National eXtension Initiative

One of the critical success factors used to gauge the success of eXtension is the inclusion of eXtension in various grants and contracts, especially in USDA-NIFA competitive grant programs.

To this point in time, 114 grants supporting up to 33 Communities of Practice have been funded by a combination of private, state and federal entities. The majority of these funds (86%) have been used to enhance CoPs, the remainder (14%) focused on creating new Communities of Practice. Approximately 95% of the funds have gone to Extension faculty at member institutions.

In 2012, when counting all contracts, sponsorships, donations, course revenue and grants received including the New Technologies for Ag Extension award, CES received $1.69 of additional funds for each $1 invested by CES Directors and Administrators.

In 2013, the inclusion of eXtension in USDA-NIFA competitive grant programs continues to grow. To date, 80 “letters of acknowledgement” have been written and included in various grant applications to the following list of programs:

• AgrAbility and Youth Farm Safety
• Organic Transitions
• Agriculture and Food Research Initiative (AFRI):
–Agricultural Science for Climate Variability and Change
–Agriculture and Natural Resources Science for Climate Variability and Change
–Childhood Obesity Prevention
–DOE-USDA Plant Feedstock Genomics For Bioenergy program
–Food Safety Challenge
–NIFA Fellowships Grant Program
–Plant Breeding for Agricultural Production
–Sustainable Bioenergy
• Children, Youth, and Family at Risk (CYFAR)
• Pest Management Alternatives Program (PMAP)
• 1890 Capacity Funding Program
• Health & Human Services
• Higher Education Challenge (HEC) Grants Program

As stated, interest in including eXtension continues to grow, for instance in 2012, a total of 83 letters of acknowledgement were included in various programs. The bottom line is an emphasis in collaboration and working together remains high among all those developing grant applications.

Enhanced Reporting

There’s a new “questions touched” metric which counts all question activity (answered, assigned, tagged, edited, located, grouped) for individual experts. State reports have also been expanded to include a breakdown of in-state vs out-of-state expert activity for that state’s questions. Reports now include the entire list of experts for a given location or group, and not just the top forty.

Editing for SEO (Search Engine Optimization)

Added the ability to edit a question and responses. Designed primarily to allow SEO of public questions, this features allows experts to correct spelling, grammar and tweak a question’s title to generate better search rankings.

I’m Working on This

We’ve brought back the ability to indicate an answer is “In Progress.” When someone has indicates they are working on it, we display a banner at the top of the question.

Group Assignments in Plain English

Have you experienced any confusion about question assignments in your groups? We’ve added a new page which attempts to describe the assignment settings in plain English for each particular group. Click the “How are questions assigned to this group?” link on any group homepage to get the explanation.

Expert Reassignment Alert

New alert banner on the reassignment screen indicates if a question has been previously assigned to that expert. Also displaying additional expert info to help with reassignment decisions.

New Assignment Option for Groups

There’s a new option designed to eliminate the impact of high volume counties and distribute questions evenly across a state. Look for the “Ignore a question’s county when assigning to group members” option on the Group Home > Settings > Assignment Options page.

Work continues on the construction of Georgia AgrAbility’s project in Second Life, located on eXtension’s Morrill4 Region. The learning experience at Virtual AgrAbility Farm will include models of adapted farm equipment, learning games, informational kiosks, and several scenes depicting Georgia farmers who have benefited from AgrAbility’s assistance.

Take a look at one of the farmer vignettes, depicting organic farmer Ruby Davis.

Have you ever wondered just how the Extension Master Gardener program came about? If so, check out “Exploring our Roots—A Short History of Extension and the Master Gardener Program”. This article, found on the Extension Master Gardener blog was “first written by Bob Kellam for the North Carolina Extension Master Gardeners Volunteer Association Newsletter. His preface is directed at members of the North Carolina Extension Master Gardener Association, but has relevance for all programs exploring the roots and connections between Extension and the Master Gardener program.”

eXtension continues to have great interest in its train-the-trainer opportunity to help support staff become “Digital Information Brokers” through learning to use eXtension tools. Since the training was first offered in December 2012, more than 16 states have participated. Virginia Tech was the first institution to take the next step, offering Digital Information Broker training to support staff. This training is slated to be offered monthly in Virginia.

Lela Vandenberg, Jerry Thomas and Terry Meisenbach invite you to attend one of the sessions in July or October. These session are for those willing to take responsibility for training support staff (AND agents/educators) in their states to make better use of eXtension’s online resources to help customers find answers to their questions.

