The Smith-Hughes Act 1917: The Agriculture Teacher Shortage

If you are involved in an agriculture organization whether it's FFA or 4-H you’ve heard the biggest challenge we are facing; the agriculture teacher shortage. Programs are closing, chapters are shrinking and students aren’t getting involved in the most important industry to mankind. With a growing industry with such high demand, our industry needs more students to choose a path in agriculture. How can we do that if we don’t have enough teachers to encourage them and teach them about the industry? Let's go back to the beginning; where it all started, the Smith-Hughes act.

1917. The year the Smith-Hughes act was passed. The purpose of the Smith-Hughes act was to promote vocational agriculture to train people who wanted to go into an agriculture
Every ag classroom across America is filled with bright minds that will eventually be the next CEO of a company, a politician focused on agriculture, a scientist that works on ways to prevent diseases for crops, or maybe even an ag teacher. But who will inspire them, who will activate a passion, who will get them involved, who will guide them? The answer ag teachers. The sad part is not every student that has a passion for ag, has the opportunity to learn from an ag teacher. In 2015,42 programs closed due to no ag teacher or lack of funding. If each program had 10 students that would be 420 students who would not be able to learn about the industry that they love. That was 2015 alone there has been many schools who have not had a program for years, some may have never had one, to begin with. When you think of how many students go without having their full potential reached is heartbreaking.

In the year 2015 there were 1,028 open positions in agriculture education. And the number keeps growing. Many ag teachers who have taught for years are going into retirement leaving their position unfilled. Nationwide 248 ag teachers went into retirement, 619 left teaching altogether, 207 teachers are not licensed to teach agriculture. Those are just a few statistics on the
Wouldn’t so many people love to teach students about agriculture and continue their journey in FFA, but as an advisor? This is the mindset of a lot of students who go into ag education. “A lot of former FFA members go into it thinking it will be fun and a continuation of their FFA career and then realize there's more to it than that and they don't stay for long which creates a huge turnover. Teaching Ag is a high paced and stressful job and that is what turns a lot of people away from it. In order for a program to be successful a lot of work has to be done and it takes a great time commitment and little monetary compensation and most people aren't willing to do that.Your heart really has to be in it, and the rewards that come from it are more enjoyable than any monetary compensation, just knowing you've made a difference for a least one kid.”- A very wise Ag