Standard 1 Aspect A

Standard 1a: Evidence shows that, by the time of program completion, candidates exhibit knowledge, skills, and abilities of professional educators appropriate to their target credential or degree, including: Content, pedagogical, and/or professional knowledge relevant to the credential or degree sought

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Data Sources & Analysis

Data Source 1

T-14 Occupational Experience Form

Description of Data Source:
Occupational experience is a requirement for candidates to attain the Agriculture Specialist Credential. The T-14 Form requires candidates to list their agricultural occupational experience. Candidates list their experience in various areas and the amount of time they worked in each area. They are required to accumulate 3,000 clock-hours of experience. Candidates complete the T-14 Form and then schedule a meeting with the San Joaquin Region Supervisor, who is an employee of the California Department of Education. The California Dept. of Education / San Joaquin Region Ag Education Supervisor interviews each candidate and signs the T-14 form to verify the candidate has attained the agriculture skills they listed on the form. After reviewing the form and meeting with each candidate to verify the candidate has attained the agriculture skills they listed on the form, the supervisor signs the form. 

Perspective Captured from Data Source: Candidate

Rationale for using Data Source:
The T-14 form requires each candidate to list all of their occupational experience including both paid and unpaid experience. This experience is critical to ensuring candidates are able to develop the necessary content and professional knowledge needed as an Ag Education Specialist.  

Specific Elements of Data Source:
Candidates’ documented and verified hours of occupational experience 

Definition of Success for Each Element:
Candidates are required to accumulate a minimum of 3,000 clock hours of occupational experience prior to placement for final student teaching.

Displays of Analyzed Data:
Table 1: Summary of Candidates’ Occupational Experience by Semester 

Link to Full Database:  T-14 Student Hours of Occupational Experience

Interpretation of Data:
Data collected from the past four semesters indicates that program candidates have demonstrated occupational experience necessary to develop an understanding of content knowledge related to selected agriculture occupations. All candidates accumulated at least the minimum of 3,000 or more hours, and the mean total greatly exceeds the 3000 hour minimum.

Data Source 2

CI 161: Methods and Materials in Agricultural Education: Curriculum Project

Description of Data Source:
CI 161: Methods and Materials in Agricultural Education is the course all agriculture candidates take during their first semester in the credential program. The course focuses on teaching methodology. In this course candidates develop and demonstrate their knowledge for teaching agriculture lessons. The curriculum project assignment is designed to focus students on planning and developing course outlines, units of instruction, and lesson plans for teaching agriculture subject matter.

Perspective Captured from Data Source: Faculty

Rationale for using Data Source:
Because candidates focus on planning and developing course outlines, units of instruction, and lesson plans for teaching agriculture subject matter, we believe that this assignment is a way to evaluate whether or not candidates are developing the requisite pedagogical knowledge to be effective Ag Educators.

Specific Elements of Data Source:
We are using assignment grades to evaluate candidate success. 

Definition of Success for Each Element:
Candidates are expected to receive a grade of “B” (80%)
or better although a “C” (70%) grade is accepted as meeting the learning outcome. Our goal is for at least the majority of candidates to meet this learning outcome with a “B” (80%) grade or higher. The CI 161 Course Curriculum Project consists of five graded components: a Course Outline, Unit Outline, and at least three consecutive lesson plans. Each component is evaluated by the instructor up to 20 pts for a possible score of 100 pts.

Displays of Analyzed Data:
Figure 1: Mean Scores of CI 161 Course Curriculum Project

Link to Full Dataset:  CI 161 Teaching & Curr Project Data

Interpretation of Data:
Data from 2017 was excluded as the scoring rubric used was changed (150 points possible) so it wouldn’t be appropriate to compare those scores with other years. The data collected for 2015, 2016, 2018 and 2019 utilized the same rubric, on which 100 points were possible. Data from 2020 was not included since the CI 161 course was delivered online due to COVID restrictions which created new challenges for students not comparable with those in previous years. Data collection will resume in Fall 2021, the next time the course is offered. Findings from 2015-16 and 2018-2019 demonstrate that, overall, program candidates scored well above the programmatic target of a “C” (70%) grade or better on this assignment. This suggests that candidates leave the program with a solid foundation for developing and delivering effective instruction.  