It’s best (but not required) if you recruit at least one other person to attend this train-the-trainer, so that there are at least two people from your institution responsible for offering training.

Participants will learn how use an online format to teach their front-line personnel to:
‒ search for an answer or ask a question in eXtension’s Ask an Expert system
‒ direct clients to and search two other eXtension sites
‒ get an eXtension ID and join the Support Staff Community
‒ Use People to connect people to specific national experts
‒ Use Learn for their own professional development

The sessions will be participatory and hands-on. Each participant will have the opportunity to go through the same process they’ll use when training support staff. Step-by-step instructions for conducting a similar training will be shared, along with useful handouts for support staff.

The sessions are conducted in this Adobe Connect room: https://connect.msu.edu/find/, which will also be sent to you prior to your session, along with a phone number.

PLEASE REGISTER for one of the free sessions below; all are from 1-2:30 p.m. ET. They are limited to 12 people per session. If there’s only one that fits your schedule, sign up even if it’s full to get on a waiting list. More sessions will be offered if there’s a demand.

#7580 How to Help Clients with Questions-CES Train the Trainer 07/08/2013
#7581 How to Help Clients with Questions-CES Train the Trainer 07/16/2013
#7582 How to Help Clients with Questions-CES Train the Trainer 10/07/2013
#7583 How to Help Clients with Questions-CES Train the Trainer 10/15/2013

Thanks, and we look forward to ‘seeing’ you online!

National media outlets featured and cited eXtension on a number of topics in April 2013:

Dairy cattle – 2 mentions
Entrepreneurs and their communities – 1 mention
Extension Master Gardeners – 2 mentions
Families, food and fitness — 1 mention
Floods – 1 mention
Grapes – 1 mention
Imported fire ants – 1 mention
Military families – 2 mentions
Organic agriculture – 1 mention
Personal finance – 4 mentions
Plant breeding and genomics – 1 mention
Small meat processing – 1 mention

If you know of other eXtension mentions in national media outlets or have suggestions of potential national news stories, contact Lynette Spicer at lynette.spicer@eXtension.org.

The mentions with links to media are posted at http://create.extension.org/node/95883.

The recent fire and explosion in West, Texas garnered national news attention. Behind the scenes, our Cooperative Extension peers contributed in part to the recovery. The following is a message that Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service employees received from Director Doug Steele:

“Put simply, the emergency response to the tragic explosion in West, Texas, required extraordinary efforts. As the recovery began, many of you helped on a personal level and others also served in official roles, as part of state and county emergency management plans—all doing exceptional work to help friends, family, neighbors and fellow Texans in need. Although I can’t recount all your efforts following this catastrophic event, I would like to acknowledge the following:

· County Extension agents and staff in McLennan, Hill and surrounding counties, who helped wherever they could, in addition to their support role for animal issues, public information, and ongoing educational needs during community, business and family recovery.

· Our 4-H and Youth Development Program, which activated statewide to collect, pack and ship basic supplies to first responders and affected families, as well as to raise more than $5,600 in monetary donations.

· Texas A&M AgriLife Communications for assistance with media inquiries; the Texas Extension Disaster Education Network (EDEN) for elevating relevant educational material on its website; Mr. Ron Woolley for serving as agency liaison to the Texas Department of Public Safety Disaster District Committee; and Dr. Andy Vestal, our Extension director of emergency management, for providing reference information for a USDA-NIFA and White House teleconference on April 18.

At such a difficult time, the importance of each person’s part simply cannot be overstated. Thank you to all who helped and continue to help the residents of West.”

According to Suzanne Deatherage, assistant agency director-communications, other members of the Texas A&M University System also supported West, a community just 107 miles north of the flagship campus.

Linnette Goard

Cindy Bond

Reduce health care costs. Increase wellness and productivity of employees. That seems to be today’s mantra for every industry and organization but that was the goal in 2006 when the wellness coordinator for the County Commissioners Association of Ohio asked Ohio State University Extension for help in lowering health care costs and having healthier, more productive employees.

Since that beginning, OSU Extension educators have developed lessons, a blog, an email challenge and a Facebook page to help people live healthier.

The OSU Extension Live Healthy Live Well Workplace Wellness Program works to
• encourage healthy lifestyles through research-based workplace programs,
• develop new or strengthen existing partnerships,
• empower individuals and communities to make informed choices about healthy behaviors, and
• use online communications to reach busy adults.

Linnette Goard, Assistant Professor and Field Specialist for Food Safety, Selection and Management, and Cindy Bond, Extension Educator in Community Development with Ohio State University Extension, shared their methods and results at the Priester Extension Health Conference last month.

