Thursday, March 28, 2024

Farm course gets NZQA tick

Avatar photo
A programme designed to engage primary and secondary school students in farming can now be used to gain NCEA credits. 
Reading Time: 2 minutes

The resources, trialled in 10 primary and 16 secondary schools last year, help students learn more about the sector and promote awareness of the wide range of career opportunities.  

It was developed by the Red Meat Profit Partnership (RMPP), a Primary Growth Partnership programme working to help the red meat sector increase productivity and profitability. 

Resources, including assessments within the programme, have now received the New Zealand Qualification Authority (NZQA) Quality Assured Assessment Materials (QAAM) trademark.  

RMPP’s project manager for people capability Diane Falconer said the resources were developed in response to farmers and the need identified by the Ministry for Primary Industry (MPI) for more skilled and qualified people to enter the industry.  It will be rolled out to further schools this year. 

“MPI’s 2014 People Powered report identified the red meat sector will need about 11,000 more qualified people by 2025, particularly to achieve its targets of doubling the value of primary industry exports,” Falconer said.  

“Also, 75% of farmers agree not enough young people are coming into the industry and there’s a need to address the perception that farming is for secondary school students who are struggling.  

Dunedin’s St Hilda’s Collegiate was among the trial schools. John Bradfield, the school’s Head of Maths, said the maths department had used the resource across all of its Level 3 statistics classes, using adapted NCEA Level 2 inferences work for Level 3 students. 

“The trial went very well and we will be continuing to use the resource,” he said. “We are always looking for material like this. There is a lot of depth to the data provided including around stock. We used data such as lamb weights, dates and single and multiple births.” 

John McPhail, of St Bede’s College in Christchurch, said he had written plans to incorporate the secondary resources into teaching for 2017. 

“They are a great resource to get ideas for planning units of work,” he said. “I have adapted them slightly to meet my needs but I would assume most teachers would do that.” 

The primary school resource, for years seven and eight, is designed to fit into the school curriculum and be applicable to different subjects.  

Falconer said the resource looks at the common stereotypes and aims to debunk the myths and broaden understanding around the many skills farmers need. 

“It’s designed so that at the end of the programme, the children get to do a farm visit.” 

The secondary school programme includes a cross-curriculum resource for maths and science for years nine and 10. There are additional resources for NCEA English, Maths and Science, including an agricultural resource for creative writing for NCEA Level One English and one on genetics for the Level Two maths statistics programme. 

Total
0
Shares
People are also reading