Allison Hoover (@allihoov), Inaugural AgriCorps Volunteer! #Liberia

Allison Hoover

The semester is wrapping up, student teachers are coming back to Penn State, and graduates are on the hunt for jobs! One student however, knows exactly what she is doing and it is a lot different than what most normal graduates would do! Allison Hoover (@allihoov), has been hired to be one of twelve, first time volunteers to work with AgriCorps in Liberia for a year!

For as long as Allison can remember, she has wanted to travel. She has studied abroad in Costa Rica and has traveled to Thailand and Cambodia which have all opened her eyes to new opportunities and has prepared her for this experience. When she was hired by AgriCorps, she discovered that she would be working in Liberia. Liberia is a small country (about the size of Pennsylvania) located in the western coast of sub-Saharan Africa.


The volunteers will be placed in different villages in Bong County which is northeast of the capital city of Monrovia. The mission of AgriCorps is to serve the impoverished and food insecure communities of Liberia by empowering youth with agricultural education. Allison will be working with local secondary schools teaching science with the agricultural content. They will be serving as experts in youth leadership and development by designing 4-H clubs, be developing school gardens, and design programs to empower the youth in skills that would be similar to an SAE experience.

Allison is looking forward to seeing Africa in all of its beauty! It has so much cultural history and geographic diversity that she can’t wait to immerse herself in it. She also realizes that it will be a lot different than what she is used to. The challenges with not having any family or friends there, no running water, or luxurious comforts for a whole year will be hard, but she knows that it is the right plan for her. “One thing I learned in my student teaching experience is that I love teaching kids… especially in the setting of agriculture education. There are countless beautiful souls in this world, and I will get to meet, grow, and establish friendships with them.”

Allison is going to do great things in the future and through her hard work and passion, she is going to make an impact in every life that she touches in Liberia! We all at Penn State wish her luck in her success and can't wait to hear the amazing stories that she will bring back home with her! Congratulations Allison!

If you would like to learn more about what the AgriCorps has to offer, and if it is right for you, please click on the provided link or check out this blog!

To learn more about starting on the path to having a career that makes a positive impact on the lives of students across the globe by becoming an agricultural educator, please contact the agricultural teacher education program at teachag@psu.edu. Follow us on Twitter at TeachAgPSU, on Facebook, or on our blog! 

Olivia Murphy-Sweet
Student Blogger
Teach Ag! Avenger
Twitter Handle @OSweetMurph
2016 Agricultural Education Student Teacher 

AgriCorps: A new frontier of learning

The Liberian Flag

In America, we are fortunate enough to have food ready when needed. McDonald's, Starbucks, grocery stores, are all in walking and driving distance for most of us. Everything is easily accessible in America. Other countries don’t have the luxury of food being available every day. Over 1.4 billion people live on less than $1.25 per day. 70% of those people are living in extreme poverty in rural and agrarian (meaning that they depend on agriculture as its primary means for support and sustenance) areas.  With the world’s population growing, reaching 9 billion people in 2050, food security should be our top priority. Blaze Currie, Executive Director, works with a program similar to the Peace Corps, where students who have a degree in Agriculture, can travel for a year to teach in primary and secondary schools in a developing country about agriculture education. This amazing program is called AgriCorps. 

Ever heard of the saying “You can’t teach an old dog new tricks?” Agricorps took notice to the fact that over 60% of the world’s population was under 25 years of age, which showed them to focus on young learners.  They hoped by teaching the younger population, that knowledge would trickle upwards to the older population. The goal was to eliminate the outdated farming traditions that have been passed down for generations in these villages.  Next they developed a model of what they wanted to be taught in all of the different counties within each country where AgriCorps was stationed. There had to be a school where instruction would be in a garden or a field, have a home project where the students could plant their own seeds and compare it to their parent’s gardens, and then have 4H/FFA development in the classroom. Ultimately the model looked like this:

Example of the AgriCorps
3 Circle Model

Does that look familiar to one we already have based in the United States for FFA? If you said YES than you are correct! Here in the US, the FFA established their 3 circle model that entails an SAE project, classroom instruction, and FFA leadership club. AgriCorps built upon the existing model and tailored it towards different countries.  

Starting in August of this year, 12 volunteers will be stationed in Liberia for a 1 year commitment. They will each be 30 minutes away from one another so that if they wanted, they could talk to each other about lessons and potentially have competitions in the different counties! 

If you would like to learn more AgriCorp you can go to the following website, http://agricorps.org  and explore this awesome opportunity!

To learn more about starting on the path to having a career that makes a positive impact on the lives of students across the globe by becoming an agricultural educator, please contact the agricultural teacher education program at teachag@psu.edu. Follow us on Twitter at TeachAgPSU, on Facebook, or on our blog!

Olivia Murphy-Sweet
Student Blogger
Teach Ag! Avenger
Twitter Handle @OSweetMurph
2016 Agricultural Education Student Teacher