Monday, July 27, 2015

Get Involved in Twitter Town Halls

The Communications and Marketing Committee, Scott Reed, chair, Oregon State University, encourages colleagues to contact Ashley Hawn, Ashley.hawn@kglobal.com, at kglobal to coordinate a Twitter Town Hall. AgIsAmerica is an effort to communicate impacts of land-grant universities, specifically the Colleges of Agriculture, Agricultural Experiment Stations, and Cooperative Extension. Twitter Town Halls are live Q+As that happen over Twitter during a set time and all responses are grouped together by a unique hashtag. Twitter Town Halls help raise awareness, establish credibility, and fuel discussion about the importance of the land-grant system topics of public concern. In order to implement regular Twitter Town Halls, your help is needed to highlight a variety of local, multi-state, and national topics of interest, specifically water security; nutrition and health; agricultural systems; environmental stewardship; energy and bioproducts; youth, family, and communities; and food security. 

ECOP Meets in Providence – Private resource mobilization was a prime topic of consideration by ECOP at its meeting last week in Providence, RI. ECOP leadership, under the direction of Delbert Foster, chair, South Carolina State University, and Michelle Rodgers, chair-elect, University of Delaware, is investigating Cooperative Extension’s potential as a national system to complement existing resources. Other actions related to follow-up on the USDA-NIFA Plan of Work Expert Panel, summary of impacts from Cooperative Extension’s work with USDA Farm Service Agency on producer education related to new farm/ranch programs, and discussion of urban programming as a national priority. 

ECOP members Mark Latimore, Fort Valley State University,
Chris Boerboom, North Dakota State University, and
Lyla Houglum, Executive Director, Western Extension
Directors Association, engage in facilitated process.
Many Voices, One Message Theme of Joint COPs Many Voices, One Message was the theme of the APLU Board on Agriculture Assembly (BAA) Joint COPs meeting last week in Providence. Laura Kalambokidis, University of Minnesota, set the stage by outlining how public value needs to be a part of outcomes reporting. Cathie Woteki, USDA Chief Scientist and Under Secretary for USDA Research, Education and Economics, and Sonny Ramaswamy, USDA-NIFA director, also addressed the group of about 100 key leaders. A facilitated discussion set the stage for the development of a unifying message about the value of university-based agriculture research, academic programs, and Cooperative Extension. The BAA Policy Board of Directors chaired by Jay Akridge, Purdue University, will continue efforts to reach agreement on a unifying message. 

Urban Programming Webinar 7.30.15 – Hear how Washington State University (WSU) Extension in Snohomish County continued to grow its programming through the recent recession by creating visible, relevant and successful urban Extension programs built on the strengths of traditional Extension programming. Learn the strategies that preserved and grew programs, enabled the development of new programs and defined WSU Extension as a leader in this metropolitan community.Register for the Western Center for Metropolitan Extension and Research seminar on Successful Urban Programming: Building from the Traditional Base, July 30, 2015, Noon -1:00 pm PDT at https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/4733757465126636289

Cultivating Change Summit – ECOP Personnel Committee co-chair Mike O’Neill, University of Connecticut, calls your attention to an inaugural summit August 6-9, 2015 in Atlanta, GA designed to value and celebrate the diversity of Gay, Bi, Trans, and Questioning men in or around agriculture (and the people who love and respect them). Goals of the summit are to strengthen the social fabric and further develop the community of Gay, Bi, Trans, and Questioning men involved with agriculture; articulate how personal and professional identity development has or has not been influenced by involvement in the agriculture community, and network with similar professionals and their allies to improve careers and professional development. For more information, contact Marcus Hollan, marcus.hollan@uky.edu, Kris Elliott, elliokris@uga.edu, or Jesse Lee Eller, jeller@studio5consulting.com or visit www.studio5consulting.com/cultivatingchange.

Monday, July 20, 2015

Celebrating 125 Years

Congratulations 1890 Land-grants! Please enjoy this photo gallery of ECOP members and other Cooperative Extension leaders participating in the 1890 land-grant university 125th anniversary celebration last week in Washington, DC. 

