Progress 09/01/20 to 08/31/24
Outputs Target Audience: An estimated 3,000+ first-generation refugees have started urban agriculture and independent farming through Refugee Incubators Farming Projects (RFIPs). Based on our 2019 census, over 50 such initiatives werein operation across the country, providing T&TA to over 1000 refugee and immigrant beginning farmers (and over 3500 gardeners and aspiring farmers). These were our overall targets, to benefit from the resources and training tools we developed. This project formally included nine of these RFIPs from across the country, with varying farmer constituencies and farming conditions. Combined, they reported more than 1260 enrolled beginning and aspiring farmers / gardeners. These local initiatives were: International Rescue Committee (IRC) - US National office - NYC; Four IRC local programs: Tucson, AZ; Sacramento, CA; Seattle, WA; Salt Lake City, UT; Global Growers Network, Decatur, GA; Catholic Charities of Northern Kansas, Kansas City, KS; Lutheran Services of Iowa, Des Moines, IA; The Nashville Food Project, Nashville, TN. In total, they host over 660 beginning-level and 600+ aspiring refugee, immigrant and other new farmers. There were approximately 40 staff from these RFIPs participating in Training of Trainers activities. Approximately 15 were involved in new resource development and pilot testing. Changes/Problems:Partners: We initially lost three partners who had signed up but for internal reasons were unable to participate. These are Tufts / New Entry in Massachusetts; Groundswell Center in New York State; and Global Growers in Atlanta. Staffing and leadership changes were major contributing factors for the latter two. COVID:The pandemic started just a few months after the project got underway. This suspended the use of program offices by incubators and their ability to get to farm sites needed to engage in content development work. This also applied to the 2501 content that many partners were also involved with. Because of that, we were really unable to get going on most BFRDP content development until developers had caught up with their 2501 work commitments. Related to this was the ToT. We had planned five in-person trainings with experts, mostly in Year's 1 and 2. However, COVID made these impossible; none were held during Yrs. 1 or 2.In place of this, we transitioned to online or virtual trainings, with Zoom. This did limit the CoP dynamics and full-day trainings planned. Instead, we held some of them over several weeks, with 2-hour sessions and assignments in between. The upside was much higher participation because we did not have to cover travel costs. For the expert trainings, we had an average of 25 participants for each session, which is double what we could have done for in person events. And that also made it easier than having train-the-trainer internal coaching for those who would have not been able to attend the in-person events.This also expedited ISED staff-led coaching sessions and shorter trainings.The quality of the photo series and videos we were generating was also much higher as a result. Because of the above factors, we requested an additional year to the grant and it was received. The additional 2021 funds we received were used to continue the work over this period. Website:ISED's website showcasing our prior BFRDP resources became obsolete, but our web developer was unable to sufficiently update it. We thus looked for a replacement and hired them in mid-2023 to design a new site from scratch. It was supposed to take a few months. A year later, the work had barely progressed, so we had to part ways. After another search that vetted 50 applicants we found a qualified developer who started work on it at the beginning of October 2024. It is almost complete, but at the time of this report submission it is not released. The address iswww.isedsolutions.netand it should be activated within weeks of this submission date. The website will house all the T&TA resources ISED has produced since 2015, which will exceed 400 in 2025. In addition it will initial house close to 1000 photographic and illustrated images, independently and clustered by topic. Additional third party materials as well as Training of Trainers guides will also be posted. A well-designed search engine will make it easy to find items. The delay in launching the website contributed to a lack of data about use of the resources that would be accessed through it. In turn, we have been unable to survey users, especially core incubator targets, as to which items they used and any benefits to farmers resulting. However, we are able to undertake this looking ahead during this new BFRDP period. That will give us over 2.5 years to gather feedback and we will provide that data in the annual RVS reports related to it. What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?There are two intersecting