Progress 09/01/03 to 08/31/07
Outputs
The specific objectives of this award was centered on curriculum development and included the creation of the following courses and educational opportunities: (a) to create a fall semester Mexico-US dairy seminar followed by a 15-day study tour of the Mexico, (b) to provide University of Wisconsin undergraduate students with a semester at the Instituto tecnico y de estudios superiores de Monterrey, campus Queretaro (ITESM-CQ) to improve language skills, their understanding of Mexican culture and the Mexican dairy industry; (c) to develop a range of private sector (farms and businesses) and public sector (university and government agencies) internship opportunities; (d) to develop an on-line learning community to provide (d1) a means of continued communication between students and class instructors, (d2) a publishing medium for the work of students, and (d3) a promotion tool for the project; (e) to develop a series of "hybrid courses" including discussion sessions
through video-conferencing of pre-assigned web-posed lecture material and case studies dealing with common key issues between the U.S. and Mexico (environmental management of farms and international trade). Actual project accomplishments (as described below) were closely aligned with intended accomplishments as listed above. Overall student responses to the proposed educational activities related to dairying in Mexico was positive as indicated by enrollments in a newly created course (which included a number of videoconference sessions with Mexican partners), a annual study tour of Central Mexico and a summer language program in Mexico. Although, three students in the first year of the project completed internships in Mexico, placement of students on Mexican farms or businesses for summer internship did not occur in the subsequent years. We believe that language barrier and the high costs deterred students from a full summer internship in Mexico. Nevertheless, the main accomplishments
of this grant includes the following items. First, a new course was created: "Agriculture in Developing Economies: Dairying in Mexico". Second, four annual study tours were organized in collaboration with three separate institutions of higher education from Central Mexico. Third, students were able to attend a summer language program in Queretaro. Fourth, over the course of the grant scholarships in the amount $25,550 were awarded to a total of 45 students. Fifth, an extensive web site has been created (http://dairynutrient.wisc.edu). The site includes material for the seminar course, material related to Mexico and its agriculture and student-generated electronic material describing their learning experiences for the 2005, 2006 and 2007 study tours. Intentional outcomes included the exposure of undergraduate students to the Mexican culture and agriculture in an academic context. The combination of a course, a study tour and a summer language program were key elements to achieving this
outcome. A series of unintentional outcomes are described below under project impact.
PRODUCTS: This project has produced a new UW-Madison course titled Agriculture in Developing Economies, Dairying in Mexico. Course enrollment was 14, 11, 10, and 10 in the fall of 2003, 2004, 2005 and 2006. It has produced an on-going 12-day study tour in collaboration with three distinct institutions of higher education in Mexico. Study tour enrollment was 13, 7, 9, and 8 in January 2005, January 2006, March (spring break) 2006 and January 2007, respectively. It has produced a web site that provides course content and highlights program activities. We have also created a series of questionnaires to be administered to project participating students to evaluate program activities. Finally, the grant has produced a group of thirty-seven students who have learned and have been exposed to Mexican culture, history and agriculture and eight students who have improved their Spanish skills by attending an eight-week summer language program in Mexico.
OUTCOMES: This project has engaged forty-five students who have gained an appreciation for issues related to agriculture in Mexico. The majority of students who were in the seminar have also gained a first-hand experience of the country, its culture, history, people and agriculture through the study tour of central Mexico. The study tour allowed them to build an appreciation for constraints of various agricultural systems (tropical dairying, small scale farming, and industrial farming). Students have developed presentations and have presented seminars of their learning experience to their peers on the UW-Madison campus. Funding of this grant allowed a group of motivated students to become fluent Spanish speakers.
DISSEMINATION ACTIVITIES: Activities related to this grant have been featured in a number of times in the UW-Madison College of Agriculture and Life Science newsletters and in popular press articles. Activities of the project were included in the material that earned the project director the honor of being the recipient of a university of Wisconsin-Madison Chancellor's Distinguished Teaching Award. In addition, the web site was designed as a dissemination tools of project partners, students and other stakeholders.
FUTURE INITIATIVES: The success of our activities encouraged us to write a new USDA HEG proposal to advance even further the academic level and expectation of students participating in international-related activities. The grant was selected for funding. Thus newly-designed activities that built on existing collaboration have started September 1, 2007 for a three year period.