Lunch and Learn Lessons
Working with the County Commissioners Association of Ohio, OSU Extension developed an online health needs questionnaire. The survey results were used to develop lessons for onsite lunch and learn workshops. The lessons were peer reviewed by out of state reviewers. The lessons covered topics including
Physical Activity: A Good Fit!
Stress Management
Maintaining a Healthy Weight
Cooking for One or Two
Planning Healthy Meals for Meetings

Wellness Challenge Started in 2007
There are three wellness challenge periods (fall, Thanksgiving to New Year’s, and spring) each year. Two short email messages go out each week on themes such as eat more vegetables and fruits, cut out fast food and consider your portion sizes.

“The challenge is a new way to link face-to-face classes with technology so people get the information from the lessons via email,” said Goard. Extension educators promote the challenge at all their programs, through the university at large and at national Extension events so the challenge includes people outside Ohio. In 2012, the challenge had more than 1,100 participants per session.

Challenge participants survey responses
94% Learned new information
98% Recommend participating in an online challenge to others
54% Lost weight, 42% maintained current weight
Respondents lost 406 pounds in Zero Weight Gain Challenge –and the goal was just maintenance!

Blog, Facebook
In November 2010 the blog, Live Healthy Live Well, went online. The blog, with twice weekly posts, averaged 55 views per day. In September 2011, the initiative added a Facebook page, go.osu.edu/PRP.

“I went to the first eXtension conference in Louisville,” Goard said. “eXtension opened my eyes to technology that I didn’t even know about. When I came home and talked to my (then) teenage children, they encouraged me to try the technology. We started this program with six OSU Extension educators. Other educators got excited about this and now we have 16 working on it. This is really exciting. We have enough people to create subgroups to work on the different aspects.”

The Wood Products community of practice provides research-based information on the design, production, management, marketing and environmental impact of wood products. It’s at http://www.extension.org/wood_products.

“Our goal is to educate practitioners and communities by disseminating key knowledge in the effective and efficient use of forest products,” said Henry Quesada, assistant professor at Virginia Tech. Through frequently asked questions and the Ask an Expert feature, the new web site connects wood products academicians with farmers, wood enthusiasts and small businesses that are interested in the use of wood as a truly sustainable material.”

Featured articles include:
• Basics of Cross Laminated Timber (CLT)
• Marketing for Wood Products Companies
• Carbon Impacts of Wood Products
• Integrating Lean Manufacturing Techniques and Energy Saving Practices Boost Productivity and Cuts Costs
• Design and Operation of a Solar-Heated Dry Kiln

The new content compliments other resources on eXtension including forest farming; climate, forest and woodlands; farm energy and wood energy. Efficient use of wood products has a positive impact in the management of the forest and woodlands. Many farmers own forests that can generate new value-added products as well as wood products residues or byproducts that can be used to generate clean and sustainable energy.

Experts from across the country contribute to the site and respond to current and future issues on the use of wood. The leaders and contributors for the wood products content include Adam Taylor from the University of Tennessee, Omar Espinoza from the University of Minnesota, Phillip Mitchell from North Carolina State University, and Brian Bond, Henry Quesada, Earl Kline, and Robert Smith from Virginia Tech.

The State of Nevada requires employees to take mandatory training courses upon employment and retake them every few years. The courses had to be completed using specific state computers or by attending in-person classes.

Much of Nevada is rural, and therefore it was difficult for rural county employees to complete the trainings. Seeing a need, Vicki Jones, a University of Nevada Cooperative Extension employee, wanted easier access for county employees. Jones worked with the Nevada Department of Personnel to get the department’s Moodle-based training courses duplicated on eXtension at http://campus.extension.org/.

Now all of Nevada’s Cooperative Extension employees as well as all employees of Nevada’s higher-education institutions have online access to the trainings.

Each of the state’s 10 institutions currently using these courses is provided a unique enrollment key. Nevada administrators can create reports for individual institutions. Each institution receives a quarterly report of those who have completed final exams for the various courses and received a certificate of completion.

Nevada has eight of these training courses on eXtension’s website. There have been more than 4,000 certificates issued since 2010.

Nevada’s organizational training courses are specifically for State of Nevada employees, but there are likely components of these courses that would apply to employees of almost any institution.

For information about how Moodle might contribute to your educational efforts, contact the eXtension Moodle help desk at moodlehelp@extension.org. You may also contact Chad Waters at University of Nevada Cooperative Extension, watersc@unce.unr.edu, for additional information about the Nevada courses.