facets to the ET workplan. The first is Training of Trainers (ToT) - building skills across staff and partners that are needed to develop the innovative content and to improve overall communications with refugee constituencies for all outreach and T&TA. The second is content development - which incorporates principles and practices we started using in a related 2501 grant and wanted to expand with BFRDP. Along with that is sourcing third-party resources that would be useful for both purposes. A: COVID:The pandemic started just a few months after the project got underway. This suspended the use of program offices by incubators and their ability to get to farm sites needed to engage in content development work. However, COVID made these impossible; none were held during Yrs. 1 or 2.In place of this, we transitioned to online or virtual trainings, with Zoom. This did limit the CoP dynamics and full-day trainings planned. Instead, we held some of them over several weeks, with 2-hour sessions and assignments in between. The upside was much higher participation because we did not have to cover travel costs. For the expert trainings, we had an average of 25 participants for each session, which is double what we could have done for in person events. And that also made it easier than having train-the-trainer internal coaching for those who would have not been able to attend the in-person events.A detailed list of online workshops was provided in a prior report. In Year 3 we finally held an in-person 2.5 day ToT in Phoenix. There were 40 attendees - 3 ISED staff and the rest were partner incubator staff. The major focus was Experiential Adult Education, though several other topics were also cover. Additional more informal ToT continued throughout the project. In particular, we focused on orienting new incubator staff who came aboard and wanted to participate. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?The incubators and their personnel who were active participants in ToT and T&TA content development have had full access to both these components. Otherwise, full dissemination has been intended We have been adding a distinct photo bank with thousands of images that can be used by developers or anyone else for T&TA purposes. However, getting them formatted and identified to fit a search engine in our new website has been a slow process. We hired a website developer to generate a new website to house all these resources and make them easy to search for. After a year of non-performance, we had to replace the developer, which set then whole website launch back over a year in turn. A launch in very early 2025 is expected.The new ISED Resources website iswww.isedsolutions.net. In tandem, the BFRDP Clearinghouse, has also received these, and will post them on their Farm Answers website.? Third-party utilization data will be available in 2025 onwards once the items are circulating. Our new 2024-2027 BFRDP ET award allows us three more years to follow up on downloading and utilization. What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?
Nothing Reported
Impacts What was accomplished under these goals?
Obj. 1: Implement a Community of Practice (CoP) Outputs: * ISED and partners worked as a team to develop and test products and build multiple competencies; * Communications protocols include team email, phone and Zoom calls, and use of Google Docs and Box for resource access. *ISED hired a design and graphics specialist who assisted all developers with content design and illustrations. *Tot was team-based events involving 42 partners; including 25+ at most events. Only one in-person meeting held due to COVID restrictions 2020-22. Data collected: *Assessment tools included baseline and follow-up staff self-assessments focused on the perceived benefits and skills improvement of staff engaged in the project, and a follow-up survey and interviews to learn about the impact of the project on intended and unintended outcomes. *Key findingsincluded positive changes in new knowledge gain and skills, and an increase in the use of key elements of plain language, visual literacy, and experiential teaching in their workshops and training tool design. Results suggest that live and recorded trainings developed and delivered through this project, especially those in plain language writing and speaking, were most valuable to participants. And the recordings of online workshops were very useful for ongoing reinforcement of skills as well as for new staff orientation. Summary statistics and discussion of results *Community of Practice is strongest in its culture of mutual support and information sharing. 