Physically Distant yet Socially Connected. This USDA funded project brings state-of-the-art technology to agriculture education in the Pacific Northwest.
We provide immersive experiences for middle and high school Pacific Northwest youth and educators to explore agriculture, including virtual reality and online activities that they help create. Experiences range from half-hour interactive agriculture activities starting now to a virtual challenge event closing the project next year.
We hope to help everyone involved in our project - educators, students, and trained volunteers - build relevant agriculture knowledge and skills through activities exploring different kinds of agricultural practices with a "farm to table" approach. We also want to equip those involved with new communication tools to promote meaningful participation and impactful learning in virtual environments and with innovative technology.
We grow the Oregon 4-H Teens as Teachers (TAT) program. In the DIVE4ag TAT program, high school youth develop leadership skills by creating educational materials and teaching younger students.
A Virtual Agriculture Challenge event will close our DIVE4Ag project. Educators and youth will be able to sign up as groups to engage in a task-based challenge where they get to use virtual and augmented reality (AR/VR) tools to create their own agriculture story, including experiencing the Metaverse.
Content, materials, and resources are delivered to middle and high school teachers, other educators and volunteers through virtual professional development sessions.
Once our agriculture apps are released, we will design and disseminate DIVE4Ag supplementary lesson plans for middle and high school level youth in preparation for the app learning experience and/or to build from it.
One-and-a-half-hour long virtual opportunities are offered to youth to learn from and interact with agricultural STEM professionals in lively discussions and hands-on activities. High school youth will design and lead the program with the support of adult mentors.
We develop Virtual Reality (VR) field experiences featuring farms, agriculture experiment stations and processing facilities. These experiences will be accessible on free smartphone and tablet apps, showing different types of agricultural practices from farm to table or farm to you. They can also be accessed with Virtual Reality headsets.