The Tuesday Letter
Agricultural Experiment Station & Cooperative Extension Service
Tuesday, May 10, 2011
(Vol. 17 No. 27)
IN THIS ISSUE...
WORD FROM THE ASSOCIATE DIRECTOR - EXTENSION AND APPLIED RESEARCH
I am pleased and excited to announce that we have received Attorney
General approval for the creation of 1 new Extension District beginning
July 1, 2011 and to add 3 additional counties into existing Districts. Those changes are as follows:
Extension District #14 (Wildcat) - Crawford, Labette, and Montgomery
Extension District # 9 (Twin Creeks) - Sheridan will be joining Decatur and Norton
Extension District #10 (Southwind) - Bourbon will be joining Allen and Neosho
Extension District #12 (Golden Prairie) - Gove will be joining Logan and Trego
I
extend my congratulations for all the hard work that has gone into this
process by the Extension Agents, Extension Board and Council members,
County Commissioners, Extension administrative team, and all others
involved in reaching to this point. Having 6 counties joining into new or existing Extension Districts is excellent momentum.
I also extend my thanks
and encouragement to all the same groups of individuals in counties
where serious discussions and work is underway to move towards creating
or joining a District in 2012. You may recall that I laid out a series
of goals for organizing districts back in the May 19, 2009 issue of the Tuesday Letter.
Those goals were to have at least 40 counties organized into districts
by July 2011, 75 by 2013, and essentially all counties who were ever
going to organize into districts by 2015.
With the addition of 6
more counties in districts as of July 2011, we now will stand at 39
counties operating within districts, only 1 off the goal of 40. With work underway in other
counties, I believe we are on track to achieve our goal by July
2013 and 2015!!
Thanks for all your continued diligence and hard work
towards making K-State Research and Extension relevant, valued, and
sustainable! Have a great week! --Daryl Buchholz dbuchhol@ksu.edu
P.S.
We anxiously await the state legislature to complete its work with the state 2012 budget which will kick in on July 1, 2011. No updates available at the writing of this message.
P.S.S. Ending on a much more positive note.... May is a month of graduations and celebrations. I for one am cheering as I have a daughter completing her Masters program this week. I know many of you are experiencing graduations of family, relatives and friends. Cheer on the graduates for their great accomplishments and be proud for their having
completed a goal!
LAST CALL FOR PHOTO ADVENTURE CAMP 2011
Photo Camp 2011 - The Next Generation, is close to the number of campers needed to hold camp and the registration deadline is May 15. A decision will be made soon. If you know of youth and adults who were wanting to attend camp, please check with them to be sure they got their registration in. For information and the registration form please go to http://www.kansas4-h.org/DesktopDefault.aspx?tabid=191.
Photo Camp registration is only through a Google Docs form. To register, please use the link on the Photo Camp web page. Be sure to complete the form and hit submit. A confirmation page should appear. If it does not, the registration did not go through. Try again. If there are questions or problems with this, please contact the Camp Director, Rachel Harmon, 800-457-3453, rachel@sagebrushvideo.com; or me, Rod Buchele. We will work with folks to get them registered. Other questions? Please ask.
Don't delay, registrations are due now! --Rod Buchele rbuchele@ksu.edu
4-H MARKETING NEWS: UPCOMING WEBINARS AND COUNTY FAIR MATERIALS
Mark your calendars to attend a 4-H Marketing Update webinar this month. The 4-H Marketing Action Team will cover their recent (and insightful) findings about why people AREN'T joining 4-H, and the plan to help you overcome those hurdles. Plus they have new recruitment materials for you to use at your county fairs, which will automatically be sent to you (no ordering).
Webinar times (your choice):
*May 17, 10 a.m.
*May 18, 10 a.m.
Please register by noon, Monday, May 16. To register, please sign up on the doodle poll at http://doodle.com/64356fc3y45h78p8, and select the date that works for you. If you want to learn more, but neither date works for you, please make a notation in the comment section. Details to connect will then be emailed to you.
