Performing Department
(N/A)
Non Technical Summary
The long-term goal of this Collaborative Education and Training Project is to establish an inclusive and sustainable framework for food safety training and support that effectively integrates neurodiverse individuals into the food industry workforce, fostering their professional growth and contributing to the overall success of agricultural enterprises while promoting diversity and equity in the industry. The first step to achieving our goal is through the inclusive design of food safety training via optimization of the Produce Safety Alliance Grower Training curriculum to meet the unique learning requirements of neurodivergent (NDV) learners who compromise 15-20% of the U.S. population. To be successful, training of co-workers and supervisors of NDV persons will be critical to providing effective support of NDV persons employed within the food industry. This will be implemented primarily through multimedia learning tools that address the learning accommodations required for low to higher need NDV persons. Importantly, this multimedia training approach is proven to aid in better understanding of concepts and adoption of behavior change. Our target audience include NDV persons seeking meaningful employment within the produce industry and their future co-workers and supervisors.
Animal Health Component
30%
Research Effort Categories
Basic
0%
Applied
30%
Developmental
70%
Goals / Objectives
The long-term goal of this Collaborative Education and Training Project is to establish an inclusive and sustainable framework for food safety training and support that effectively integrates neurodiverse individuals into the food industry workforce, fostering their professional growth and contributing to the overall success of agricultural enterprises while promoting diversity and equity in the industry. The first step to achieving our goal is through the inclusive design of food safety training for workers within agricultural production environments growing and handling raw agricultural commodities (RACs) covered by the FSMA Produce Rule to meet the unique learning requirements of neurodivergent (NDV) learners who compromise 15-20% of the U.S. population. To be successful, training of co-workers and supervisors of NDV persons will be critical to providing effective support of NDV persons employed within the food industry. This will be implemented primarily through multimedia learning tools that address the learning accommodations required for low to higher support NDV individuals. Importantly, this multimedia training approach is proven to aid in better understanding of concepts and adoption of behavior change and has demonstrated effectiveness within our primary population. Our target audience includes NDV persons seeking meaningful employment within the food industry and their future co-workers and supervisors. The primary objectives to achieve our long-term goal are:Define specific learning needs of NDV individuals for effective food safety training.Determine the most effective learning media and approaches for NDV individuals.Develop training for co-workers and supervisors to effectively support NDV individuals.Create tailored food safety training modules for NDV learners.
Project Methods
We plan to form a stakeholder advisory group composed of partners within the produce industry. The advisory group will: i) assist in development of data collection methods, ii) review research findings, iii) assist in development of training program content to best assure content is practical and consistent with regulatory provisions, and (iv) assist in disseminating the results. Objectives will be completed sequentially with some overlap in Objectives 1 and 2 as well as Objectives 3 and 4. Before data collection begins, all protocols will be reviewed by the Institutional Review Boards (IRBs) of the University of Arkansas, New Mexico State University, Michigan State University, and University of Houston-Clear Lake to ensure requirements are met for social and behavioral research with human subjects. Our primary research questions are:What types of jobs roles are available to NDV individuals across agriculture/food production enterprises from generic to specialized?What types of learning media and approaches are best for food safety training of NDV individuals based on level of support required (low to high)?How can supervisors and co-workers of NDV individuals best support and work with their colleagues and ensure their success?What are the most essential training needs and how can we integrate using new information and approaches?Objective 1. Define specific learning needs of NDV individuals for effective food safety training. Our project content experts (PD Gibson; Co-PIs Lerman and Tocco) will identify the knowledge and evidence needed to develop content and practice messages to be included in food safety training materials. As an initial step, our team will research common needs (i.e., levels of support) of NDV individuals and consult directly with REED Foundation for Autism, NDV individuals, and other advocacy groups to further understand the gradation of needs. Knowledge gaps related to food safety principles will also be ascertained during this initial step. Next, we will also perform a realist review to identify contextual elements that promote or impede the act of receiving and implementing knowledge during knowledge dissemination to our target