AGRIC 3530WT - Horticultural Production and Quality III
Waite Campus - Winter - 2024
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General Course Information
Course Details
Course Code AGRIC 3530WT Course Horticultural Production and Quality III Coordinating Unit Agricultural Science Term Winter Level Undergraduate Location/s Waite Campus Units 3 Contact 2-Week block in Winter Semester break (10 full days) Available for Study Abroad and Exchange Y Assumed Knowledge All Level I Agriculture courses Assessment Practical reports, written reports, exam Course Staff
Course Coordinator: Dr Kate Delaporte
Course Timetable
The full timetable of all activities for this course can be accessed from Course Planner.
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Learning Outcomes
Course Learning Outcomes
On successful completion of this course, students will be able to:
1 Identify the major commercial horticultural varieties, pests and diseases in annual and perennial crops in Australia. 2 Explain how diverse horticultural industries contribute to food culture, environmental resilience, and economic opportunity. 3 Compare and contrast the differences in physiology and related management of several horticultural crops. 4 Explain best practice in management and use of technology within an industry domain. 5 Create an implementation program for a new crop enterprise. University Graduate Attributes
This course will provide students with an opportunity to develop the Graduate Attribute(s) specified below:
University Graduate Attribute Course Learning Outcome(s) Attribute 1: Deep discipline knowledge and intellectual breadth
Graduates have comprehensive knowledge and understanding of their subject area, the ability to engage with different traditions of thought, and the ability to apply their knowledge in practice including in multi-disciplinary or multi-professional contexts.
1,2,3 Attribute 2: Creative and critical thinking, and problem solving
Graduates are effective problems-solvers, able to apply critical, creative and evidence-based thinking to conceive innovative responses to future challenges.
3,4,5 Attribute 3: Teamwork and communication skills
Graduates convey ideas and information effectively to a range of audiences for a variety of purposes and contribute in a positive and collaborative manner to achieving common goals.
3 Attribute 4: Professionalism and leadership readiness
Graduates engage in professional behaviour and have the potential to be entrepreneurial and take leadership roles in their chosen occupations or careers and communities.
4,5 Attribute 5: Intercultural and ethical competency
Graduates are responsible and effective global citizens whose personal values and practices are consistent with their roles as responsible members of society.
2 Attribute 6: Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultural competency
Graduates have an understanding of, and respect for, Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander values, culture and knowledge.
2 Attribute 7: Digital capabilities
Graduates are well prepared for living, learning and working in a digital society.
3,4 Attribute 8: Self-awareness and emotional intelligence
Graduates are self-aware and reflective; they are flexible and resilient and have the capacity to accept and give constructive feedback; they act with integrity and take responsibility for their actions.
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Learning & Teaching Activities
Learning & Teaching Modes
This course is delivered as an intensive in Winter School.Workload
The information below is provided as a guide to assist students in engaging appropriately with the course requirements.
A student enrolled in a 3 unit course, such as this, should expect to spend, on average 12 hours per week on the studies required. This includes both the formal contact time required to the course (e.g., lectures and practicals), as well as non-contact time (e.g., pre-class preparation, post-class assessments, reading and revision).Learning Activities Summary
Horticulture is a diverse field covering many different kinds of crops, from fast growing bean shoots, to slow growing walnuts and everything between. In order to cover the breadth and depth, we chose to design the course around five industry domains and five knowledge domains. The five industry domains are protected cropping, field vegetable crops, perennial tree & vine crops, amenity horticulture, and peri-urban & innovative horticulture. The five knowledge domains cover industry structure, propagation & crop management, postharvest & supply chain, plant health (nutrition, pests & diseases) and irrigation –are fundamental to production of fresh food crops and are relevant to all industry domains. The course presents content on all ten areas through lectures, focussing on crops key to the South Australian horticultural sector, and providing reinforcement of all industry and knowledge domains through field tours, hands on practicals, workshops, and discussion groups, with a range of assessments.
Lectures: content delivery as online pre-recorded and live (recorded) sessions with nine SAFW lecturers, all specialists in their fields.
Practicals: hands on practical sessions covering 5 topics: technology in Horticulture, propagation by grafting, pruning of perennial fruit tree crops, and assessing the impact of temperature on shelf life and quality of fresh produce and Irrigation scheduling software/technology.