The team has been working with Lori Bower, Strategy Chief at BowerComm Marketing Communications. Lori, a former McPherson County 4-H member and former Butler County 4-H Agent, is now volunteering her time to help us develop a comprehensive marketing strategy for Kansas 4-H. --Diane Mack and 4-H Marketing Team Members
SOCIAL MEDIA TRAINING - WEBINAR SERIES
Join National 4-H Council for its premiere 4-H Social Media
webinar series on Wednesdays in May and June.These interactive and instructive 45-minute tutorials will
help you develop social media strategies that create platforms that are
engaging, interactive, safe and effective. Built for those who are new to social media, as well as
advanced users, this series will help you harness the power of Facebook and
Twitter to communicate with a variety of audiences. You’ll learn how to generate
content, build community, increase participation and how to do it all in a safe
manner for youth and adults alike.
To attend, RSVP to individual sessions in the social media webinar series; we will reply with instructions on how to join the webinar.
Questions? Contact Ashley Lusk at National 4-H Council, 4Hmarketing@4-H.org.
Sessions for Basic Users
Choosing your channels -
Wednesday, May 18, 2011 2 PM EST
Start off your social media
ventures by discovering how a quick survey of your audience can help you
understand their interest and investment in social media. This session will also focus on finding your
primary audience and how they will affect your engagement online. Finally,
examine how a social media strategy can help you meet your organizational
goals.
Starting your own
pages - Wednesday, May 25, 2011, 2 PM EST
Should you develop a page or a group? Who will build and manage your pages? What privacy settings
should you consider? What is a hashtag anyway? Get to the nuts and bolts of
creating your own social media channels, as National 4-H Council’s social media
team lead you through a step-by-step process of preparing your own Facebook and
Twitter pages.
Content Generation -
Wednesday, June 1, 2011, 2 PM EST
Generating content can be easy when
you use the incredible resources of the 4-H Community. Learn how to build an
editorial calendar, schedule your updates in advance using tools like
Hootsuite, and how to use eXtension to collect general content for your social
media outlets.
Sessions for Advanced Users
Online Safety Best
Practices - Wednesday, June 8, 2011, 2 PM EST
The best way to build a 4-H network
is to create a secure online community for both adults and youth. Social media
experts will provide you with an outline of best practices for adult volunteers
who may be interacting with youth online, as well as a series of recommended
privacy settings to keep youth and adults safe on your pages.
Measuring your Impact -
Wednesday, June 15, 2011, 2 PM EST
Make sure your efforts are
generating the maximum impact. Discover a series of free metric systems
including Facebook Insights, Hootsuite and more. --Barbara Stone bjstone@ksu.edu
MARIE'S PICKS. . .
My pick this week includes a medium-term outcome from Diann
Gerstner, Thomas County:
With an intended outcome to increase purchase and consumption of fruits and
vegetables in Thomas County, Diann made an arrangement with Dillon's to each
week feature a different vegetable or fruit. She developed brochures for each
featured item.
*Evidence: Dillon's records of fruit and vegetable sales showed a small
increase in sales of the featured vegetable/fruit most weeks. During some weeks
all the brochures were taken. Excess brochures were used during the Wise Up and
Count Down (WUCD) classes. Due to the interest, brochures were attached to the
WUCD email newsletter. In addition, the Beets and Zucchini brochures were used
for the Kids-a-Cookin’ program with the community garden.
Her long-term outcome: As
a result of increased fruit and vegetable consumption, Thomas County citizens
will have a healthier diet with increased fiber, vitamins and minerals.
Fruits and vegetables can be filling and satisfying, decreasing the desire for
or the amount of other foods, some which may be higher in fat and
sugars. This decrease in foods higher in fat and sugar can lead to
lower daily calorie intake which can lead to long term weight loss. These factors can lead to healthier people and lower medical costs for
participants.
*The public value then is experienced when non-participants/other
community members benefit from lower health costs and increased numbers of healthy,
productive, contributing community members. --Marie Blythe mblythe@ksu.edu
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