Buchholz Elected to BAA Policy Board

Daryl Buchholz, Kansas State University

Daryl Buchholz, Kansas State University, will represent Cooperative Extension on the APLU Board on Agriculture Assembly Policy Board of Directors, effective November 2015. Buchholz served as ECOP chair in 2013. The alternate member is Doug Steele, Texas A&M AgriLife Extension. Daryl and Doug replace Tim Cross, University of Tennessee, and Beverly Durgan, University of Minnesota, who have served as member and alternate, respectively, for the last two years. ECOP expresses appreciation to these colleagues for serving in this national leadership role. 

Delbert Foster, South Carolina
State University

Foster Receives USDA-NIFA Honor – Delbert Foster, South Carolina State University, was inducted into the USDA-NIFA Hall of Fame last week at award ceremonies in Washington, DC. This honor recognizes contributions helping NIFA fulfill its mission to invest in and advance agricultural research, education, and Extension to solve societal challenges. Foster is the current ECOP chair. 

REMINDER i-Three Corps Nomination Deadline 11.6.15 – The NEW eXtension is seeking 200 individuals to co-invent the future!!! These 200, called the i-Three Issue Corps, will join us to experiment with new tools, model new behaviors all with the goal of working effectively to make a measurable impact. eXtension is looking for individuals with plans of work including either Climate or Food Systems. Nominations can be for individuals or teams. The nomination deadline is November 6, 2015. For more information check out the blog post on the i-Three Corps OR contact Terry Meisenbach at tmeisenbach@extension.org. 

Roberta Riportella, Kansas State Univ., third from the left,
chairs the ECOP/ESCOP Health Policy Issues Ed. Action Team

Health Extension Webinar 10.27.15 – The Health Policy Issues Education Action Team, Roberta Riportella, Chair, Kansas State University, invites you to a webinar Building Cooperative Extension’s Capacity to Support Health in Policy Issues Education: A Case for Strategic Planning, 3:00 – 4:00 p.m. ET, 10.27.15. Connect at https://connect.extension.iastate.edu/communities. The purpose of the webinar is to explore Extension capacity to inform policy, systems, and environmental approaches that impact human health. 

Urban Extension Webinar 10.29.15 – Register at https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/396906474592232962 for the 10:00 a.m. ET webinar on 10.29.15 on Metropolitan Engagement in Oregon: Community Engagement and Partnerships within a Successful Urban Extension Model. The presentation explores contemporary and emerging issues for urban Extension programming to consider in addition to discussing key strategies in developing strategic, collaborative and mutually beneficial partnerships in urban environments with best practice models and lessons learned as OSU’s urban extension work evolves in the Portland metro region. 

ECOP Budget Webinar Recording Available – The recording of the ECOP webinar on Understanding the Federal Budget Process is available at https://connect.extension.iastate.edu/p2dfeb7b8sq/. Organized by the ECOP Budget and Legislative Committee (BLC), speakers were Rick Klemme, BLC chair, University of Wisconsin, and Doug Steele, BLC Vice-chair, Texas A&M AgriLife Extension, together with Rick Mertens, Texas A&M, and Hunt Shipman, Cornerstone Government Affairs.

NEDA 2015 in Photo Review

The Cooperative Extension Section Business meeting and the National Extension Directors and Administrators (NEDA) meeting last week in St. Louis engaged 123 registrants representing 47 states, the District of Columbia, and 3 U.S. territories. The theme Innovation: Driving Extension’s Next Century permeated through 

• a keynote address, 

Claudia Fernandez, keynote speaker, addresses NEDA participants - Characteristics of Innovation Leadership

• an innovation showcase,

Commodities for Communities - University of Tennessee, Tim Cross; First Generation 4-H Families Initiative - Kansas State University - Barbara Stone; Fast Track Gardening - Southern University Ag Center, Stephanie Elwood; Forward Learning Experience (FLEx) - Iowa State University, Pete Evans; Open Campus - Oregon State University, Jeff Sherman; Unmanned Aerial Systems - North Dakota State University, John Nowatzki; Urban Food Hubs - University of the District of Columbia, Bill Hare; District Program Leadership - Virginia Tech, Mike Lambur

• a Twitter town hall, 

Excerpts from Twitter feed on October 14, 2015. Total impressions (potential views) was > 6,000,000. Total reach (number of individuals who viewed content) was > 300,000. Total number of Tweets was > 700.

• deep dive work sessions, and 

• a capstone video produced on site. 

 

On the evening of October 13, 2015 ECOP Chair Elect Michelle Rodgers, University of Delaware presented an ECOP Resolution for 1890s Universities to colleagues in celebration of the 125th anniversary signing of the 2nd Morrill Act. To read the entire resolution go to http://bit.ly/ECOP1890Resolution. 
 