Field Tours: Students visit diverse industry sites in the Northern Adelaide Plains, Adelaide Hills, and Fleurieu Peninsula to view and appreciate all 5 industry domains, meet industry stakeholders and understand the drivers that affect different enterprises (such as processing, value adding, field and covered production, storage, marketing, price points). As a group, we will ask questions of the growers, at the end of the course there will be a discussion session on the field tours to coalesce knowledge and compare enterprises under set topics that will support exam revision. The 2020 videos of eight enterprises visited, are available for all students.
Discussion groups: create opportunity for deeper understanding on the topics of sustainability and resilience in horticultural systems, and non-traditional horticultural enterprises, with contributions by external stakeholders (eg AusVeg, Hort Innovation, permaculture, biodynamic production).
Sustainability in Horticulture Workshop: focus on specific knowledge domains to extend lecture content though group work on developments in sustainable management of horticultural crops. Students work in teams to develop an "elevator pitch" on a new sustainability initiative for a key SA horticultural crop and present to the class and external stakeholders. Students participate in a classroom group activity for engagement, feedback and active learning. Students build deeper knowledge of a range of crops through the group activity, and develop their entrepreneurial and communication skills.
Video Quizzes: four pre-course videos to provide context and prior knowledge.
Pest & ID: The ‘Horticultural Identification Tool’ learning tool (online database), has images and descriptions of varieties and symptoms. Students can undertake the training quizzes quiz as many times as desired, aiming for a hurdle of at least 50% correct. The sequence of image display is randomised so each student experiences the quiz differently each time it is attempted. The training material and quizzes are available two weeks before the course begins.Specific Course Requirements
Attendance on all three field tours expected; so appropriate clothing required (i.e. closed top shoes, dress to daily weather). Attendance at all practicals, workshops and group discussions is expected.
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Assessment
The University's policy on Assessment for Coursework Programs is based on the following four principles:
- Assessment must encourage and reinforce learning.
- Assessment must enable robust and fair judgements about student performance.
- Assessment practices must be fair and equitable to students and give them the opportunity to demonstrate what they have learned.
- Assessment must maintain academic standards.
Assessment Summary
Assessment Task Task Type Due Weighting Hurdle? Learning Outcome Four online pre-course Quizzes Formative Complete before end of 2-week block;
Can begin 1 week before course0% No 2,3 Sustainabilty Elevator Pitch Formative & Summative During 2-week block 10% No 1,3 Practicals
A. Propagation & Pruning report
B Postharvest report,
C Irrigation technology reportFormative & Summative During 2 week block 30% No 3,4 Consultant Report Summative 2 weeks after 2-week block 20% No 1,4,5 Examination
Part A. Pest & Disease ID
Part B. Written answersSummative 1 week after 2-week block 40% Yes 1-4 Assessment Related Requirements
Assessment Item with Hurdle or compulsory component % needed to meet hurdle or requirement to meet compulsory component Is additional assessment available if student does not meet hurdle requirement or compulsory component, if no please explain If additional assessment is available, explain what type Written exam 50% Yes R/AA exam Assessment Detail
Four online quizzes. [0%] The online quizzes are based on foundational material presented in online videos and currently cover industry structure and figures, propagation and irrigation. For the quizzes students are given two attempts to complete each quiz, with indications of correct answer after first attempt. All quizzes will be available to students two weeks before the course begins.
Sustainability in HorticultureElevator Pitch [10%] Supported by lectures on each of the industry domains and their own research, with guest presentations by industry leaders, students will focus on specific knowledge domains to extend lecture content though group work on developments in sustainable management of horticultural crops. Students work in teams to develop an "elevator pitch" on a new sustainability initiative for a key SA horticultural crop and present to the class and external stakeholders. Students participate in a classroom group activity for engagement, feedback and active learning. Students build deeper knowledge of a range of crops through the group activity and develop their entrepreneurial and communication skills. In teams, students will develop an innovative idea with online research for their selected crops to formulate their idea. Students will undertake activities to share knowledge and undertake active learning. As a team, they will prepare 3-5 slides and elect a presenter(s) to deliver a 5 minute pitch to the class. This will be assessed in class.
