How protecting local farms can protect local communities

Suitable for 14 to 19-year-olds (secondary and high schools, and college), this article and accompanying activity sheet can be used in the classroom or shared with students online.

This resource links to KS4 and KS5 Geography, Agriculture and Careers.

It can also be used as a careers resource and links to Gatsby Benchmarks:
Gatsby Benchmark 2: Learning from career and labour market information
Gatsby Benchmark 4: Linking curriculum learning to careers

• Small farms make up more than half of the agricultural land in the US and produce just over a fifth of the country’s agricultural produce. Not only do they play a vital role in feeding people, small farms are also integral to local communities. And yet, many small farmers have limited access to resources and find themselves at a social disadvantage due to bias and prejudice. This teaching resource explains the work of E’licia Chaverest, from the Small Farms Research Center at Alabama A&M University, USA, who is supporting these farmes to help them manage successful and resilient farms.
• This resource also contains an interview with E’licia about her career path. If you or your students have a question for her, you can submit it online – go to the article using the Futurum link below and scroll to the bottom of the page. E’licia will reply!
• The activity sheet provides ‘talking points’ (based on Bloom’s Taxonomy) to prompt students to reflect on E’licia’s work, and tasks them to design an outreach programme to help socially disadvantaged small farmers connect with their communities.

This resource was first published on Futurum Careers, a free online resource and magazine aimed at encouraging 14-19-year-olds worldwide to pursue careers in science, tech, engineering, maths, medicine (STEM) and social sciences, humanities and the arts for people and the economy (SHAPE).

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