Sidewalks and City Streets: A Model for Vibrant Agricultural Education in Urban American Communities

In 2005, The National Council for Agricultural Education (NCAE) unveiled The Long Range Goal for Agricultural Education also known as 10 x 15. According to NCAE, the primary goal of 10 x 15 was to create 10,000 new agricultural education programs by 2015 that focused on an integrated model of classroom and laboratory instruction, experiential learning, leadership, and personal skill development. In an effort to meet this goal, NCAE identified a need to design programs that focused on specific customers and communities. Urban programing was one area of emphasis cited in the report. In light of the call for several thousand new agricultural education programs nationwide and the dearth of literature to support direction for creating new programs, this instrumental case study resulted in a deeper understanding of the process that led one urban school district to create a new, community-focused agricultural education program. Five themes emerged that informed a model for originating future urban agricultural education programs: 1) reasoned motivation, 2) hourglass advocacy, 3) intentional innovation, 4) community rejuvenation, and 5) program regeneration. Each theme is presented in the sequence in which it unfolded and, subsequently, resulted in the creation of an urban agricultural education program.