Skip to content

Author: bobbertsch

Published on

On the last podcast of the year, regulars Jamie Seger (Ohio State University Extension) and Paul Hill (Utah State University Extension) of the eXtension EdTech Learning Network join us to look back on 2017 and forward to the new year.

Paul and Jamie spent a lot of time this year encouraging innovation in Extension. We talked about the innovation challenge or as Paul called it the crisis Extension faces. We also touched on the upcoming eXtension Designathon One events, the Ed Tech Learning Network tweet-ups and the new book, "We've Tried That Before: 512 Years of Extension Wisdom."

Happy New Year!

Published on

I found out about the "Get Engaged! A Guide to Getting Involved in Your Community" program on Twitter. Eric Walcott, a State Specialist with Michigan State University Extension’s Government and Public Policy programs, was sharing his experience offering the program in Grand Traverse County, Michigan. Here are the 2 tweets that prompted me to reach out to Eric.

Our conversation for the podcast covers the "Get Engaged" program, but also Eric's work talking with local governments about real engagement. As we talked, I was reminded of this Gapingvoid illustration:

A post shared by gapingvoid® (@gapingvoid) on

Eric referenced the Public Participation Spectrum from the International Association for Public Participation as a resource for increasing public engagement. I think it's a great resource, not just for governments, but for Extension programs. Eric wrote a series of articles on the public participation spectrum. This is the first article in the series: http://msue.anr.msu.edu/news/public_participation_beyond_public_comment_at_open_meetings and here's the last onewith links to all the prior articles: http://msue.anr.msu.edu/news/engaging_the_public_in_local_government_decisions_empower.

Listen to the podcast

Published on

Alex Chan, University of Maryland 4-H Youth Development Educator for Prince George's county, is teaching high school students about healthy romantic relationships. He's a great example of bringing one's whole self to Extension work, bringing his experience as a marriage and family therapist to his current work.

I found out about Alex's workshops through this NPR Education article. Here's our conversation.

Published on

An important article came out in the June 2017 edition of the Journal of Extension.

"Redefining the Concept of Learning in Cooperative Extension" is a thoughtful, challenging conversation starter. I recently discussed it with the NDSU Extension Innovation team, and it sparked several questions from the practical to the existential.

After that conversation, I could hardly wait to talk with the authors, and they were kind enough to oblige. Here's my conversation with Steven Worker, 4-H Youth Development Advisor, University of California, Agriculture and Natural Resources; Kristy Ouellette, Associate Extension Professor, 4-H Youth Development, University of Maine, Cooperative Extension; and Alexa Maille, 4-H STEM Specialist, Cornell University, Cornell Cooperative Extension. I hope it gets you thinking.

Published on

The latest Working Differently in Extension podcast features a conversation with Dave Campbell, Community Studies Specialist in Cooperative Extension and associate dean for social/human sciences in the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences at the University of California-Davis.

Dave says the goal of his work is "to deepen the practice of democratic citizenship in California communities." That goal speaks directly to my interests in equity, engagement and collective action. It also speaks to Extension's legacy of empowering citizens. We talked about whether that legacy still plays a central role in Extension.

We also talked about what Dave means by forming a "community of the problem."  It's really about turning a private problem into a public problem. Can people faced with the same problem come together to define the problem and work on it together? Dave is looking at that possibilities around the issue of food waste.

Here's our conversation:

2

Published on 2 Comments on Backhauling to Connect Small Farms With Wholesale Markets: A WDinExt Podcast

Kathy Draeger and her colleagues at the University of Minnesota had a brilliant idea.

Every week or more a loaded semi truck arrives at every rural grocery store in Minnesota to deliver the food needed to stock their shelves, but all of those trucks return to the food distributor's warehouse empty. Kathy and her colleagues wondered if there was a way to load those trucks with the garlic, potatoes and strawberries being grown on small and medium-sized farms near those grocery stores. It's a powerful idea that could significantly impact the sustainability of the farms, while benefiting the grocery stores and the wholesalers. So they set out to do it.

I spoke with Kathy to find out more. I hope you enjoy our conversation.

Published on

I had to hold back the tears in a small meeting room at Big Sky Resort. Jennifer Anderson, Montana State University Extension Agent in Rosebud and Treasure Counties, was wrapping up her incredible presentation, "Community Foundation and Extension Building Capacity Together: One Community's Story," at the 2017 NACDEP/CDS Conference. Her enthusiasm and sincerity had the room mesmerized. When she said, "We know our community foundation has saved lives," the emotion in her voice had people leaning forward in their chairs. At the end, she quoted Devine Carama. At our general session just a hour or so before, Devine had said, "We are arrogant to believe we will see the impact of our leadership while we are alive," and he challenged us to build a legacy that would live beyond us. As Jennifer ended her presentation, she said she knew this, the Community Foundation of Northern Rosebud County, was her legacy. I wasn't the only one moved to tears.