85% agreed or strongly agreed that there is a culture of inquiry and mutual support; 86% agreed or strongly agreed that the project gives them access to a wider network of partners, and 65% agreed or strongly agreed that they get informed about relevant opportunities or discussions through the network, although 7% also disagreed with this statement. Key outcomes or other accomplishments realized *Coordination and interactions among all partners at multiple stages was instrumental in generating a consistent quality of T&TA content. Team approaches to ToT resulted in standardized learning and skill building that was applied to content development; piloting; and inter-project communications and sharing. COVID limited the amount of in-person meetings to one from the proposed 5; this diminished overall CoP. Obj. 2: Expand visual-basedcontentfor T&TA providers and beginning farmers. Outputs: *ISED and incubator partners developed 100visually-based T&TA products. We mainly developed novel resources - much different from what we had developed before. These include videos, photo series guidebooks, posters, handouts, and audience exercises. *Another 600+ original images were generated - mostly photographic - and over100illustrations by ISED graphic artist. These will be added to an online photo library using our new website www.isedsolutions.net. *Via a 2501 grant, we similarly generated 150 instructional photo series that complement these products. *Third party resources were researched but most turned out not to be very useful, so most were not compiled or made available in our collections. Many lackedhigh visual quality and/or needed various permissions. But we did collect and use some third party clip art, other graphics, images from agricultural businesses such as seed companies. *Pilot testing: RFIPs used these resources along with enhanced instructional methods for farmer T&TA to provide feedback to improve them as needed. Outcomes: *Up to 50 incubators nationwide - instructors and participating farmers - can access these items for their own T&TA. Generally, these projects lack decent resources of their own, and those with materials can also use them additively to enhance what they offer. Similarly, these can be used by anyone else by accessing our website or Farm Answers. *We have also been strategizing a photo bank with thousands of images that can be used by developers or anyone else for T&TA purposes. Data collected;) Summary statistics and discussion of results No additional use-related or subsequent outcome data was collected. Third-party utilization data will be available in 2025 onwards and added to reports for our new BFRDP ET project. Key outcomes or other accomplishments realized. *Given to COVID, we were delayed in completing most of these items and added another year to the project in order to reach our total output. *Our 2024-2027 ET award allows us to generate dozens of new items consistent with the items generated here. Dissemination: *Due to Covid and original site developer problems, a new ISED Resources website (www.isedsolutions.net) was severely delayed and a replacement developer hired. It is due to launch in very early 2025. It will house all above resources and actively promoted. *In tandem, the BFRDP Clearinghouse, has also received these, and will post them on their Farm Answers website. *Third-party utilization data will be available in 2025 onwards once the items are circulating. Our 2024-2027 ET award allows us three more years to follow up on downloading and utilization. Obj. 3:Training of Trainers (ToT):Build the skills of 25-30 staff in nine programs in experiential teaching methods tailored their core farmer audiences. Outputs: *We provided ToT in a consistent manner to 42+ staff across 9 incubators and ISED. We coveredexperiential teaching methods, as well as photography, videography, Plain Language,Plain Speaking, and Visual Literacy. Details provided in prior REEports. *The original sessions in Years 1&2 were delivered online due to COVID restrictions. That allowed many more to participate than originally planned. In tandem, intra-project dissemination was less important as more staff were trained directly. *RFIPs use these instructional methods to improve their T&TA delivery for all farmers. This was especially effective via piloting new resources that integrated the aforementioned skills. * All projects were piloting new resources and had free use of them for their own T&TA. *WhatsAppdid not work out. Two partners and ISED staff tried to engage farmers in different locations but the necessary farmer leadership did not develop. Outcomes: *From our evaluation report: To evaluate the effectiveness of the staff skill development, a self-assessment survey was created for each of 4 areas of training competency covered by the project: plain language written skills, plain language speaking skills, visual communication skills (using images to communicate a concept or deliver instruction), and experiential teaching skills. *Overall, the project was successful in building the skills of participants in four domains: plain language written and speaking skills, visual