Red Dirt meets Desert Sands: OSU students explore Morocco's ancient agricultural practices
Wednesday, May 21, 2025
Media Contact: Sophia Fahleson | Digital Communications Specialist | 405-744-7063 | sophia.fahleson@okstate.edu
With the golden sands of the Sahara, the bustling markets of ancient medinas, and the rolling olive groves of the countryside, Morocco is a land where history and agriculture intertwine.
For 18 Oklahoma State University students, a two-week study-abroad course provided an immersive experience in this culture and an agricultural system vastly different from their own.
The Ferguson College of Agriculture offers several study-abroad courses for students, said Steve Phillips, plant and soil sciences professor and a Morocco course leader.
“They’re primarily agricultural-focused, but we also want to expose the students to a variety of cultural aspects, including architecture, arts, cuisine, religion, politics, geography and history,” Phillips said.
Arakssi Arshakian, the college’s student engagement and international experiences director, started working with Phillips the summer of 2023 on the details for the course to Morocco. The travel portion occurred from Dec. 28, 2024, to Jan. 11, 2025.
“Study-abroad courses do not just happen overnight or even a few months,” Arshakian said. “They take about a year of planning in advance.”
Phillips lived in Morocco for four years as a researcher for a nonprofit international research organization.
While in the country, Phillips focused on precision agricultural research and education.
“I have three college-aged children who are the same ages as these students who were in the course,” Phillips said. “I know the effect living in Morocco had on them in terms of dispelling their preconceived ideas about a country like Morocco.”
The course provided the opportunity for students to explore the agriculture and culture in a less-developed country, Phillips added.
“In parts of Morocco, you’re literally taking a step back in time,” he said.
During the fall semester, the 18 students in the study-abroad course attended four class sessions, Arshakian said.
“For this course, we had in-person classes to learn about the topics we would study in Morocco,” said Josey Austin, animal science junior.
The students in the course developed presentations on various aspects of Moroccan culture and agriculture to share with the rest of the class, she added.
“Dr. Phillips did a great job of preparing us for what to expect when interacting with the locals in Morocco, and those classes were super beneficial,” Austin said.
Once in the country, the class made a full loop through Morocco, starting and ending in Casablanca, Phillips said. Traveling from the Atlantic coast to the Sahara Desert, students explored the country’s diverse agricultural opportunities, he added.
“We never stayed more than three nights in one location on the two weeks of the course,” Phillips said.
This study-abroad course allowed some students to leave the country for the first time, said Tori Booker, crop science doctoral student.
“I had never been on a plane before, I had never been outside of the Midwest, and I had never seen the ocean,” Austin said. “I got to experience all of that for the first time during this course.”
The study-abroad course featured a balance of agricultural tours and cultural experiences, Phillips said.
“For our cultural days, we visited the medinas and the king’s palaces,” Booker said. “We would get to immerse ourselves in the culture there.”
On the agricultural-focused days, the class visited olive groves, vineyards, argan oil cooperatives and research institute facilities. They also participated in a cooking class, Arshakian said.
The study-abroad course focused on crop sciences but included visits to a sheep and goat farm and a honeybee farm, providing students with a well-rounded view of agricultural practices, Phillips said.
“We visited my old employer, saw some of the research, and talked to some of the faculty there about the things they are doing in different parts of Africa,” Phillips said.
In Morocco, crop research focuses on breeding disease-resistant crops and improving irrigation efficiency, Booker said.
“A lot of what we’re focused on in the U.S., too, is making our varieties more disease-resistant and trying to make the best use out of the little water we have,” Booker said.
One of the most memorable agricultural tours for the students involved the argan oil cooperative, Phillips said. Argan is a tree nut used for cosmetics, he added.
“If you have heard of the brand Moroccan oil, like hair products, they use argan oil, and it’s primarily grown in Morocco,” Booker said.
The argan cooperative still uses ancient methods to extract the oil from the nut, and students had the chance to try cracking the nuts themselves.
“There are only a few cities in the world able to produce authentic argan oil,” Austin said, “and three of those cities are in Morocco.”
The students also visited a rose oil farm, where they learned about the extraction method of rose water and how to make cosmetics, Phillips said.
While traveling in Morocco, the class stayed overnight in tents on the Sahara Desert.
The class rode in four-wheel-drive vehicles to the dunes. They then traveled about two hours on camels to their lodging.
“We rode the camels an hour into the sand dunes, and then we sandboarded, which is basically like snowboarding,” Austin said.
As the sun set on the Sahara Desert, the students began to head to their campsite for the night, Phillips said.
“I told them in class, ‘You can see pictures of it, but until you are actually sitting on the dune watching the sunset and the colors change the sand, it really is not something you can describe,’” Phillips said. “You just have to experience it.”
After their camel rides, sandboarding and a sunset over the dunes, students reached the heart of the Sahara Desert.
“It was hard to grasp we were in the Sahara Desert in Africa,” Booker said.
The Moroccan culture is driven by religion, Phillips said. The nation is ruled by a constitutional monarchy with the king the head of state.
“The first thing I noticed as really different was the lack of fixed prices or taxes,” Austin said. “Anything we wanted, we could haggle for it.”
The markets in Morocco are called medinas and are full of art, shops, dancers, snake charmers, and people selling goods, Austin said.
“I grew up in a very hospitable culture, but Moroccan people take it to the next level,” Arshakian said.
America is a young country, but Morocco has an ancient culture, Booker said.
Moroccans want to preserve their history and want tourists to see where they came from, Booker added.
The main languages spoken in Morocco are Arabic and French.
“The regional Arabic they speak isn’t the classic Arabic I grew up with,” Arshakian said. “I’m Armenian from Eastern Europe but was born and raised in Iraq. Armenian was my first language and Arabic my second.”
The architecture, history, festivals, landscape, agriculture and language vary from what Americans are used to, Phillips said.
“We would be in the Sahara one second, up in the mountains the next, and then on the coast the next,” Austin said. “Morocco had a very diverse terrain in such a small country.”
This is the first study-abroad course to Morocco offered by the Ferguson College of Agriculture, Arshakian said.
“Being my first time to lead a study-abroad course, I think my experiences were more based on the student reactions, and I am very impressed with the way they embraced the opportunity,” Phillips said.
A study-abroad course has a profound impact on students, expanding their perspectives, Arshakian said.
“This course reignited a travel bug in me,” Booker said. “It made me want to learn about different cultures in different countries.”
Phillips is proposing to teach the course again in May 2026.
“They need to keep Dr. Phillips in charge of the course because he lived and worked in agriculture in Morocco,” Booker said. “Having him teach this course is very vital to the success of the study-abroad course.”
With the potential for the course in the summer, the pre-session classes would occur during the 2025-26 school year, Arshakian said.
Students considering a study-abroad course should investigate the host country thoroughly before traveling, including its history, culture, customs and agricultural practices, Arshakian said.
She encourages students to approach new cultures with curiosity and an open mind, allowing them to try new things and gain a deeper appreciation for global perspectives, she added.
“Be curious and challenge yourself to get out of your comfort zone,” Arshakian said. “Be curious about global agriculture, and be curious about culture.”
Story by Rylee Smith | Cowboy Journal