New Agrarian Program

Supporting apprenticeship and mentorship in agriculture

About

The New Agrarian Program (NAP) partners with skilled ranchers and farmers to offer annual apprenticeships in regenerative agriculture. Our apprentices learn from expert practitioners in full-immersion professional settings.

This program specifically targets first-career professionals with a sincere commitment to life at the intersection of conservation and regenerative agriculture.

We also seek mentors who are dedicated stewards of the land; practice intentional, regenerative methods of food or fiber production; provide excellent animal care; and are skilled and enthusiastic teachers.

“Once upon a time apprenticeship was the primary form of education available to a person, whatever the field – medicine, music, cobbler, or scholar. Not necessarily a beginner but not yet a master, an apprentice agreed to work for a specific period of time for a master craftsperson in a craft or trade, in return for instruction. An agrarian apprenticeship is a form of this age-old process whereby a learner becomes a practitioner.” – Julie Sullivan, San Juan Ranch, CO

Since 2008, NAP has partnered with ranches and farms around the west to offer eight-month apprenticeships and has successfully graduated nearly 100 apprentices.

Agriculture drives economies, creates green jobs and directly affects the health of our nation. With the national average age of U.S. ranchers and farmers approaching sixty, and with less than two percent of the U.S. population currently dedicated to producing food, it is critical that the next generation of food producers and land stewards have sufficient training opportunities.

NAP Apprentices have gone on to become ranch managers, start their own agricultural operations, join family businesses with new enterprises, work at federal agencies and nonprofits providing direct services to ranchers and farmers, and a number of other critical roles to the future of healthy working lands and functioning food systems.