Three students from the Northern Marianas College (NMC) participated in the Future of Agriculture Study Abroad program in Taiwan, which was a 15-day course held on the campus of National Pingtung University of Science and Technology (NPUST) through the University of Guam’s College of Natural & Applied sciences in July.
Throughout the experiential learning field trip, the participants had an opportunity to visit industries in Kaohsiung, Taichung, Pingtung City, and Taipei, Taiwan. They engaged with industry experts and farmers to understand global agricultural trends while attending lectures about the fundamentals of agriculture and how agricultural practices are currently advancing. The students also gained hands-on field practice in building a high tunnel greenhouse, irrigation techniques, and fertilizer application.
The students explored the latest research on agricultural implements, crop pest management, biological control, and broadened their understanding of the importance of value added products through visits to agritourism industries.
This trip was a valuable experience for participants to broaden their knowledge in the field of agriculture. NMC student Rosemarie Faisao shared her preparations for the experiential learning field trip, sharing, “Before we left, I researched agriculture in Taiwan, and what I learned online was further deepened through hands-on experiences, understanding farming from the soil to our tables at home.”
Karim Johnson, NextGen Program Manager, expressed her satisfaction in her scholars, sharing, “Our NMC NextGen scholars, again prove that no matter how far they venture geographically or academically, they are fully capable and willing to rise to the occasion. They never sink. Instead they rise eagerly to the forefront to learn and gather seeds of knowledge to bring home.”
“Our NMC students are learning abroad, while also sharing the knowledge and wisdom that they’ve gained through living in the Marianas and studying at NMC,” stated NMC-CREES Interim Dean Patty Coleman.
With the knowledge gained from experiential learning field trips, the three students produced a collaborative report comparing agricultural, natural resource management, and agritourism practices observed across the NextGen experiential learning field trips and used this analysis to reflect upon which methods and strategies they believe will benefit the CNMI.
This experiential learning field trip was conducted by the NMC-CREES NextGen Program in partnership with the University of Guam, National Pingtung University of Science and Technology (NPUST), Taiwan Agricultural Research Institute (Ministry of Agriculture), with trips to various companies such as HiPoint, Known You Seed Company, and Honhui Group.
For more information about this trip or NMC NextGen program, please contact Karim Johnson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it., or call (670) 488-0801/8.
Three Northern Marianas College students and NMC NextGen Program Manager (Karim Johnson) who participated in the experiential learning field trip to Taiwan. From the left, Bonnie Gio Sagana, Rosemarie Faisao, Jude Litulumar, Karim Johnson.
NMC student Jude Litulimar engages with Hipoint Technical Manager, Hsin-Cheng Chen on how to use smart agriculture for phenotyping and image processing.