Impacts
This project helped students to broaden their views and attitude toward issues related to international agriculture and the role played by the U.S. Colleagues at our university have also been involved in re-thinking how to successfully include an international component to already "crowed" agricultural science curriculum. We will continue our work in developing a set of academic expectations that students will have to meet in order to demonstrate academic (and not just cultural) learning gains associated with an increasingly international-based curriculum. An other unintentional outcome was the writing of a $10,000 grant to help a student who participated in the study tour to return to Mexico for a summer research project on dairy farms. Thus, the annual study tour was the mechanisms through which the project director created new opportunities of collaboration with Mexican counterparts. The face-to-face visits that occurred during the study tour became, in effect, a
starting point for a number of new initiatives. For example, the initial grant was to have us work primarily with the ITESM-CQ. However over time the quality of the study tour improved through the strengthening of our relation with the Universidad de Guadalajara campus (CUAltos) and the Universidad Autonoma del Estado de Mexico (UAEM) in Toluca. Another unintentional outcome was the development of a 6-month sabbatical project for the project director himself. This proposal was awarded a Roble-Garcia Fullbright through the U.S. Department of State and the Council for International Exchange of Scholars (CIES).
Publications
- Michel A. Wattiaux, Jesus Olmos Colmenero and Othon Reynoso. 2007. Contrasts and Challenges of Dairying in Mexico: National statistics cloud the complexity of the Mexican dairy industry. Why aren't Mexican producers able to increase domestic production to meet national demand? Hoard Dairymen (In press).
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Progress 10/01/04 to 09/30/05
Outputs
In the fall of 2004 the seminar titled - Agriculture in Developing Economies, Dairying in Mexico - was offered to sophomores in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences (CALS). Instructors included the project director and Mexican graduate students from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Enrollment was 11 including 6 Dairy Sci majors, 2 Animal Sci. majors with the remaining students from Biology, Applied Agricultural Economics, and Nutritional Sciences. The seminar has been a real success. Schedule and reading assignments have been posted at: http://dairynutrient.wisc.edu/375/page.php?id=23 The average of 12 items in the departmental course evaluation was 4.5 (1 = not at all to 5 = very much). Of the 11 students enrolled in the seminar, 7 participated in the Mexico winter study tour that took place January 3-14, 2005. Web pages have been created to feature the tour: http://dairynutrient.wisc.edu/375/page.php?id=51 This html document includes: (a) the tour
schedule, (b) a gallery of photos and /or a downloadable power point slide show with student commentaries and (c) students evaluation. Briefly, the daily highlights of the tour included: 01/03, Arrival at Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mx; 01/04, historical and cultural center of Guadalajara; 01/05, INIFAP (Instituto Nacional de Investigacion Forestal y Agropecuarios: Tropical Dairy Grazing System, Dual Purpose Cattle Operation of Don Rafael Gonzales; 01/06, 2005 Acatic Dairy coop including a feed mill and a collective dairy replacement raising facilities, visit of Universidad de Guadalajara - Campus Los Altos ; 01/07, 2005 Los Cristeros Tequilla factory, PROAN (Proteinas Animales), feed mill, poultry unit, swine units, and dairy unit; Government sponsored dairy coop for small producers; 01/08, Visit of a Large commercial dairy farm in Aguascalientes El Gigante; 01/09, Colonial City of Guanajuato, a World Heritage (Patrimonio de la Humanidad) with visits including La Basilica, La Universidad
de Guanajuato y Museo de Mineralogia, Las Minas ; 01/10, Campus of Monterrey Tech in Queretaro including a lecture by Dr. Alejandro Ardilla on the history, cultures, religion and social movements of Mexico. La Serpentina Dairy goat farm and specialty cheese. ; 01/11, Dairy Day: Visit of the ISO 9000 approved La Montanesa with a double rotary parlor and La Hondanada a grazing Jersey operation which process and market its own dairy products; 01/12, Cuatitlan on the outskirt of Mexico City to visit the processing of Alpura, the second largest dairy cooperative of Mexico and the archeological site of Theothiuacan, a city built two thousand years ago featuring the third largest pyramid in the world, la pyramid del sol; 01/13, Central de Abastos, the main food market that serves the 20 millions people of Mexico City. Museo Nacional de Antropologia ; 01/14, Traveling back home. Student evaluated the tour by ranking most of the visits 8 or above on a scale of 1 to 10 (1 = an awful visit; 10 =
a fantastic visit). Student descriptions of the site visits and their experiences have been compiled and are is available at: http://dairynutrient.wisc.edu/375/page.php?id=51
PRODUCTS: In 2005 the project has produced: (a) a fall seminar titled Agriculture in Developing Economies, Dairying in Mexico; (b) a 10-day winter study tour in collaboration with both the Instituto Technologico de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey, Campus Queretaro (ITESM-CQ) and the Universidad de Guadalajara; (c) A web-site focusing on the seminar and the study tour.