literacy, and experiential teaching techniques. Findings indicate increased skill and confidence in plain language and experiential teaching skills, and new knowledge gain in visual literacy, with clear application across all skill domains.Respondents have become better at simplifying written language, have increased their awareness of communication practices, have improved their listening skills, and are better at using concise language."I think the exposure to plain language teachings has truly changed my worldview for the better. Not only does it benefit our targeted ESL audiences, but it also has greatly improved my communication styles with others, especially in a written format. Never again will I write an email in a passive tone!"One person noted specific ways that their training has improved: "I more regularly implement teach-back, checking for understanding, and using active rather than passive language." And several respondents said they think they have become better at using visuals in their printed or presented materials. Data collected: See evaluation report
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Progress 09/01/22 to 08/31/23
Outputs Target Audience:Audiences overall are refugee beginning and aspiring farmers ? Asian or Pacific Islander ? Immigrant producers ? Limited resource producers ? Organic producers ? Small farms ? Specialty crop producers ? Urban producers Changes/Problems:The major changes over this reporting period were: * We had followed behind on overall new content development, some of that related to COVID. We made an arrangement with one partner (Luthern Services Iowa) to take on a major portion of remaining content, to get it all completed. We also hired another content developer who is a graphic artis and designer, to produce new content and to assist others in designing and illustrating theirs. * We determined that a new website is needed to house and circulate all the new reosruces. We determined the existing contracter could not do this, and it took several months to find someone new who could. Work on the new site began in July 2023. * We requested a one-year NCE whch was approved, in order to complete these commitments and deliverables. A final report will thus be required towards the end of 2024. What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?Training of trainers: T&TA providers integrated their improved skills and new resources to deliver more appropriate and better designed T&TA. This will involve multiple approaches where other staff can be engaged (a) resources from the workshops; (b) posted additional written and video training resources; (c) manuals prepared by ISED and / or IRC; (d) follow-up online Webinars or equivalent; (e) follow-up phone or online coaching by the workshop experts; (f) reviews and input by ISED staff and shared experiences at training meetings. Training of trainers was in four domains, via in-person workshops, online seminars, written or video training resources, and individual or group coaching. * Visual literacy - focus on photography and video skills * Plain Language and Plain Speaking * Financial literacy * Adult education We provided associated resources on these skills for ongoing access for all incubators: Useful guidance on these subjects is available as books, manuals, videos, and audio were available. * Plain Speaking: Little is available on oral literacy, especially this when it comes to beginning English learners. * "Picture This "Financial literacy by ISED: Developing a new section focusing on farming enterprise, again incorporating primarily visually-based content. This will be used in the financial literacy workshop and added to ToT resources. * Adult experiential education: IRC has piloted a "Training of Experiential Teachers" course to help develop farmer mentors and will develop it into a resource for training staff in incubator programs across the country. From Feb. 28- Mar. 2, we sponsored an all staff and partner training of trainers meeting. The emphases included experiential adult education for effective delivery of T&TA to our refugee audiences. We also covered evaluation, and new approaches to content design. This was a fusion meeting insofar as it bridged the work we were finishing up on this 2501 and moving ahead on with the 2022-2025 2501 (see that report). Training/Workshops conducted and purpose; include agencies and their representative's names that lead or participated in training: ISED Scottsdale Meeting Agenda Tuesday Feb. 28th (8:30-4:30) TIME AGENDA RESPONSIBLE NOTES 8:00-8:30 Setup and arrival at meeting Katie, Hugh, Aley ~30 people 5-6 tables with fidgets, workbooks, markers, Ppt/screen, Easel/flipchart 8:30 Welcome, review agenda, housekeeping, (15 min) Hugh Joseph I have some more in-depth intros integrated into the workshop, so no need to do those separately. 