Non Technical Summary
The Veterinary and Animal Science Training for Teachers (VASTT) project is designed to address the Animal Health and Production and Animal Products priority area of the AFRI Farm Bill. The primary objective of this project is to provide professional development in animal science and veterinary science and aligned resources to 120 agriculture teachers. This will be accomplished through providing experiential, innovative training (including tours of local veterinary facilities) toagriculture teachers. Teachers will in turn use the resources given to them at their training sessions (i.e., commercially-developed textbooks, digital content presentations, and laboratory instruction workbooks, laboratory teaching supply kits, and digital copies of project team-developed materials shared via a Google Drive folder) to facilitate instruction for their students. Training sessions (one annually) will begin in the Summer 2026 semester and conclude in the Summer 2029 semester. Every participating agriculture teacher will be provided with resources to take back to theirschool. It is anticipated that 6,000 students will be indirectly impacted by this project. The secondary objective of this project is to support faculty-led, course credit-bearing, stipend-funded mentorship opportunities for 16 undergraduate Agricultural Education students. Exhaustive, multi-faceted project evaluation methods will be employed by selected project team members and the external evaluator. Several scholarly presentations and publications will be generated by this project. AMurray State University-hosted project information website will be developed and regularly maintained by the project team.

Classification

Knowledge Area (KA)	Subject of Investigation (SOI)	Field of Science (FOS)	Percent
903	6099	3020	100%

Knowledge Area
903 - Communication, Education, and Information Delivery;

Subject Of Investigation
6099 - People and communities, general/other;

Field Of Science
3020 - Education;

Goals / Objectives
1) Provide professional development (PD) in animal science and veterinary science and post-PD support to 120 agriculture teachers in public schools;2) Provide an extensive set of teaching and learning resources (i.e., commercially-developed textbooks, digital content presentations, and laboratory instruction workbooks, laboratory teaching supply kits, and digital copies of project team-developed materials shared via a Google Drive folder) to 120 agriculture teachers in public schools to facilitate engaging, STEM-focused, hands-on instruction in animal science and veterinary science; and3) Support faculty-led, course credit-bearing, stipend-funded mentorship opportunities for 16 undergraduate Agricultural Education students during the duration of theproject.

Project Methods
Oneproject training session will be offered on the Murray State University (MSU) campus during each year of the project. Regarding each year's training session at MSU, Drs. Wells and Parr will direct the training session participant recruitment, lodging, and support. The entire project team will lead all training sessions. These immersive learning experiences will lead to improved student outcomes through increased teacher competence and the provision of teaching and learning resources (e.g., commercially-developed textbooks, digital content presentations, and laboratory instruction workbooks, and laboratory teaching supply kits [each kit will contain assorted medical supplies and resources, such as syringes and bandaging], etc.) at each participant's respective school.Solicitation for teacher participants will begin in February of each project year. This solicitation process will involve an electronic communication sent to agriculture teachers across the United States. This solicitation process will occur through a variety of outreach modes (e.g., social media, state- and national-level agriculture teacher associations, etc.) to reach the maximum number of potential participants. Applicants for the project will complete a digital application hosted on the Qualtrics platform. The entire project team will have access to the applications and will help oversee participant selection for their individual trainings at their host institutions. The online application will be available starting in early February 2026 with an application deadline of early April 2026. Applicants will be notified of their selection status by mid-May 2026. The training session will be held in June 2026 (this timeline will follow for subsequent years of the project). An independent review panel excluding any of the project team members will review all submitted applications, rank them based on designated participant selection criteria, and provide recommendations on participant selection. This independent review panel will be comprised of Agricultural Education stakeholders who each have a vested, long-term interest in supporting sustainable efforts to grow and develop agriculture teachers, students, and their respective communities. Dr. Wells and / or Dr. Parr will notify applicants of their selection status via e-mail.The first component of the online application will describe the project and its components andlist the project expectations and outcomes. As part of the application packet, teachers will be asked to submit several supporting evidence items, including: (1) their unofficial undergraduate and graduate (if applicable) degree transcripts to provide evidence of their prior training (or lack thereof) in animal science and veterinary science, (2) their course schedules for the upcoming academic year on official school letterhead, and (3) their course syllabi for the upcoming academic year on official school letterhead. Agriculture teachers who agree to the project conditions and meet the initial qualifications will be considered for the project. The project participation conditions include: (1) teachers' ability to participate in the entirety of the training session and (2) teachers' willingness to share their experiences and outcomes as a result of participating in the entirety of theproject via an electronic, reflective journal. This journal will serve as each participating agriculture teacher's training outcomes report.In addition to their contact information, the agriculture teachers will be asked to identify their school district of employment, current program curricula, and their prior experience teaching animal science and veterinary science. Agricultureteachers who demonstrate the greatest need for additional professional development in animal science and veterinary sciencewill be prioritized in the selection process.Once all participants have been selected, the selected participants will contact their respective school administrators to ensure the school agrees to support all aspects of participation in the project. Evidence of this agreement must be supplied to Dr. Wells and / or Dr. Parr via e-mail. Participants will receive both a travel reimbursement stipend and a stipend upon providing evidence (e.g., revised course syllabi, observed instruction, etc.) of training / curriculum implementation to the project team. An alternate list of participants will be generated to replace any agriculture teachers who must leave the project early or not attend as originally planned. To help reduce any potential participant attrition, the project team members will: (1) offer the aforementioned travel and implementation stipends to participants and (2) communicate directly with each selected participants' school administration before each year'sproject training session begins to ensure agriculture teachers' pending participation and their post-training implementation support from their school administration.The project team members will establish and maintain an online, interactive Faculty Mentoring Network (FMN) for the participating teachers. As part of the FMN, the veterinary medicine faculty members will provideproject participants with virtual technical update training and support after their respective training sessions. During such virtual meetings, participating teachers will: (1) engage with the project team members, (2) discuss implementation strategies, and (3) further build professional relationships with one another. The project team members intend for this project to create long-lasting relationships between the participating teachers and them. Participants will continue to have access to this network after project funding has ceased, facilitating continual growth and application of knowledge and skills from colleagues.Project evaluation will occur: (1) through formative and summative means, (2) at numerous times, and (3) using varied methods, including: (1) quantitative and qualitative workshop evaluation forms completed on the final day of eachproject training session, (2) electronic training outcomes reports completed by individual agriculture teacher participants completed at both six and 12 months after their respectiveproject training session, (3) qualitative, virtual interviews and teaching observations conducted with each participating agriculture teacher during the academic year immediately after their respectiveproject training session, (4) quantitative pre-test and post-test agricultural career interest data collected from the students of each participating agriculture teacher, (5) quantitative pre-test, post-test, and post-post-test perceived competence change data collected from each participating agriculture teacher, and (6) qualitative pre-test and post-test data collected from the undergraduate Agricultural Education student mentees supported by the project. PD Wells, Co-PD Parr, and the external evaluator (Dr. Steven "Boot" Chumbley), who each have extensive social science research expertise, will actively collaborate to implement the data management plan. All data collection methods and procedures will align with the three objectives guiding theproject. As the external evaluator, Dr. Chumbley will use the Holistic Model of Evaluationto guide his evaluation efforts.PD Wells, Co-PD Parr, and the external evaluatorwill follow all appropriate MSU Institutional Review Board (IRB) procedures and will seek approval to proceed with human subjects research data collection prior to collecting evaluation data. A publicly-available, project team-developed, MSU-hosted website containing a variety of instructional resources and concepts will be developed and maintained to disseminateproject information.