding process to include families in students’ career choice journey and also implement a mentoring program using former USDA fellows that have already participated in an internship and have employment in USDA or government agencies. The program will also initiate outreach for FANH majors other than agriculture, including nutrition, family and consumer science, engineering, biology and chemistry.

The Texas State grant is part of the larger “From Learning to Leading: Cultivating the Next Generation of Diverse Food and Agriculture Professionals Program” (NextGen) initiative from the USDA’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture. The $262 million NextGen investment in institutions of higher education is intended to foster the next generation of diverse agricultural professionals across the nation.

For more information, visit nifa.usda.gov/about-nifa/press-releases/usda-announces-inaugural-learning-leading-cultivating-next-generation.