8:45 Workshop onexperiential education part 1 (3 hours, 15 min) Aley Kent IRC Use a breakout room for food setup? 12:00 Lunch (~ 1 hr.) Catered 1:15 Taylor Forte - Intro and overview of Design (45 - 60 min.) Taylor Fourt Elements of visual design What role she will be playing 2:00 Mini Break 2:15 How should we practice "sustainable farming"? Hugh Formulate core principles and practices. Use sticky notes at tables and Jamboard if possible 4:15 Wrap up and prep for day 2 (15 min) Katie 7:00 Dinner @ Herb Box Survey: Follow-up post-assessments on PL, PS, VL, Photography Wednesday March 1st (8:30-4:30) TIME AGENDA RESPONSIBLE NOTES 8:00 Arrival and setup Katie, Hugh, Aley 8:30 Welcome back / housekeeping Katie / Hugh 8:45 Evaluation: -Key findings from the staff survey -Training onFarmer Skills - BenchmarkingTool Aley Ppt for findings Handouts for benchmarking tool exercise/breakouts 10:30 Break 10:30 Content development & testing protocols Hugh, Katie, Taylor Product development "lifecycle" -from proposing topics to piloting. 12:00 Lunch 1:00 Workshop onExperiential Education,Part 2 Aley 4:00 Wrap up and housekeeping 7:00 Dinner Experiential Ed self-evaluation Thursday March 2nd(9:30-12) TIME AGENDA RESPONSIBLE NOTES Breakfast and check out On own 9:00 Travel to Camelbackyard (~30 min) Coordinate! Ubers. Leave by 9! 9:30 Camelbackyard IRC Site Visit Jillian Robinson 11:30 Wrap-up/what's next and/or program meetings Hugh/Katie Other agencies that participated in training/ workshops: All our partner content developers and T&TA providers attended (30 in all). Other activities conducted and purpose of activities, i.e., introduction to USDA Programs/Services, assistance in the application process, etc.: We also had a visit at IRC's Camelbackyard site where NRCS national and state-level personnel attended. They also discussed a new NRCS funding opportunity targeting socially-disadvantaged farmers. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?Current products and training tools are stored in Google Drive and made available to all partners, totally aroun 40 people. We initiated development of a new ISED website in July, 2023, as the older one could not handle all the search needs for what we are providing. It was not completed andrunning by the end of Year 3 of this grant, which was end of August. What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?We have a one year extension on the grant, Our main activities will be: * Finish production of the 100 products for foarmer T&TA. * Complete production of the three added Picture This financial literacy modules. * Provide follow up Traing og Trainers for all new staff at ISED and partner incubators. * Use these skills for work on related grants, including 2501 and NRCS, with their own distinct original content. * Get the new website up and running, and house all our resoruces there. * Widely promote access to and use of the new reosurces. * Have all new resoruces posted on Farm Answers.
Impacts What was accomplished under these goals?
Partners, Coordination, and Community of Practice: ISED collaborated with the following programs (1) Major partner: International Rescue Committee (IRC) - US National office - NYC; (2-5) IRC local programs: Tucson, AZ; Sacramento, CA; Seattle, WA; Salt Lake City, UT; (6) Catholic Charities of Northern Kansas, Kansas City, KS; (7) Lutheran Services of Iowa, Des Moines, IA. +++++++++++ A content design and graphics specialist was hired to braoden the visual content focus from just being photo-based. She also assisted in the overall design of all new content, as well as producing dozen of original sketches and other graphics that totally transofrmed and diversified the new content in many respects. +++++++++++ Community of Practice (CoP): ISED and partners worked as a team to develop and test products and build multiple competencies; apply these to T&TA and evaluate the outcomes. * Continuous interaction among all partners is integral to the process. * Communications protocols include team email, phone and Zoom calls, and use of Google Docs and Box for resource access. * Expanded visual-based content from third parties: Specifically, we are sourcing diverse high quality visual resources - clip art, other graphics, images from agricultural businesses such as seed companies - to help projects incorporate more audio-visual content for presentations, handouts, posters, and similar. ISED staff and interns will extensively vet these resources for appropriateness, availability, and quality, and get partner feedback. * All items are vetted for intellectual property and accreditation requirements to facilitate access and use. Image-based development: We are producing image-based T&TA products. This includes 100 posters, handouts, PowerPoints, etc. suitable for electronic and/or print formats. Two partner incubators and ISED staff are engaging in the following content development and piloting activities.
