Choosing social science as specialization for my masters was a conscious decision for me. But not a well researched one. I have never been able to put my head and heart into anything that I didn't like and so, after my bachelors when I had to choose a stream to apply for masters, Agricultural Extension was an automatic choice. I have loved that subject always. It was the only one that talked about people, their development, how to effectively connect to them, help them, and all these actually made me interested. I applied, I got in, and and called up my parents to tell them I got in my preferred subject for my masters. Everything seemed fine till then.
My father had been an extension officer and many people have asked me if that was why I took extension. No, not at all. My father didn't actually like me taking extension as it involved a lot of travel in rural areas, communicating with the grassroots, included lots of field visits, overall not something suitable for a girl. But that was a father's concern for daughter and I understood that. Also, he never said that aloud too. But what I didn't understand was when immediately after the counselling I visited the state agriculture dept., many officials just assumed I didn't get anything else and so it was a forced choice. But the thing that stood out for me was their concern more because of my gender. "If you were a guy it is a good stream, but for a girl it is not at all suitable". And mind you, that was just the first time I have heard that. Funny enough, with that mindset, we are concerned about gender mainstreaming and inclusion at grassroots. Talk about big talks!
Anyways, I never cared much for other's opinion and so happily joined my Masters. And lucky I did where I did! A small campus with some wonderful teachers who opened my eyes to the vast possibilities of the future. But along with that, one question that plagued me was very frequently asked only to extension students, "Why we need extensionists?" I mean no plant breeder or pathologist or microbiologist or agronomist or economist for that matter had to answer that question. It was just implied that they are needed for agricultural development, no questions asked. But it's a whole different story for extensionists. I had so many arguments with friends from other depts. when they said extension serves no real purpose. I have explained to them and will also put my points here but the apathy towards the subject is ashtonishing, not just among the students but faculties too. And being in the stream for five years now, I don't completely blame them.
The major reason behind the mindset is lack of knowledge of how we work. An extension student won't be seen in the field all day tending to crops, neither in the lab, but sitting in the comfort of his/her room with the laptop whole day. And since we don't put any physical labour, it must be pretty easy. Also, the field work is required for us is mostly outside campus, most of the times in our home states for easier data collection. All others see is us going home on vacation for two months when they are working hard in field or lab. What's there to like, right? But honestly, we do have advantages too. We can actually finish our work on time if we are working hard as our studies are rarely dependent on the weather as we don't have to grow field crops, neither on lab results which are effected by many external factors. We are only bound by our own limitations. And that is the biggest flaw that we social scientists have actually created for ourselves.
There is growing concern that the quality of research in extension is falling in our country and to a good extent, it is true. Most of us wants the easy way out of replicating the work that has been done a hundred other times so we have lots of data to support our findings.
It is not fair to ignore a subject just because it doesn't deal with hard facts replicable in every occasion, it is also not fair to those who are working hard in yhe field to achieve something for the sake of science. But, when I think things through, it is our own apathy towards our subject that has brought us here. So who are we to call it unfair?
