Mary Rodriguez

Education is a fundamental human right and a crucial tool for sustainable human capacity development, which can advance the economic growth of a country. Yet for many children in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), quality education remains out of reach. This study aimed to identify the barriers and challenges to enacting Sustainable Development Goal 4: “Ensuring Inclusive, Equitable, and Quality Education and the Promotion of Lifelong Learning Opportunities for All”. Through a content analysis of the relevant literature, we identified three themes: funding constraints, access and inclusion, and teacher education. Regarding funding, issues of resource allocation, technical capacity, and accountability were identified as primary factors requiring intervention strategies to become fully realized in SSA. When exploring access and inclusion, we found that incorporating students with disabilities, gender disparities, physical barriers, and inadequate curriculum are essential factors limiting quality education in SSA. Finally, teachers’ conditions and training emerged as crucial challenges to reach quality pedagogy. Some SSA countries have improved their efforts for quality education, but these barriers and challenges continue to impact education for all children. A new perspective on mitigating these impediments can address several factors responsible for the exclusion of diverse groups from accessing quality education in the SSA region.

Background: College students need the ability to generalize and apply solutions through reflective practice. University faculty need professional development to use authentic cases to prepare students for the future. Purpose: This study was to explore the experiences of faculty through a year-long professional development program that included a field experience contextually focused on natural disasters. Methodology: This phenomenological study used personal interviews with faculty about the essence of the shared experience. Data were analyzed through open coding, axial coding, and theoretical triangulation from Kolb’s experiential learning model. Findings/Conclusions: Participant interviews yielded 32 codes that were categorized into 12 themes and theoretically triangulated into the four components of Kolb’s experiential learning model: Experience, Reflection, Generalization, and Application. The concrete experience themes were connection to disasters, to other faculty, and new perspectives. Faculty reflected on their expertise, the importance of engaging experiences, and new realizations. Generalization broadened disciplinary perspectives and connections. Faculty gained teaching applications, including leadership concepts, and humanizing science. Implication: Professional development for faculty using experiential learning can improve teaching capacity for the next generation to solve complex problems of social, economic, and health concerns within communities.

The Journal of International Agricultural and Extension Education is the official refereed publication of the Association for International Agricultural and Extension Education (AIAEE). Its purpose is to enhance the research and knowledge base of agricultural and extension education from an international perspective.

Introduction to Volume 30, Issue 2 of the JIAEE.

Because climate change has severely impacted global bee populations by depleting their habitats and food sources, beekeepers must implement management practices to adapt to changing climates. However, beekeepers in El Salvador lack information about necessary climate change adaptation strategies. This study explored Salvadoran beekeepers’ experiences adapting to climate change. The researchers used a phenomenological case study approach and conducted semi-structured interviews with nine Salvadoran beekeepers who were members of The Cooperative Association for Marketing, Production, Savings, and Credit of Beekeepers of Chalatenango (ACCOPIDECHA). The beekeepers perceived water and food scarcity, as well as extreme weather events (e.g., increasing temperature, rain, winds), as the leading climate change-induced challenges to their production. Such challenges have augmented their honey bees’ physiological need for water, limited their movement patterns, decreased apiary safety, and increased the incidence of pests and diseases, all of which have led to honey bee mortality. The beekeepers shared adaptation strategies, including box modification, apiary relocation, and food supplementation. Although most beekeepers accessed climate change information using the internet, they struggled to understand and apply pertinent information unless they received it from trusted ACCOPIDECHA personnel. Salvadoran beekeepers require information and demonstrations to improve their climate change adaptation strategies and implement new ones to address the challenges they experience.

Updated guidelines for submitting manuscripts to JIAEE.

The Journal of International Agricultural and Extension Education is the official refereed publication of the Association for International Agricultural and Extension Education (AIAEE). Its purpose is to enhance the research and knowledge base of agricultural and extension education from an international perspective.

Climate change is the primary environmental threat to subsistence farmers’ productivity in Peru. Adaptation is promoted as the best mechanism to cope with climate change in subsistence agricultural livelihoods. However, climatic adaptability depends on the resources the farmer has access to or can use, which are not always adequate to respond effectively to the speed and aggressiveness of climate change. This study explored the local factors and dynamics (assets) influencing the climate adaptability processes of subsistence farmers in Huayhuay, Peru. Twenty subsistence farmers participated in semi-structured interviews within a basic qualitative design. The results brought to light 18 local factors and dynamics that influence the coping mechanisms of climate adaptability. These findings support other investigations that demonstrate the difficulty of climate change adaptation agricultural communities face. The difficulty of climate change adaptation has rooted the interrelationships of assets of different natures within the same adaptive process. Future research and interventions should encourage the active participation of farmers in local climate action and evaluate the efficiency and effectiveness of farmers' adaptability mechanisms, considering the role of each local-scale factor and dynamic.