Consultant’s report [20%] Each student will select a crop from a provided list (focus on key SA crops) and prepare a report for a hypothetical client who wishes to establish a specific horticultural enterprise. The report will provide recommendations on the type of site (region and soils, minimum property size), crop genetics and sources, crop management, production infrastructure, postharvest handling, marketing, quality assurance and industry links that will support the enterprise. Alternatively, students may select an aspect of technology that spans across many industries (eg robotics, postharvest grading systems) This assignment will be submitted 2 weeks after the 2-week teaching block has completed.
Practicals: [30%] Students will participate in four hands-on practicals over the 2 weeks
A Technology in Hort demonstration: B: Propagation + Pruning; C: Postharvest assessment, and D: Irrigation technology.For sessions A & B, students choose to write either a reflective piece on individual technology of relevance to Hort, or a reflective piece on the use of propagation and pruning for key SA Hort crops. This individual assignment will be submitted during the course.
For session C, students will prepare responses to a set of online questions that will require data analysis and interpretation of results gathered in the practical and discuss specific points. This assessment will be submitted after the 2 week teaching block.
Session D: Irrigation technology practical will enable exposure to and learning the basics of using a soil moisture sensing platform (software) to enable decision making on irrigation in horticultural crops. Understanding of the software is examined by using the package to propose appropriate irrigation management decisions in a variety of horticultural crops, and to optimise the irrigation practices. These assignments will be submitted at the end of the 2-week teaching block.
Written examination [40%] The examination will cover pest & disease identification, and material gathered in the lectures, workshops, practicals, discussion groups and field tours. It will consist of an identification quiz, and scenario-based essay-type written answers. The Pest & Disease ID quiz will take 45 minutes with 50 questions that have been taken from the Horticultural Pest & Disease Identification Training Tools. The essay-type question component will take 120 minutes. This online exam will be conducted 1 week after the 2-week teaching block has completed.
Submission
Late submission of assessments
If an extension is not applied for, or not granted then a penalty for late submission will apply. A penalty of 10% of the value of the assignment for each calendar day that is late (i.e. weekends count as 2 days), up to a maximum of 50% of the available marks will be applied. This means that an assignment that is 5 days or more late without an approved extension can only receive a maximum of 50% of the mark.
Course Grading
Grades for your performance in this course will be awarded in accordance with the following scheme:
M10 (Coursework Mark Scheme) Grade Mark Description FNS Fail No Submission F 1-49 Fail P 50-64 Pass C 65-74 Credit D 75-84 Distinction HD 85-100 High Distinction CN Continuing NFE No Formal Examination RP Result Pending Further details of the grades/results can be obtained from Examinations.
Grade Descriptors are available which provide a general guide to the standard of work that is expected at each grade level. More information at Assessment for Coursework Programs.
Final results for this course will be made available through Access Adelaide.
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Student Feedback
The University places a high priority on approaches to learning and teaching that enhance the student experience. Feedback is sought from students in a variety of ways including on-going engagement with staff, the use of online discussion boards and the use of Student Experience of Learning and Teaching (SELT) surveys as well as GOS surveys and Program reviews.
SELTs are an important source of information to inform individual teaching practice, decisions about teaching duties, and course and program curriculum design. They enable the University to assess how effectively its learning environments and teaching practices facilitate student engagement and learning outcomes. Under the current SELT Policy (http://www.adelaide.edu.au/policies/101/) course SELTs are mandated and must be conducted at the conclusion of each term/semester/trimester for every course offering. Feedback on issues raised through course SELT surveys is made available to enrolled students through various resources (e.g. MyUni). In addition aggregated course SELT data is available.
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Student Support
- Academic Integrity for Students
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Policies & Guidelines
This section contains links to relevant assessment-related policies and guidelines - all university policies.
- Academic Credit Arrangements Policy
- Academic Integrity Policy
- Academic Progress by Coursework Students Policy
- Assessment for Coursework Programs Policy
- Copyright Compliance Policy
- Coursework Academic Programs Policy
- Elder Conservatorium of Music Noise Management Plan
- Intellectual Property Policy
- IT Acceptable Use and Security Policy
- Modified Arrangements for Coursework Assessment Policy
- Reasonable Adjustments to Learning, Teaching & Assessment for Students with a Disability Policy
- Student Experience of Learning and Teaching Policy
- Student Grievance Resolution Process
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