L. Washington Lyons, Executive Director of Association of Extension Administrators,
Celvia Stovall-Alabama A&M University, and Mark Latimore, Jr.-Fort Valley State University
each receive a copy of the resolution.

Attendees are encouraged to fill out the evaluation form at http://www.jotformpro.com/form/52872008336960 by 11.6.15. NEDA 2016 will be joint with the Experiment Station Section September 19-22, 2016 in Jackson Lake Lodge in Grand Teton National Park. 

More photos from NEDA are available at https://goo.gl/photos/J4r9SappM785rbfdA.

Top Honors for Extension Excellence and Diversity Announced

Joe Outlaw,
Texas A&M Agrilife Extension

Joe Outlaw, Texas A&M AgriLife Extension, will receive the 2015 Excellence in Extension Award for his commitment to community engagement and his visionary leadership as Extension educator. A second honor, the National Extension Diversity Award, goes to a pilot program called Texas Grow! Eat! Go! aimed at improving community health through exercise and nutrition education, also from Texas A&M AgriLife Extension. Both awards will be presented at the 128th Annual Meeting of the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities (APLU) in Indianapolis, Indiana, November 15-17, 2015. The Excellence in Extension Award is a national award given annually to one Cooperative Extension professional in recognition of visionary leadership, excellence in programming, and positive impact on their community. The National Diversity Award recognizes an Extension program exhibiting significant contributions and accomplishments in achieving and sustaining diversity and pluralism. In addition to the national recognitions, one Extension educator from each of the five Cooperative Extension regions (northeast, north central, south, west, and 1890 universities), will be recognized for excellence at the APLU Annual Meeting. The 2015 Regional Excellence in Extension recipients are Virginie Zoumenou, University of Maryland Eastern Shore; Julie Garden-Robinson, North Dakota State University; Changlu Wang, Rutgers University; Derrell S. Peel, Oklahoma State University, and Dana Martin, Oregon State University. USDA-NIFA and Cooperative Extension have sponsored the Excellence in Extension and National Diversity awards since 1991. 

Extension Twitter Town Hall This Week – On Wednesday 10:30 – 11:00 a.m. ET, 10.14.15, Agriculture Is America will host a Twitter town hall with the University of the District of Columbia, Kansas State University, North Dakota State University, and Southern University’s Ag Center. These institutions are among eight showcased at the 2015 National Extension Directors and Administrators (NEDA) meeting this week in St. Louis. Submit questions using the hashtag #agischat to @AgIsAmerica. The link to the Twitter page is https://twitter.com/agisamerica. Extension educators from each institution will make up a experts to answer questions about youth development, unmanned aerial systems, health, nutrition, urban agriculture, and more. 

Participate in SNAP-ED Survey – The SNAP-Ed Program Development Team, Paula Peters, Chair, Kansas State University, requests your assistance in documenting the impact of land-grant universities with Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) educational programs. Expect to receive the survey in late October with a due date of 12.15.15. Previous reports http://www.extension.org/pages/73228/national-snap-ed-program-impact-reports#.VhvksNGFOpo describe this portion of Cooperative Extension’s nutrition education programming and provide information for decision-makers and other stakeholders. 

Susan Crowell, CARET Liaison to ECOP

CARET Liaison to ECOP Gets National Award – Susan Crowell, who represents the Council on Agriculture Research, Extension and Teaching (CARET) on ECOP, received the National Friends of Extension Award last week at the Epsilon Sigma Phi National Conference in Coeur d’ Alene, Idaho. Crowell is editor of Farm and Dairy, a regional newspaper based in northeastern Ohio. 

Eliminating Childhood Obesity – Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Update: The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) has awarded a planning grant to permit the Cooperative Extension System to determine how Extension could partner with the RWJF to address childhood obesity through evidence-based programming. National 4-H Council serves as the fiscal agent and sought the funding based on the Cooperative Extension National Framework for Health and Wellness (March 2014) http://www.aplu.org/document.doc?id=5134. A National Leadership Advisory Team (NLAT), facilitated by Bonnie Braun, University of Maryland (retired), convened the first of three on-site meetings at the National 4-H Youth Conference Center in September 2015. NLAT includes representatives from multiple facets of Extension, including four college-aged 4-H youth representatives. A special thanks to Michelle Rodgers, ECOP chair-elect, University of Delaware, for her leadership and participation on NLAT and to Delbert Foster, ECOP Chair, South Carolina State University, for his support of this initiative. The advisory team determined that in general, Extension is positioned to help eliminate childhood obesity because of its commitment to health and wellness; its capacity to engage with others to address societal issues such as childhood obesity; and its ability to contribute to transformational change resulting in health and wellness for all. It is presently studying evidence-based obesity intervention programs both within and outside of Extension. Additional information will be shared following the November 9th NLAT meeting. 

