A CHAPTER in rural education will come to a close at Orange next year with the old ag college no longer offering its name-sake course.
Due to low enrolments Charles Sturt University (CSU) will not offer a Bachelor of Agricultural Business Management course on-campus at Orange in 2015.
CSU course director for the school of agriculture and wine sciences Dr Yann Guisard said the college itself was not closing down, with health courses still running strong at the campus.
But he lamented the fact agriculture courses would no longer be offered face to face.
"It is a sad situation and we're not trying to hide from it," Dr Guisard said.
"The local community has had several generations living with the ag college but from a rural perspective the outcomes from Orange as a health campus is huge."
Dr Guisard said last year there was only a small cohort of students in the course, and those that were continuing on to their second year in 2015 would be receiving their classes in blocks.
Those who were in their third and final year of the course would complete it at the site as normal.
Dr Guisard said the university had offered the small group that had enrolled for first year in 2015 places at its Wagga Wagga campus which offered the same course.
"We don't like to run the course with such a small cohort as their experience of university isn't what they pictured.
"There isn't the social life and the group of peers who enter the industry at the end with you."
The university will continue to offer a range of agriculture courses through distance education and its post-graduate courses, however Dr Guisard said he couldn't see ag returning to the campus in a face-to-face situation in the medium-term.
"The expertise we have in Wagga is sufficient for NSW.
"It will be sad losing the course because of the tradition, but new things will happen and there will be exciting opportunities."
He said the university would now look to running a range of short professional courses, such as those the ag college used to run.
This would include courses looking at animal health and welfare, nutrition, pasture, ag business and more.
Despite the loss of the course, no staff would lose positions he said.
"The staff are going to teach distance education."
Former student Fiona Lake was saddened to hear that future students would not have the same opportunities she had to study there.
From 1982 to '83 she took the Farm Secretarial Studies course, which she said was an invaluable learning experience.
"I'm a photographer specialising in cattle stations and from that I have a mail order business and I can say that course set me up to do what I do now," Ms Lake said.
"It was a brilliant time and one of the best things I ever did."
Ms Lake said the course, which was discontinued many years ago now, combined practical livestock and cropping skills, along with business studies skills including tax and administration.
She said without agriculture degrees, the college would be a shell of its former self.
"It's a sad thing to see something as unique as the ag college go."
