On campuses across the Prairies, spaces at
agricultural schools are a hot ticket these days.
As news spreads that a growing food industry sector is offering jobs to graduates, places in agricultural schools are in demand.
It has allowed agricultural schools to raise their academic demands.
“We find that students are perhaps a little more serious,” said University of Saskatchewan College of Agriculture dean John Stewart. “You have to have a higher high school average to get into agriculture than you did previously. There’s more demand.”
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At Saskatchewan, as well as at the University of Manitoba, the minimum average required out of high school is 70 percent.
“The average academic rank of the students that have come in has gone up,” said University of Manitoba’s agriculture college dean James Elliot. “We get a lot more applications than we accept.”
The University of Alberta is an exception. Faculty members there say the agriculture/food business management program developed in 1992 has not yet “caught on” with students.
“There’s not as much demand for it as we’d like,” said chair of the program Scott Jeffrey. “But the trend in the numbers is upwards.”
The entry requirement for the program is 60 to 65 percent, but most applicants have an average of about 70 percent. Students have to complete a year of post-secondary education before enrolling in the program.
Across the Prairies, transfers from other faculties also are becoming common. Students in other fields are hearing about agriculture’s potential and moving over.
“It doesn’t take long for word to get around the campus when there’s jobs in agriculture,” said Elliot.
The University of Saskatchewan recently created the Program for Agricultural Co-operative Education, a program for agricultural students. PACE allows students to work in a business atmosphere similar to a potential future job.
Co-op programs were introduced with recent changes in curricula.
“We’ve been looking at trends, consulting with industry, consulting with government, consulting with other universities across Canada to see what they’re doing and beginning to focus and bring a consensus as to what the program should be,” said Stewart.
The University of Alberta is considering a co-op project co-ordinated with its faculty of business.
“When (Alberta) was looking at revising the program and the program structure, they surveyed alumni … and what came back was if there was one thing they would’ve liked to have more of, it was exposure to management skills, as opposed to technical skills which they’ve got a lot of,” said Jeffrey.
The schools found there was a market for graduates with business skills.
The focus was not to be shifted entirely from agriculture. Students still take a majority of classes in their chosen fields.
However, sprinkled between those classes are strong doses of business education.
“Now in our group, like in any other types of business, people need to be more self-starters, team players, and people that are ready to go out and present themselves…,” said Alain Gagnon, marketing manager of the Royal Bank’s agriculture and agri-business department.
“They need to be much more business-oriented than maybe they used to be.”