Timberline Manifesto Featured in JOE – See the current issue of the Journal of Extension (JOE), August 2015 http://www.joe.org/joe/2015august/index.php for a paper by ECOP members Scott Reed, Oregon State University, and Fred Schlutt, University of Alaska, along with Lou Swanson, Colorado State University, called the Timberline Manifesto: Seven Concepts Linking Extension and Engagement. It describes discussion by the Western Region Extension Directors (WEDA) on a vision for institutional engagement in Extension’s next century.

Budget Webinar Today 10.5.15

ECOP Budget and Legislative Committee Chair Rick Klemme, University of Wisconsin, and Vice-chair Doug Steele, Texas A&M AgriLife Extension, remind you of the webinar today at 1:00 p.m. ET on Understanding the Federal Budget Process. See www.bit.ly/ECOPFedWays for details. For best results, please use Firefox or Internet Explorer, not Chrome, as your web browser. 

Join Twitter Town Hall 10.14.15 – Extension educators and researchers from the University of the District of Columbia, North Dakota State University, Kansas State University, and the Southern University Ag Center (Louisiana) will partner with Agriculture Is America, a national communications initiative aimed at highlighting the nation’s land-grant institutions, to host a joint Twitter Town Hall on Wednesday, 10.14.15 from 10:30 – 11:00 a.m. ET. The experts will answer questions regarding youth development, gardening, nutrition, and unmanned aerial systems, among other agricultural topics. The University of the District of Columbia sponsors Urban Food Hubs, which tests the feasibility of small-scale food systems in urban communities in order to address food insecurity in our nation’s capital and beyond. Kansas State University helps rural and minority families connect with 4-H and Extension offices to learn more about higher education and join community clubs. North Dakota State University is one of six FAA national test sites for unmanned aerial systems, and university research and Extension specialists are performing field tests to assess crop and livestock sensing and monitoring. Southern University hosts a fast track gardening program that gives incarcerated youth the opportunity to use gardening as a tool to learn more about agriculture and nutrition. The four projects will be acknowledged at the 2015 National Extension Directors and Administrators (NEDA) and Cooperative Extension Section Annual Business Meeting next week in St. Louis. A Twitter Town Hall, like a public meeting or seminar, gives the opportunity for live question and answer periods. To follow the conversation or submit a question, include the hashtag #agischat in your tweet. All agriculture-related organizations, industry leaders, friends, and supporters are invited to join the discussion. The participating Twitter handles include: @agisamerica, @KState, @suagcenter, @UDC_CAUSES, and @NDSUExt. 

$9.8 Million Award to Support 4-H National Mentoring Program – 4-H symbol The U.S. Department of Justice's Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) has awarded National 4-H Council $9.8 million for implementation of the 4-H National Mentoring Program. This marks the sixth consecutive year that Council has received this important funding which is a testament to 4-H and the Cooperative Extension System's success in providing one-to-one and group mentoring services to youth. This new award brings the total investment from OJJDP in Cooperative Extension's 4-H program to $43 million since 2010. A special thanks to National 4-H Council Trustee Delbert Foster for his important role in helping to secure this funding by representing all of Cooperative Extension in his role as ECOP Chair. Through this award, land-grants across the country will have the opportunity to continue, enhance and expand mentoring services to at-risk, high-risk, and/or underserved populations through the replication of three successful Cooperative Extension youth mentoring programs. All three programs were brought to full implementation through USDA-NIFA's Children, Youth and Families at Risk Program. 

Health Conference Proposals Due 10.16.15 – You are invited to submit a presentation proposal for the 2016 National Health Outreach Conference hosted by Virginia Cooperative Extension and coordinated by a multistate planning team. The goal of the conference is to build a collaborative approach among organizations and agencies to achieve a healthier and safer America by promoting health and wellness, advancing health equity and reducing health disparities. For more information, see www.nationalhealthoutreach.org. Submit proposals at https://osu.az1.qualtrics.com/SE/?SID=SV_3fW18frku1WJwWN. 

Cooperative Extension at North Carolina A&T State and North Carolina State
universities are part of the Plants for Human Health Institute
centered at the Kannapolis Research Campus near Charlotte, NC.

Experiment Station Leaders Meet in Charlotte – Water security and plant breeding were key topics of discussion at the annual meeting of Experiment Station directors/administrators last week in Charlotte, NC. Included in the event was a tour of the Kannapolis Research Campus, which houses research efforts of various universities including land-grants North Carolina A&T State and North Carolina State universities. Bev Durgan, University of Minnesota, is the ECOP liaison to the Experiment Station Committee on Organization and Policy (ESCOP).