19 Tex. Admin. Code § 127.59 - [Effective 8/1/2025] Geographic Information Systems for Agriculture (One Credit), Adopted 2025
(a) Implementation.
(1) The provisions of this section shall be
implemented by school districts beginning with the 2025-2026 school
year.
(2) School districts shall
implement the employability skills student expectations listed in §
127.15(d)(1) of
this chapter (relating to Career and Technical Education Employability Skills,
Adopted 2025) as an integral part of this course.
(b) General requirements. This course is
recommended for students in Grades 10-12. Recommended prerequisites: Principles
of Agriculture, Food, and Natural Resources. Students shall be awarded one
credit for successful completion of this course.
(c) Introduction.
(1) Career and technical education
instruction provides content aligned with challenging academic standards and
relevant technical knowledge and skills for students to further their education
and succeed in current or emerging professions.
(2) The Agriculture, Food, and Natural
Resources career cluster focuses on the essential elements of life, food,
water, land, and air. This career cluster includes occupations ranging from
farmer, rancher, and veterinarian to geologist, land conservationist, and
florist.
(3) Geographic Information
Systems for Agriculture is a course designed to provide students with the
academic and technical knowledge and skills that are required to pursue a
career as a precision agriculture specialist, a crop specialist, an independent
crop consultant, a nutrient management specialist, a physical scientist, a
precision agronomist, a precision farming coordinator, a research agricultural
engineer, or a soil fertility specialist. Students will learn to use computers
to develop or analyze maps of remote sensing to compare physical topography
with data on soils, fertilizer, pests, or weather.
(4) Students are encouraged to participate in
extended learning experiences such as career and technical student
organizations and other organizations that foster leadership and career
development in the profession such as student chapters of related professional
associations.
(5) Statements that
contain "including" reference content that must be mastered, while those
containing the phrase "such as" are intended as possible illustrative
examples.
(d) Knowledge
and skills.
(1) The student develops a
supervised agriculture experience program. The student is expected to:
(A) plan, propose, conduct, document, and
evaluate a supervised agriculture experience as an experiential learning
activity;
(B) use appropriate
record-keeping skills in a supervised agricultural experience;
(C) participate in youth agricultural
leadership opportunities;
(D)
review and participate in a local program of activities; and
(E) create or update documentation of
relevant agricultural experience such as community service, professional, or
classroom experiences.
(2) The student explains the current
applications of geographic information system (GIS) in agriculture, food, and
natural resources and identifies the future need for GIS in precision
agriculture. The student is expected to:
(A)
research and compare current and emerging careers related to GIS in agriculture
and natural resource fields;
(B)
identify and analyze applications of GIS technologies in agriculture, food, and
natural resources;
(C) explain GIS
data as it pertains to agriculture; and
(D) describe the types of licensing,
certification, and credentialing requirements related to GIS
occupations.
(3) The
student analyzes geographic information and spatial data types in agriculture,
food and natural resources. The student is expected to:
(A) identify the uses of GIS in
agriculture;
(B) identify the GIS
terminology used in agriculture applications, such as spatial analysis, remote
sensing, georeferencing, geostatistics, and geocoding;
(C) identify GIS models and representations
in precision agriculture;
(D)
explain GIS representations of geographic phenomena in soil types, topography,
and farming management;
(E)
organize and describe spatial data in yield monitoring for crop planning;
and
(F) analyze GIS data sources
and ethics in agriculture.
(4) The student uses agriculture, food, and
natural resources GIS tools. The student is expected to:
(A) identify hardware and software for
agriculture data management and processing;
(B) explain spatial data capture and
preparation, spatial data storage and maintenance, spatial query and analysis,
and spatial data presentation for agriculture; and
(C) describe remote sensing tools and
technologies used in precision farming, including unmanned aerial support
(UAS), unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV), and global positioning satellite
(GPS).
(5) The student
integrates spatial referencing and global positioning techniques in
agriculture, food, and natural resources. The student is expected to:
(A) explain spatial referencing systems and
projections for capturing and displaying agricultural data; and
(B) identify uses for satellite-based
positioning to increase agriculture proficiency.
(6) The student evaluates applications for
spatial data entry and preparation for agricultural analysis. The student is
expected to:
(A) analyze agricultural GIS
spatial data; and
(B) explain and
analyze data accuracy and precision related to using GIS in
agriculture.
(7) The
student performs agricultural spatial data analysis. The student is expected
to:
(A) analyze GIS maps of agricultural
fields to determine variables that would impact maximum crop yields;
(B) compare vector and raster-based data for
agricultural analysis; and
(C)
explain types of GIS analysis used in natural resource management.
(8) The student creates spatial
data visualizations and cartographic models. The student is expected to:
(A) identify types of GIS maps used in
agriculture;
(B) develop GIS maps
for various types of agricultural data;
(C) identify and explain the purpose of
cartographic symbols used in precision farming; and
(D) analyze visual data and explain how the
data is used in agricultural decision making.
Notes
State regulations are updated quarterly; we currently have two versions available. Below is a comparison between our most recent version and the prior quarterly release. More comparison features will be added as we have more versions to compare.
No prior version found.