audience. To identify these contextual elements, a variety of data sources can be used, including grey literature (e.g., reports, white papers), commentaries, and theoretical papers in addition to empirical studies.More nuanced, qualitative data regarding factors perceived to be barriers, challenges, and facilitators to the understanding and subsequent adoption of food safety practices by workers with NDD. This step will involve identifying agricultural production enterprises that have a specific social mission to provide meaningful employment for our target audience and assessing what job roles are currently available to NDV individuals. More specifically, our team will consider existing roles in agricultural production across a range of systems, enumerating tasks for each role, articulating how each task is carried out, and looking for areas of incompatibility for NDV audiences (such as concepts which could provide a disconnect). This will occur through observation of job sites, and consultation with trainers in both produce safety and NDV audiences. We will then continue aligning tasks into general clusters to identify ways to demonstrate or teach the correct way to do a task and the rationale behind the correct way. These clusters will lead to cluster level objectives and define necessary components for training in each job. Objectives, roles, and cluster alignment will be reviewed by focus groups with potential users and stakeholders for fidelity.Objective 2. Determine the most effective learning media and approaches for NDV individuals. Based on level of need or support required, our team will identify what types of learning media and approaches are best for NDV individuals.Therefore, we will conduct a content analysis with stakeholders to identify what content exists for NDV learners, what NDV-specific training exists in related fields, and what, if any, food safety content for NDV learners exists. During the content analysis, we will evaluate the use of videos, images, diagrams, and models for demonstration and consider interactive games or simulations for applied learning. In addition, we anticipate the need to explore available mobile apps with reminders, prompts, and customizable features to assist in the learning process. Additional strategies for creating effective learning media may include peer modeling and social stories to build skills as well as providing multisensory tools like auditory prompts. Overall, our team will use this content analysis to identify where our work can have the greatest impact.Objective 3. Develop training for co-workers and supervisors to effectively support NDV individuals. For current and future supervisors and co-workers of individuals with NDD, we aim to determine how this group can best support and work with their NDV colleagues within the context of agricultural food production. In addition to supporting food safety practices, we aim to determine how co-workers and supervisors/managers can ensure success of employees within the agricultural industry who have special cognitive and SEL needs (i.e., non-cognitive or interpersonal skills). During a design summit at the NMSU Innovative Media, Research and Extension design studio, our team will work with Co-PI Lerman as a subject matter expert to identify essential recommendations for co-workers and supervisors working with NDV populations. Here, our team will articulate and prioritize what materials can then be most useful to facilitate effective communication and interaction between neurotypical and neurodivergent individuals.Objective 4. Create tailored food safety training modules for NDV learners.The NMSU Innovative Media team will lead the design and development of the educational material for this project, which may include training modules, virtual interactive tools, and animations. Research completed in prior objectives will inform the team which learning media format are best for learners within in the NDV spectrum and the most essential training needs for this target population. Learning modules will include three levels of training materials:Training program for employerson how best to support colleagues who are neurodiverse. This could include a certificate program or self-directed training programs to support employers in agricultural production environments specifically those producing RACs covered by the FSMA Produce Rule. Materials will also be developed to assist employers with in-person interactions regrading food safety practices and feedback.Training program for lowest support employees which will likely mirror currently available content but will be delivered in ways that are more appropriate such as less visually stimulating or require less social interaction with others yet, the concepts are attainable.Training materials for highest support employees. For learners on the highest end of the NDV spectrum, we anticipate that content will also need to be addressed differently, in addition to the general training approach. For example, some learners are less able to conceptualize ideas, or apply concepts that are not concrete and explicit -- particularly in food safety training, we often struggle as individuals to 'see' the unseen. We will work to identify content that can be problematic from a conceptual standpoint for these learners and create more intentionally designed animations and interactives to help these learners make sense of the things that are less observable.