Candidates' scores have varied and appear to have decreased in recent years.  There is no clear explanation for this decrease. However, our program has experienced significant growth over the past five years so there is more variance in the skill level of candidates in our program.

It is important to note that the assignment grades do not indicate candidates’ knowledge of all the particular focal content areas covered within the course. Still, the mean scores across the semesters suggest that candidates have demonstrated a strong general knowledge of content and pedagogy.

Data Source 3

Agriculture Specialist Graduate Survey

Description of Data Source: 
Approximately every five years the Agriculture Specialist Program administers a survey to program completers to determine their perceptions of how well the program prepared them for teaching agriculture. The Graduate Survey seeks to measure the effectiveness of the agricultural coursework in preparing graduates to teach the core areas of agriculture.  Based on the courses completed at Fresno State, participants indicate their perceived level of preparation by selecting the appropriate number using a 1 to 5 Likert-type scale: 1 = Not Prepared, 2 = Less than Adequately Prepared, 3 = Adequately Prepared, 4 = More than Adequately Prepared, and 5 = Well Prepared.  Respondents were also asked to indicate N/A if they completed coursework at another institution.

Perspective Captured from Data Source: Program Completers

Rationale for using Data Source:
The Agriculture Specialist Graduate Survey provides us with candidates’ perceptions of how well the program prepared them with content and pedagogy necessary to carry out their role as agriculture teachers.

Specific Elements of Data Source:
Completers’ scores on the Core Agriculture Areas and the Agricultural Education Professional Competencies

Definition of Success for Each Element:
Overall mean scores of 3.00 or greater which would indicate that Graduates are at least “Adequately Prepared” to teach the Core Agriculture Areas and Agricultural Education Professional Competencies.

Displays of Analyzed Data:

• 2021 data summary 
• 2012 data summary

Table 1. Summary of participants' level of preparedness on the Technical Competency Scale.

Table 2. Summary of participants' level of preparedness on the Professional Competency Scale.

Link to Full Dataset:  2021 Ag Ed Graduate Survey Data

Interpretation of Data:
Because the program only captured data from the graduate survey in 2012 and 2021, we only have two cycles of data to analyze. Graduates indicated that they were at least “Adequately Prepared” in all technical and professional competencies areas except for Ag Business/Economics, Natural Resources, and in preparing for an Incentive Grant Review.  These competencies will be examined and efforts made to improve the curricula through a review of the current course curriculum in these areas.  Efforts will be made to work collaboratively with the departments and faculty offering our Ag Business and natural resources courses in an effort to improve the level of preparation of our candidates in these areas.

Next Steps: 
The data for occupational experience indicates that all candidates had the minimum or more of occupational experience. We plan to continue to encourage candidates to seek internships or paid employment in agricultural occupations to ensure they meet this requirement. The University Agricultural Laboratory and the Fresno agricultural community both provide opportunities to help students meet this requirement.

The CI 161 curriculum project will continue to be reviewed and refined to meet the needs of our current and future candidates. It provides a good foundation for preparing candidates for our initial student teaching assignment. In the future, we will work to analyze the rubric scores by attribute area, in an effort to better understand specific areas where candidates are having success and where there may be challenges.

The graduate data we analyzed for this aspect indicates that, overall, our program provides strong support for candidates to develop the content and pedagogical knowledge to become successful agriculture teachers. However, we realize that these assessment measures need to be refined to capture how candidates’ pedagogical and content knowledge is developed across the program and within specific courses.

Our program plans to examine the existing survey and develop revisions that better capture the pedagogical and content knowledge we aim to develop in our candidates. Our goal will be to revise the survey and then administer the revised survey every five years.

Aspect B →