School in Session
Despite inspection reform delay, class is in at Donald L. Houston Center
by Larry Aylward, managing editor
Meat inspection reform is in limbo. But life goes on at the Donald L. Houston Center on the campus of Texas A&M University, where FSIS meat and poultry inspection and supervisory personnel receive up-to-date training and education.
Tony W. Brown, director of instruction and programs at the Donald L. Houston Center, admits he's not precisely sure what it will take to train the inspector of tomorrow. But Brown has a hunch the future inspector must be educated thoroughly in science, possess audit skills, and have the capacity to relate objectively and professionally with plant managers and employees.
"We don't have to wait for the exact specifications to begin preparing the inspector for new and different responsibilities," Brown says. "We can begin teaching those principles that the individual will need to know and apply logically and methodically regardless of what the specific tasks are."
Although inspection reform is not finalized, Brown and Robert Tynan, director of FSIS' Human Resource Development Division, are not worried that the program's current curriculum will become outdated overnight. Like Brown, Tynan admits it is hard to nail down an exact curriculum, but these are exciting times, he says.
"It is difficult to keep up with, but it is fun because there seems to be a purpose of direction in the agency that we have not had in quite a few years," Tynan says in a phone interview from his Washington, D.C. office.
The schoolhouse
The Donald L. Houston Center opened April 3, 1989, and employs nearly 40 people. Staff officers from FSIS' Human Resource Development Division and faculty members from six Texas A&M colleges-veterinary medicine, agriculture and life sciences, science, medicine, business administration and liberal arts-are employed at the training and education center. Houston, FSIS administrator from 1979 to 1987 who died in 1988, stressed the need for preparing for the future in meat inspection.
The center is a tidy and orderly building equipped with five classrooms, a computer center, labs for microscopic and chemistry study, and a break room where Cable News Network is the channel of choice ("a viable communication tool," Brown notes).
The 1995 training center's curriculum consists of about 30 classes. Several general management and continuous education courses are also offered.
Courses run an average of 11 days. Some of the 1995 courses include: Basic Livestock Slaughter Inspection, FSIS Field Automation and Information Management, Processed Food-State, and Advanced Processed Food and Quality Control Inspection.
Several courses encompass visual inspection. If a new science-based inspection system is introduced, many in the industry don't want it layered over visual inspection. But Brown believes visual inspection will not cease and will remain in a different capacity.
"There will be some continuing activity for at least the foreseeable future by FSIS employees in visually evaluating meat and poultry carcasses," Brown says. "But my feeling is that it will become a subcomponent of a more scientifically applied and broader inspection system. Then it wouldn't be classified as layering."
Besides being a visual inspector, the inspector of the future needs to be well-educated in meat and poultry science and microbiology. The inspector will be clued in on the operation of a plant's Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point program.
"The inspector will monitor a plant's critical control points and make determinations about whether a plant is going about that set of responsibilities appropriately and consistently," Brown stresses. "The inspector will be able to sift through science and applications of science, and be able to constructively point out where there's a need for improvement and oversee that improvement.
"That's a very different role for the inspector," Brown adds. "The inspector of the future will also need audit skills. He or she will need to have investigative skills from the standpoint of record review."
Classes, such as Basic Livestock Slaughter Inspection, Advanced Livestock Slaughter Inspection and Regulation of Canning Operations, involve the teaching of HACCP principles. The center is also testing HACCP training via satellite.
"It was encouraging," Brown says of the initial satellite presentation. "It was one of several alternative methodologies that will become utilized in the future."
Peace keeper
It is no secret that plant personnel and USDA inspectors experience dissidence in their working relationships. Some plant personnel claim that inspectors are inflexible and indecisive.
Regardless of what route meat inspection travels, an improved interpersonal relationship between industry personnel and inspectors is a necessity, Brown points out.
"Traditionally, when you have a regulator and someone being regulated, there's the opportunity for friction," Brown says. "Legally and ethically, the regulator and the person or group being regulated should continue, but the relationship can and should be different. It doesn't have to be one of absolute inflexibility."
For instance, industry producers should shoulder the responsibility of providing safe food, with a regulator acting as an overseer, Brown points out.
"It is to [the industry's] advantage," Brown adds. "The role of the regulator in that kind of environment would be one of auditing."
Simply put, plant personnel and inspectors need to communicate on important issues, Brown says.
"That will require individuals that understand scientific principles, not simply protocol or prescriptive work performance," Brown adds. "Particularly in a HACCP environment, there must be cooperation and collaboration. It will be a different role and it will require different social and regulatory attitudes. An inspector is going to have a need for true interpersonal skills."
Instructors at the Donald L. Houston Center teach such gregarious skills in several courses, including Frontline Leadership-Core Interpersonal Skills. It is a three-day course that "addresses interpersonal skills dealing in giving constructive feedback; gathering in-depth information by efficiently tapping the resources in people; developing techniques for explaining tough decisions or complicated, possibly unpopular ideas that are prone to misunderstanding by employees." The course also focuses on "defusing non-constructive emotional behavior in work situations; and refocusing energies on positive, productive approaches, going beyond feedback by adding the motivating element of personal appreciation for a job well done."
The center will apply even more focus on interpersonal skills in upcoming curriculums, according to Tynan.
"The theme coming through is the changing role to a HACCP environment," Tynan says. "To affect that kind of change and philosophy is going to require a lot of interpersonal skills like conflict resolution, team building and coaching for supervisors."
Student body
The FSIS employees who come to the Donald L. Houston Center have different backgrounds and educations. Some have veterinary backgrounds and animal science degrees. Some have bachelor's degrees in food science and meat science. Others have only a high school degree or its equivalent, the prerequisite for being a line inspector.
"Ideally, people spend some time in the field before they come here to take the coursework related to that set of job responsibilities," Brown points out. "But we have had students come here shortly after being promoted or hired into a new positions."
FSIS determines which employees need training. Usually, they are new employees or employees switching specialties.
About 2,000 FSIS employees are trained and taught at the center annually. Some return, depending on their future needs.
Trainees are tested over singular modular topics. Entry-level inspectors and veterinary medical officers are tested over FSIS- and university-delivered modules that address regulations and science.
Exams are not included in advanced courses for inspectors and veterinarians with inspector-in-charge responsibilities, or supervision/management modules.
Before the opening of the Donald L. Houston Center, FSIS operated a national training center in Forth Worth, Texas.
It's beneficial to the students to offer education and training from FSIS experts, as well as university faculty who are schooled in the field, Brown notes.
"For individuals to be true professionals in what they do, they need to understand why they are doing something; not simply, what to do," Brown says. "We have the opportunity with this partnership in excellence to continually address the why behind what those employees do today."
In July, Brown, Tynan and their staff were conducting a top-to-bottom review of the curriculum. Such reassessment procedures come with the changing territory.
"As change occurs, responsibilities change," Brown says. "As science advances and technology becomes more available, there's a constant need to re-evaluate not only what is being delivered in training but how we deliver it.
"It keeps us busy. But that's to be expected and desired," he adds.