Please listen to Jennifer's inspiring story below.

Published on

Myra Moss, Ohio State University Associate Professor & Extension Educator, has been involved in helping Ohio communities plan for sustainable development. In our conversation (below), she shares her insights about and experience in that work, as well as her work building collaborative partnerships as the city of Columbus and the ag producers from outside the city try to understand each other's concerns about the watershed they share.

Published on

Image: Fostoria 4 by Willy Nelson, https://flic.kr/p/9gcUdm, CC BY_NC 2.0

I met Partick Kirby at the 2017 NACDEP/CDS conference. He participated in a pre-conference session on Working Out Loud, and his contributions to the conversation were so valuable that I had to find out more about his work.

He presented at the conference on crowdfunding real estate development, which as you'll hear below not only provides important funding for projects in rural cities, but can also give the community a sense ownership and pride in a project.

After hearing about that work, I knew I had to get him on the podcast, but later I learned he's also directing perhaps the only legislatively-created, state-focused brownfield assistance center in the nation. In short, Patrick is doing important and innovative work, and he kindly shared some of his experience below.

1

Published on 1 Comment on Why We Suck at Conversation

In his post, "Principles for engaging human systems for wellbeing and innovation in a connected world," Jeremy Scrivens shared what he has learned from Margaret Wheatley, including her 10 Principles for Healthy Communities.

Principle #3 struck me, "Conversation is the way human beings have always thought together." It makes sense. We've been talking to each other for 1.75 million years, give or take. So why do we suck at it?

A couple of years ago, Steve Judd put me onto a paper that highlighted how bad we are at conversation, why we're so bad, and what we can do about it.

Ed Gallagher is a professor in English at Lehigh University. A dozen or so years ago, he hoped that online discussion boards would solve his students' inability to talk to each other. He found that the technology alone did not magically make his students competent social communicators, but he did find a way to teach them conversation.

Gallagher's paper, "Teaching Students to Talk to Each Other: Improving the Discussion Board," is full of great insights about conversation.

Gallagher explains why we suck at conversation: "our culture almost exclusively values, practices and rewards closure and competition and winning, precisely what should be suspended in discussion." Just today, in the midst of a rich conversation with a colleague, I apologized for being unproductive. I felt if I wasn't clearly moving us toward the stated goal of the meeting, then I wasn't adding value. We want to achieve closure, to produce a result, to check the unchecked box. Deep conversation may not generate checked boxes, but it does foster creativity, collaboration and innovation.

Gallagher combated the values of the predominant culture by growing a new culture built around the idea that "Conversation makes us colleagues. Community is job one." How would such a vision change your organization? What would happen if our relationships to each other were more important than the unfinished project of the unfiled report? Jeremy Scrivens shared that Margaret Wheatley led him to the insight that how we relate to each other is actually the most important thing, "It was Meg who opened my eyes to see enterprises - not as hierarchical constructs or work processes with people as operators of these processes - but as living human systems in relationship with each other."

"The art of writing on the discussion board is to keep the conversation going," Gallagher wrote. He used the metaphor of an noncompetitive racquetball game to explain this to his students.

Instead of a typical racquetball game where each participant is trying to win, Gallagher asked his students to imagine a game where each participant's only goal was to extend the rally as long as possible. In the discussion board, students were encouraged to avoid behaviors that would end the "rally." Comments like "Great point!" might be validating but they don't extend the conversation. Neither do replies explaining how the previous post was completely wrong. The point is not to hit the unreachable shot in the corner, but hit a shot that stretches your opponent but allows the rally to continue.

Gallagher offers some strategies for giving discussions "legs:"agreeing (The improv tenant "Yes, and" should be kept in mind. The point is not just to agree but to agree and add on), questioning, enhancing, answering, building, disagreeing, weaving, re-directing and re-thinking.

So let's stop sucking at conversation. Let's use some of the strategies Gallagher suggests. Let's start avoiding, rather than seeking closure. Instead of focusing on our ideas winning, let's try to extend the rally. If, as Margaret Wheatley said, "...very great change starts from very small conversations, held among people who care," our future depends on it.