Job Summary:
Our client is seeking an Agriculturalist with good farm management skills to join their team. The Agriculturalist needs to have secondary school agriculture teaching background and should be able to maintain professional networks and keep abreast of developments in agricultural science.
The Agriculturalist must be detail-oriented but also keep the bigger picture in mind. Outstanding candidates should be keen problem solvers focused on efficiency and take a hands-on approach to management.
This will be a full-time position that offers support to teachers and students to ensure that they maximize the education potential of the farm. This person will lead garden science and nutrition during the farm visits using the garden for the practical study of what the children learned in the science class.
Duties and Responsibilities:
• Develop/analyze project operations, crops, livestock, staff, training, and farm financial documents and recommend improvements.
• Prepare plans and schedules for planting and harvesting and ensure staff understands expectations and schedules for school visits.
• Collaborate with the team to review and finalize training session plans for the school groups following the provided project curriculum.
• Visit the different divisions to inspect crops, and livestock, and also perform tests on soil and water.
• Ensure seeds, organic fertilizers and pesticides, and other supplies are regularly restocked.
• Schedule repairs, maintenance, and replacement of equipment and machinery.
• Handle the marketing of the farm to meet the annual target of school visits, and selling products produced on the farm like fruits, vegetables, dairy, meat, and grain.
• Develop site infrastructure to support learning outcomes.
• Ensure all staff adhere to health and safety regulations.
• Assist with the recruitment and training of new staff members.
• Collaborate with senior staff to prepare budgets and financial reports.
• Build professional networks and keep abreast of developments in agricultural science.
• Work with the team to engage stakeholders and schools, and also participate in the project meetings and workshops.
• Collaborate with the team to engage the local stakeholders in the district of operations, introduce the project to them for their buy-in, and ensure that they fully understand the goals and objectives of the project.
• Collaborate with the farm managers to conduct workshops to train appointed district farm managers using the central farm as a demo and conduct district workshops to train appointed champion teachers using the set curriculum.
• Facilitate garden science classes, incorporating both environmental science and nutrition education as the learners relate the garden to what they learned in the classroom
• Work closely with the teachers to guide the learners through the farm visit relating the knowledge acquired to a range of curriculum areas (science, social studies, mathematics, language etc.
• Oversee and coordinate students’ hands-on-learning experiences in the garden following the provided curriculum
• Maintain an open garden schedule for teachers
• Attend school-wide events to build relationships
• Monitor, document and report on all activities and the extent of student and teacher participation
• Work with the entire school garden team to maintain the school garden blog
Education, Skills and Qualifications:
• Bachelor’s degree in Vocational Studies in Agriculture with Education or Masters’s in agriculture and trainer of trainers is an added advantage.
• 3 years experience in the facilitation of school farm food production.
• Extensive experience in farm management and leading groups of students and adults from a diverse background in an effective garden classroom, with knowledge and interest in topics including urban gardening botany, environmental science, health and nutrition, and food systems and access.
• Excellent problem-solving, analytical, and critical thinking, time management, listening, needs identification and organisation skills.
• The ability to make decisions in stressful environments.
• Versatile with superb communication and interpersonal skills.
• Patient with the ability to handle group dynamics.
• Ability to build relationships, especially with schools.
• Willingness to work overtime as required.
• Computer skills in MS Office.
Job application procedure
Interested and qualified, Click here to apply.
More Information
- Address Entebbe, Uganda, East Africa
