Why Ag Ed

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Agricultural Education is an integral part of the Illinois School Code, to view online click here.  (Control F, type in FFA, click next to view)  Classroom instruction, FFA membership, and Supervised Agricultural Experience(SAE) are required for funding.

Start an Agricultural Education Program in 11 Steps - click here

Agricultural Education has a solid track record. Nearly 80 percent of agriculture's graduating seniors enter postsecondary education - that's a 10 percent increase from 2001.

It's working. The program has experienced a steady increase in the number of students in high school agricultural/horticultural education programs and FFA. About 56 percent are urban students and 36 percent are female.

It serves more and more student high school graduation needs. About 78 percent of the departments allow agriculture courses to fulfill high school graduation requirements in academic areas of math, science, language arts, social studies and consumer education.

An average $1902 in state incentive funding is awarded to local programs to purchase state-of-the-art equipment and curriculum materials. Incentive funding has saved many agricultural programs from extinction as well.

Online curriculum with more than 900 agricultural lesson plans have been developed and are provided free of charge to Illinois agricultural teachers. The material, which is based upon Illinois Learning, Occupational Skill and Workplace Skill Standards, is now being used in 42 other states and the curriculum has been adopted in its entirety in 14 states.