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Progress 09/01/20 to 08/31/21
Outputs Target Audience:An estimated 3,000+ first-generation refugees have started urban agriculture and independent farming through Refugee Farming Incubator Projects (RFIPs). Based on our 2019 census, over 50 such initiatives are currently in operation across the country, providing T&TA to over 1000 refugee and immigrant beginning farmers (and over 3500 gardeners and aspiring farmers). Enduring RFIPs show a consistent record of attracting, training, and transitioning aspiring producers into successful beginning farmers. For example, nearly 200 enrollees in the Farmer Education Course at Agriculture and Land-Based Training Association (ALBA) in Salinas, have launched farms, and 35 are still farming on ALBA land and ~ 50 farm independently. New Entry in Massachusetts has over 500 graduates of its Farm Business Planning Class since 2003; 50are still farming, including 32 off-site.This map shows 52 RFIP locations. This project formally includes seven RFIPs from across the country, with varying farmer constituencies and farming conditions. Combined, they currently have more than 1000 enrolled beginning and aspiring farmers / gardeners. Most refugee farming projects are small, with very limited staff and expertise to address all the farmers' needs. Many of the RFIPs that BFRDP has funded since 2009 are prior and/or current partners in ISED's BFRDP ET initiatives. African American Asian or Pacific Islander Farmworkers Hispanic or Latino Immigrant producers Limited resource producers Military veterans Native American Organic producers Small farms Specialty crop producers Traditional commercial producers Urban producers Women Changes/Problems:During the first year of the award, we have had to address a number of challenges that have slowed us down with respect to content development in particular: A: COVID:The pandemic started just a few months after the project got underway. This suspended the use of program offices by incubators and their ability to get to farm sites needed to engage in content development work. This also applied to the 2501 content that many partners were also involved with. Because of that, we were really unable to get going on most BFRDP content development until developers had caught up with their 2501 work commitments. Related to this was the ToT. We had planned five in-person trainings with experts, mostly in Year's 1 and 2. However, COVID made these impossible; none were held during Yrs. 1. In place of this, we transitioned to online or virtual trainings, with Zoom. This did limit the CoP dynamics and full-day trainings planned. Instead, we held some of them over several weeks, with 2-hour sessions and assignments in between. The upside was much higher participation because we did not have to cover travel costs. For the expert trainings, we had an average of 25 participants for each session, which is double what we could have done for in person events. And that also made it easier than having train-the-trainer internal coaching for those who would have not been able to attend the in-person events.This also expedited ISED staff-led coaching sessions and shorter trainings.The quality of the photo series and videos we were generating was also much higher as a result. What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided? Date Location # attendees length title 10/7/20 virtual 21 1 hour Intro to BFRDP 10/21/20 virtual 13 1 hour Photo skills and lighting 11/18/20 virtual 17 1 hour ISED BFRDP and 2501 12/2/20 virtual 8 1 hour PL practice/pre-training 12/3/20 virtual 23 1 hour PL practice/pre-training 12/14/20 virtual 29 2 hours PL #1 (Sabrina) 12/17/20 virtual 32 2 hours PL #2 (Sabrina) 1/6/21 virtual 12 1 hour Planning new photo series 1/22/21 virtual 28 2 hours PS #1 (Sabrina) 1/25/21 virtual 30 2 hours PS #2 (Sabrina) 2/10/21 virtual 16 1 hour Videography #1 (Jacob) 2/25/21 virtual 16 1 hour Videography #2 (Jacob) 3/11/21 virtual 12 1 hour Videography #3 (Jacob) 3/18/21 virtual 17 1 hour Photo series piloting protocols 3/25/21 virtual 15 1 hour Photography (Jacob) 9/15/21 virtual 11 1 hour PL review 9/16/21 virtual 12 1 hour PL review How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?
Nothing Reported
What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?We plan to continue the ToT and begin work on new content develoment described in the proposal.
Impacts What was accomplished under these goals?
A series of professional trainings was provided. Originially these were to be in person meetings for 12 partners, but due to COVID we switched to online Zoom protocols and reached as many as 35 partners in each training-of-trainers sessions. The topics covers skills relevant to the develoment of T&TA content ofr refugee incubators nationwide, as well as to improve communications skills across the board for all partner organizations. To do this, we brought in specialists to do the ToT and provide preparation and follow up sessions in between.
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