OUTCOMES: In 2005, 11 undergraduate students have been gained a thorough appreciation for the Mexican culture and its dairy industry. Six of the 11 students participated in the 11-day Mexico study tour.
DISSEMINATION ACTIVITIES: Some material is now available through the web. In addition, in 2005, we included the Universidad de Guadalajara as a partner of this program.
FUTURE INITIATIVES: In the coming year, we are planning (a) to continue the development of the web site featuring the activities related to the grant, (b) to repeat the fall seminar and the study tour, and (c) to further our collaboration with private sector partners to encourage internships in Mexico with U.S. dairy-related companies.
Impacts
This project broadens our students' perspectives on global agricultural issues. Also, it strengthens the competency of our students as partners in a more global agricultural economy.
Publications
- No publications reported this period
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Progress 10/01/03 to 09/30/04
Outputs
In the fall of 2003 a seminar titled: Agriculture in Developing Economies, Dairying in Mexico, was offered to sophomores in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences (CALS). Enrollment was 15. In December, a video-conference session took place between UW-Madison and the Instituto Tecnologico de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey, Campus Queretaro (ITESM-CQ). Of the 15 students enrolled in the seminar, 13 signed-up and participated in the winter study tour that took place January 4-16, 2004. The tour emphasized the understanding of the history and culture of Mexico; how its past is influencing its socio-economic situation, its political structure and its current policies; and how this rich context explain the extreme diversity observed today in its dairy industry. Here is a short list of cities and site visits included in the study tour: Mexico city and surrounding areas: (a) Archeological sites (Teothiuacan); (b) The central de Abastos (the central food market
supplying the 20 millions people of Mexico city); (c) The Alpura milk processing plant (Alpura is the second largest dairy cooperative in Mexico). Visits in Queretaro and surrounding areas: (a) Alpura farm; (b) ITESM-CQ Lectures: (1) Mexican history, culture, political structure and economy; (2) The export/import of the Mexican dairy industry; (3) the dairy herd improvement program of the Holstein association of Mexico; (c) ITESM-CQ research farm visit. Visit of a dairy goat farm (La Serpentina), who gained international reputation of the quality of its cheese and the environmentally-balanced approached used in this production system. Visit of San Miguel de Allende and Guanajuato: two historical towns recognized by the United Nations as Human Heritage Sites (a) Historical sites (Museums, churches, sliver mines, etc.); (b) Visit of low inputs dairy production farms. Visit of Leon state fair and leather market. Visit of Guadalaraja and surrounding area: (a) Resource poor dairy
production farms; (b) Visits of the Cultural Institute, which includes murals from Orozco; (c) Agave production and Tequila processor. Following are two student quotes from the study tour evaluation: 1- I enjoyed visiting the great variety of farms. The diversity from one to the next was interesting. The other part I really enjoyed was learning about the history of the cities we visited and touring around to see the historical sites. 2- My favorite part of the trip was the excellent variety of dairy farms and cultural events. I think it worked well that we were able to learn about some of the history of the country, and then see how that history has affected the way some of the agricultural practices have evolved. I really enjoyed the tour to Alpura Dairy and being able to see the milk processing facility. I think the discussions about the economy and milk marketing were also interesting and essential. In the summer of 2004, four of the thirteen students who participated in the study
tour returned to Mexico for a six-week language summer program offered at the ITESM-CQ. Students elected to live with families rather than stay in the campus dorms.
PRODUCTS: So far the project has produced: (a) a fall seminar series titled Agriculture in Developing Economies, Dairying in Mexico; (b) a series of video teleconferencing between ITESM-CQ in Mexico and UW-Madison; (c) a 10-day winter study tour; (d) Four summer internships.
OUTCOMES: Fourteen undergraduate students have been exposed to a different culture and have gained an international perspectives. In addition, four students have improved their Spanish skills through summer programs in Mexico.
DISSEMINATION ACTIVITIES: None so far, but we plan on developing a web site as second year activities of the grant.
FUTURE INITIATIVES: In the coming year, we are planning (a) to develop a bi-lingual web site featuring the activities related to the grant, (b) to repeat the seminar in the fall of 2004 (including video-conferencing), (c) to plan for the January 2005 study tour and (d) to launch a strong advertisement campaign to encourage students to take advantage of these educational opportunities.
Impacts
This project broadens the perspectives of our students on global agricultural issues. Also, it strengthens the competency of our students as future partners in a more global agricultural economy.
Publications
- No publications reported this period
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