American society has long relied on agriculture as its foundation. From the roots of early farming to the modern era of AI-powered production, our food systems have continuously reinvented themselves.

But many young people don’t want to stay and manage the family farm anymore. They’re drawn to cities, to new career paths, to technology – leading to worldwide labor shortages in agriculture.

How do we introduce students who didn’t grow up on the farm to the idea of agriculture as a career, and let them know that the ag industry needs their tech skills too?

UC Davis faculty Yufang Jin and Ali Moghimi are passionate about this challenge. Through both the AIFS High School AI Tech Camp and the AgTech Workshop for Teachers, these professors are opening up a world of new possibilities.

AgTech Workshop for Teachers

With support from both AIFS and Western Sustainable Agriculture Research Education, or Western SARE, Jin and Moghimi launched a new workshop for high school teachers and community college instructors.

The AgTech Workshop is a professional development program at UC Davis that introduces teachers to advanced technologies — including drones, robotics, and AI — that are revolutionizing the way farmers are producing our food.

Over the 2-day workshop, teachers gain knowledge and skills to develop curricula and strategies for educating the next generation of agricultural professionals. They experience innovative pedagogy and high-impact practices amidst rapidly changing technology.

The workshop brings together up to 25 teachers from across California, Nevada, Oregon, and Washington. The workshop has proven to be in high demand, receiving more applicants than the capacity allows for. The next AgTech Workshop for teachers is planned in 2025, and options are being considered to further expand the program.

Day One

Drone Technology (Unmanned Aerial Vehicles, or UAVs)

• Introduction to drone technology
• Operating a drone, from mission planning to manual and autonomous flight operation
• Drone-based sensing technologies, such as multi- and hyper-spectral imaging
• Applications of drones in agriculture
• Flight safety and regulations

Day Two

Robotics and Automation

• Introduction to principles and technologies of the sensing, perception, control-and- actuation systems
• Understanding the capabilities and limitations of robots (e.g., weeding robots)
• Applications of robots in agriculture
• Introduction to AI

Instructors:

Sean Hogan, Ph.D., IGIS Academic Coordinator II, Informatics and GIS (IGIS) Statewide Program, Division of Agriculture and Natural Resources, UC Davis

Yufang Jin, Ph.D., Professor of Remote Sensing and Ecosystem Change, Environmental Scientist, Department of Land, Air and Water Resources, UC Davis

Andrew Lyons, Ph.D., Program Coordinator, Informatics and GIS (IGIS) Statewide Program, Division of Agriculture and Natural Resources, UC Berkeley

Ali Moghimi, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Teaching, Department of Biological and Agricultural Engineering, UC Davis

Stavros Vougioukas, Ph.D., Professor and Vice Chair, Department of Biological and Agricultural Engineering, UC Davis

This workshop is supported by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, National Institute of Food and Agriculture (USDA-NIFA) award no. 2022-38640-37490-WS3SI (Western Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education - SARE, project no. WPDP23-013) and AFRI Competitive Grant no. 2020-67021-32855 (AI Institute for Next Generation Food Systems - AIFS, project no. 1024262).