| The major focus of this study was to describe vocational agriculture program quality as perceived by the vocational agriculture teacher. The investigation sought to identify variables that are related to program quality and to determine the proportion of variance in program quality explained by these variables. The variables selected for examination in relation to program quality included structure of state level supervision in agricultural education, teacher attributes, school characteristics, and level of financial support for the vocational agriculture program.;The major findings of this investigation was that the vocational agriculture teachers perceived a high level of program quality. A low positive degree of association was found between program quality and years of teaching experience, number of teachers in the department, number of students in the program, number of students in the high school, percent of urban students enrolled in the program, percent of the school day spent as a teacher of vocational agriculture, adjusted annual salary, and the amount of dollars for program support. In addition, a low negative association was found between program quality and the type of responsibility for adult education in agriculture and institute granting highest degree.;The duties of the state supervisor, the hierarchy of state supervision and the structure of state supervision were not related to program quality. Program quality was found not to be related to the vocational agriculture teacher's college major, level of educational achievement, recentness of graduation, the type of school where the program was located and the percent of rural and suburban students.;Approximately 19% of the variance in program quality is attributed to the linear combination of the adjusted salary of the teacher, the amount of dollars available for program support, number of teachers in the department, and the type of responsibility for adult education in agriculture.;From a target population of 11,775 secondary vocational agriculture teachers, a sample of 567 was randomly drawn with a 69.1% response rate achieved. The dependent variable was program quality as measured by an instrument base upon the Standards for Quality Programs in Agriculture/Agribusiness Education. Utilizing Cronbach's Alpha, instrument reliability ranged from.47 for the domain student recruitment, enrollment and counseling to.87 for the domain public relations. |
