Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture

Director: How does the Leopold Center use technology to share the latest information?

Back to Leopold Letter Spring 2008

By JERRY DeWITT, Leopold Center director

Q. How does the Leopold Center use technology to share the latest information?

One of my goals since coming to the Leopold Center more than two years ago has been to understand the incredible power and penetration of Leopold Center research via the Internet. Since 1995, the Leopold Center has maintained a web site, www.leopold.iastate.edu, but it has been difficult to determine the reach of that information.

In an attempt to accurately gauge the usage of our web site, we switched to a server maintained by Iowa State University Extension, a primary partner in helping the Leopold Center bring results of our research to the public. This server collects information on the number of requests for files, types of visitors, and which pages and files are viewed most often at our web site. For the past year, we’ve been receiving monthly reports of web site traffic.

In December 2007, the Leopold Center web site recorded a milestone: 2 million total “hits” during the year (a “hit” represents a request for information from the server, including images, page views and other files). A better indicator of interest might be the number of web site visitors, which has averaged nearly 22,000 each month during the past year.

Particularly striking is the number of PDF files downloaded or viewed every month on the Leopold Center web site (PDFs, or Portable Document Format, are viewed with a free reader). These are the kind of files we use for most of our research summaries and reports. Our web site visitors download or view an average of nearly 40,000 PDFs every month, and the numbers continue to climb.

These figures speak to the need for Leopold Center research, and the value perceived by the public. Thanks to our communication specialist, Laura Miller, our IT student Charles Richards and others who keep the Leopold Center at the forefront of timely information sharing and easy access.

Q. Beyond the numbers, how has technology been used to transmit other information and research?

Leopold Center-funded research projects have generated many creative on-line tools and interactive resources (check out a few samples). One example is the Iowa Produce Market Potential Calculator that allows the user to see the demand and supply for Iowa fruit and vegetable crops. Our partners are expanding that tool and they are building a similar tool for biomass production.

We recently have begun to include links to podcasts of Leopold Center lectures and other sustainable agriculture events. You can listen to John Ikerd’s 2008 Shivvers presentation about the importance of small family farms, and hear recent lectures by Leopold Center Distinguished Fellow Fred Kirschenmann.

Q. What can we do in the future?

I hope the Leopold Center can move to increased use of podcasts on timely topics, more recorded audio lectures, images and video clips. I envision farmers and educators receiving critical Leopold Center information and data in the field, on the road, and at the office on personal hand-held devices. Our research findings should be at their fingertips.

The key to better understanding and success in sustainable agriculture is not only having access to data and information, but also having the opportunity to interact and test the data; we need a human touch as well. Our technology and approach to sharing information can provide both.

Q. What about teaching and new technologies?

I also have been sampling a new educational delivery tool this semester as a co-instructor with Kathleen Delate for an organic agriculture course in the College of Agriculture and Life Science’s Brenton Center. We use a meeting system called Adobe Connect, and we conduct a three-hour class “live” every Tuesday evening. About 32 undergraduate and graduate students are enrolled, participating at sites both on and off-campus, and a number of students are taking the class on a non-credit basis.

I like this technology. We can teach, receive questions on-line and respond immediately. I look forward to expanding this concept for other timely topics in sustainable agriculture. This organic course will be offered again in 2010.

Back to Leopold Letter Spring 2008