Teaching Agriculture in Colorado, Learning from Indonesia

Teacher Heather Riffel is playing an instrumental role in the development of Colorado’s youth workforce. Through her work as an agriculture teacher at Boulder’s Career and Technical School (CTEC), Heather empowers students with the skills they need to contribute productively to the$20 billion dollar agricultural industry in Colorado. It was in Indonesia, however, where she found ways to strengthen the link between her work and the industry.

Through the Teachers for Global Classrooms (TGC) program Riffel recognized her district needed to do more to align vocational training directly with local community business needs.  “For too long [education] has clung to traditional programming that does not reflect the changing needs of our workforce….  I believe we need a wider input from our community, including local businesses and entrepreneurs as well as a city and county representatives.”

During her TGC international field experience, Riffel traveled to Java Island, Indonesia, to see firsthand how Agricultural Education Centers there equip students with the skills required to gain employment in the agricultural sector. “After seeing how much more expanded the link between education and industry is in Indonesia, I decided to create a new Career and Technical Education Advisory Board that involves leadership and outreach personnel from a variety of leading businesses in our community,” RIffel said.

Building upon the vocational model she researched in Indonesia, where success is measured by the number of students hired directly into the industry, Riffel set out to reinvigorate the role of vocational education, increase community member input, and strengthen the workforce training she offers her students. The new Advisory Board will engage industry members to review curriculum, identify new essential skills and trends, and guide training.  “I think that vocational schooling in America is still seen as more traditional and not as “21st century” in our educational policy.  I feel that a more systemic “reinvention” of vocational education in America could have a profound impact on how students learn and what employment opportunities are available to them.”

TGC is a program of the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs and administered by IREX.