ECOP Chair Delbert Foster, Ann Schlutt, Fred Schutt-University of Alaska
L. Washington Lyons-1890 Executive Director

ECOP Chair - Delbert Foster,
South Carolina State University

1890s Region ECOP Member - Celvia Stovall with
Alabama A&M University colleagues.
Doug Steele-Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service, Fred Schlutt


Fred Schlutt, Delbert Foster

Gina Eubanks, Southern University Ag Center,
Fred Schlutt

Steve Slack, Ohio State University-Immediate Past-chair of ESCOP, Jimmy Henning-University of Kentucky-Immediate Past-chair of ECOP,Michelle Rodgers-ECOP Chair-elect, University of Delaware

Mark Latimore, Jr.-Fort Valley State University

Mark Latimore, Jr with Jeff Myers, JCEP President,
University of Maryland

Michelle Rodgers-University of Delaware
Albert Essel-Delaware State University

Michelle Rodgers-University of Delaware
Jimmy Henning, ECOP Immediate Past-chair

Jeff Myers, University of Maryland
Nancy Bull, Northeast Extension Director

Monday, July 13, 2015

Register for NEDA 2015

With the theme Innovation: Driving Extension’s Next Century, Cooperative Extension leaders will have opportunity to gather in downtown St. Louis, October 12-15, 2015 for the National Extension Directors and Administrators (NEDA) Meeting. In a peer-to-peer learning environment, find out how to be an innovation leader and learn from each other about innovative approaches to program, resource development, evaluation, and partnerships. Register at http://www.cvent.com/d/wrq424.

Chris Boerboom,
North Dakota State University
Boerboom Named to ECOP – The North Central Region has named Chris Boerboom of North Dakota State University (NDSU) as an ECOP member for a four-year term. Boerboom began work as director of Extension at NDSU in 2012 and is a professor of weed science. He also represents the north central region on the ECOP Program Committee and is a member of the NEDA 2015 Planning Committee. Each of the five Cooperative Extension regions names three representatives to serve on ECOP. For a directory and other details of ECOP’s work, see www.extension.org/ecop

Celvia Stovall and Rick Klemme
Health Implementation Team Continues Work – With leadership by co-chairs Celvia Stovall, Alabama Cooperative Extension System, and Rick Klemme, University of Wisconsin Extension, the ECOP-ESCOP Health Implementation Team continued its work last week focusing on a process for articulating the science base, identifying existing programs and curriculums, and determining gaps where Cooperative Extension can provide education. The five action teams are chaired by David Buys, Mississippi State University (Chronic Disease); Virginia Brown, University of Maryland (Health Insurance Literacy); Sonja Koukel, New Mexico State University (Health Literacy); Roberta Riportella, Kansas State University (Health Policy Issues Education), and Sekai Turner, North Carolina A&T University (Positive Youth Development for Health). Over a three-year period the effort will implement Cooperative Extension’s National Framework for Health and Wellness. The overall expected outcome is to increase the number of Americans who are healthy at every stage of life. As indicated in the national framework (pg. 2), “This same system of Extension can do for the nation’s health what it did for American agriculture.” 

Impacts Needed on Water Security Programs – Tim Cross, chair, National Impacts Database Committee, University of Tennessee, requests your assistance to input impacts at www.landgrantimpacts.org related to water security. The Board on Agriculture Assembly has advanced a proposal for significant funding for research, academic programs, and Cooperative Extension to be focused on securing the nation’s water supply. Impact statements from Cooperative Extension are critical to this process. 

Cooperative Extension Social Media – The effort to raise awareness of Cooperative Extension continues on Social Media. After last year's work to create a unified and regular social media presence for the Cooperative Extension System, ECOP is supporting the continued operation of these platforms under the leadership of Frankie Gould, Chair of the Social Media Team. Bill Woodrum, Social Media Associate for ECOP, is coordinating the project across many platforms. Send information to him at extensioncentennial@gmail.com. Also please encourage to participate -- Facebook: facebook.com/Extension100Years, Twitter: Twitter.com/ext100years, YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC9GyqMs0FKlUKBTxtcyg04w/videos and Pinterest: Pinterest.com/ext100years/pins/.