A "peer advisory group" essentially melds a business advisory board with a peer group. Peer advisory groups consist of business managers who meet together for the purpose of mutual self-improvement and learning through the sharing of experiences. The entire peer advisory group concept encompasses many variations and this research focuses on groups consisting of farm managers. Unfortunately, some farm managers who wish to participate have expressed frustration with group formation: they find it difficult to identify suitable individuals to participate in a peer advisory group with. Peer advisory groups can take many forms, and experts have suggested an individual should specifically seek out people interested in the same type of group. For example, an individual who wants to strictly focus discussion on production issues should seek out other individuals who also seek to focus on production discussions. Some individuals have suggested that some type of "clearinghouse" organizations could be beneficial in assisting individuals with the peer advisory group formation problem. Such an organization would likely need to adapt some sort of method for identifying individuals who have interest in a similar type of group. Although this could be approached from several different angles, one possible approach involves the practice of cluster analysis?a wide set of procedures intended to break down a set of objects into "clusters" of individuals with similar attributes. Cluster analysis comes with several attractive benefits; however, literature includes countless variations in the methods and criticisms of certain aspects of the methodology. This thesis focuses on using cluster analysis to assist with peer advisory group formation. More specifically, this thesis seeks to answer the following question: how could a clearinghouse organization apply cluster analysis methods to a pool of candidates to effectively create peer advisory groups congruent to the individuals' needs and wants? An approach was proposed which differs slightly from traditional cluster analysis methods, and this was applied to a hypothetical pool of candidates, along with several control methods. The proposed approach was found to most effectively create peer advisory groups which fulfilled the desires of the individuals.

The aim of this research was to identify how farmers learn how to farm using pluriactive lifestyle block ostrich farmers who are part of the New Zealand ostrich industry as a case study. Ostrich farming is comparatively new to New Zealand farmers and the industry has attracted innovative individuals who have developed informal learning strategies. Ostrich farmers use other farmers as their main resource which is mainly facilitated through events organised by the New Zealand Ostrich Association (NZOA) and aimed at lifestyle block farmers. Ostrich farmers' community of practice is centred around their membership to the Association which enables farmers to come together to learn and socialise. For learning to effectively take place the key is social interaction, where ideas can be transferred between farmers. This thesis illustrates the important events and structure of the industry and how this has shaped farmer learning. Through semi-structured interviews and participant observation on a chick rearing farm I was able to gain a picture of how lifestyle block farmers balance full time off-farm employment while running stock, in an attempt to satisfy their version of the rural idyll. The industry is now in decline as most of the early players have exited the industry and it is now focused around New Zealand Ostrich Export (NZOE) goals. By exploring the period called the breeder phase which was characterised by some farmers making a fortune as ostrich farming was the 'next big thing' and the history since then, I have identified how these particular farmers have learned how to farm.

Does digitally-mediated farmer-to-farmer learning facilitate farm-level adaptation to climate change? Utilizing semi-structured interviews with small-scale organic farmers in the Cascadia Bioregion, I document how farmers perceive climate change and in what ways they are responding and/or adapting to these changes. Such small-scale farms have limited economic capacity to adapt to climate change. Access to innovative, low-cost but locally relevant solutions will require novel knowledge-dissemination mechanisms. A modern option is “participatory media” - a social network based approach, linking farmers to farmers through internet-exchange of photos and video. This project engages in a “bottom-up” approach to the development and sharing of knowledge. In collaboration with local farmers, I explored the efficacy of a participatory media method in moving towards improving farmers’ perception of and adaptation to climate change, as well as overall farm-level resilience. / Graduate

Cette thèse cible les dispositifs hors classe dans l’établissement et, plus précisément, leur contribution aux apprentissages des élèves, qu’ils soient scolaires ou psychosociaux. Elle vise à rendre compte de l’organisation hors classe des établissements et à connaître les appropriations spatiales et temporelles des jeunes dans les temps non scolaires et dans les moments informels. Le cadre théorique s’appuie sur le concept de dispositif pour explorer l’apprentissage, dans sa dimension "processus" et dans sa dimension "produit". La modélisation proposée permet de catégoriser et de caractériser les dispositifs hors classe et les dispositifs scolaires dans leur distance au formel. Le travail empirique a été conduit dans le contexte spécifique de l’enseignement agricole, et sur le public particulier des élèves de 4e et 3e, ayant modifié leurs trajectoires éducatives. Une méthode mixte, quantitative et qualitative, a été mobilisée. Elle permet de recueillir à la fois la parole des acteurs éducatifs et des enseignants intervenant hors de la classe et, surtout, celle des apprenants en utilisant des questionnaires, des interviews, des observations, des photographies et des agendas. Elle fait émerger des résultats significatifs dans la contribution différenciée des dispositifs hors classe aux apprentissages, tant au niveau des résultats scolaires que des scores psychosociaux. En prolongeant la remise en cause de la séparation du « dans la classe/hors la classe », par celle du "dans l’établissement/hors de l’établissement", elle pose l’hypothèse d’un curriculum éducatif qui interroge le rôle de l’école dans la société et la place de chaque acteur, notamment du jeune. / This thesis target the out of class device in the institution and, to be more exact, call for the pupil’s learning, school or psychosocial learning. It gives an account of the organization out of class and knowing spacio-temporal encroaching for young in the out of class time and in the informal moment. The theoretical framework leans on learning exploration’s concept, in its process-sized and it product-sized.The modeling proposed enable to categorize and characterize the out of class time and the school time in the formal’s distance. The empiric work had been done in farming’s institution and in a public middle school, with 4ème and 3ème’s pupils, who are changed their learning’s ways. A join method, quantitative and qualitative research, was done. It enables to take the feeling of the educational player and the teachers who operate out of class and, what’s more important, the learner. This survey use quiz, interviews, observations, pictures and schedule. It shows us significant results in the differential contribution of the out of class learning device, as much as the school results than the psychosocial hit. In challenging the separation of “in class” and “out of class” by “in school” and “out of school”, it hypothesizes an educational curriculum which ask about the part of school in the society and the part of each player, especially younger, in the new education call the global education.