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strive for excellence. These programs will produce human
resources with a better capacity to generate knowledge and
greater leadership ability (among other skills). Graduates
will staff agricultural universities and faculties of agriculture
and, through their work, catalyze reform. The key investment
elements in achieving curriculum and program
reform indirectly, by improving the quality and quantity of
higher agricultural degrees, include:
■ Identifying academic institutions that could become
centers of excellence or hubs for obtaining higher
degrees.
■ Facilitating dialogue between the centers of excellence
and universities that could potentially supply them with
degree candidates. Those universities may be unable to
afford the staff or infrastructure to support the volume
or quality of higher degrees needed.
■ Upgrading facilities at the centers of excellence.
■ Supporting academic staff capacity with training and
pedagogical skills and tools.
■ Underwriting some or all of the cost (fees, travel, subsistence)
of students accepted from smaller universities to
attend the center of excellence.
■ Subsidizing research costs in candidates’ home countries
while they fulfill their degree requirements. This item
would include students’ costs in undertaking research and
supervisors’ costs in undertaking visits to the research sites.
Anticipating future knowledge and skill needs for
the sector. Investment in brainstorming about future
knowledge and skill needs for the changing agricultural
sector can lead to better education planning and resource
allocation (box 2.8 presents an example from Indonesia).
In the United States, the Association of Public and Land-
Grant Universities launched the Kellogg Commission on the
Future of State and Land-Grant Universities in 1999, 1 and
Box 2.8 The Pursuit of Relevance Spurs Reform in Bogor Agricultural University, Indonesia
Bogor Agricultural University—Institut Pertanian
Bogor (IPB)—was a pioneer in higher agricultural education
in Indonesia. It developed the first four-year
undergraduate degree program in 1974 and Indonesia’s
first graduate school of agriculture in 1975, actively
recruited students from high schools throughout the
country, introduced community extension programs,
and established a regional planning board. More
recently, IPB envisioned additional changes in management,
organization, academic programming, community
participation, and international outreach to
continue developing and remain relevant.
These changes were reflected in the university’s
decisions to: reengineer the academic and administrative
functions in education, research, and community
services; develop human resources; undertake activities
to generate revenue; revitalize the financial and
funding systems, infrastructure, and infrastructure
management; and strengthen the management of
information systems and IT facilities. Improved governance
was a prerequisite for these changes, including
the creation of a board of trustees and an academic
senate, the use of auditors, the development of university
organizations, and portfolio analyses by all university
units.
Source: Wirakartakusumah 2007; www.IPB.org.
The curriculum was transformed by introducing
more programs that involved additional stakeholders,
most importantly the community. To reinforce the
involvement with stakeholders, IPB emphasized the
formation of a network and good working relationship
among the various stakeholders in the Bogor area.
Aside from IPB, these stakeholders consist of research
institutions, the private sector, NGOs, farmers, and
rural communities. Examples of collaboration that are
already in place include the Integrated Pest Management
and Biological Control project in northern West
Java and southern Sumatra, a shrimp restocking project
in Sukabumi, an animal husbandry project, and
reforestation and community participation projects.
An entrepreneurial spirit was developed by involving
students, communities, and the private sector in joint
projects (such as a fish-processing project currently
underway), by refocusing research at university centers,
encouraging the development and submission of
patents by the university community, encouraging
agribusiness incubator programs, renewing the focus
on community outreach and rural mediation programs,
emphasizing programs featuring student -
centered learning, and developing effective international
networks and linkages.
MODULE 2: THEMATIC NOTE 1: REFORMING PUBLIC AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION AT THE TERTIARY LEVEL 127