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Plan to attend the Urban Food Systems Symposium September 26-28, 2022 in Kansas City, Missouri. The theme for this year's conference is "building Coalitions for a Chanding World." The program schedule has been announced so check out the UFSS website to learn about keynotes, invited speakers, posters, and technical sessions. Register by August 31 to receive the best prices. Limited funds are still available for travel scholarships - check it out.

Check out the updated Innovation Skill-Building Experience ePub: A Guide for Project Incubation and Tools for Success.

Impact Collaborative Innovation Facilitators and Extension Foundation team members provide a hands-on introduction to the Innovation Skill-Building Experience (ISBE) workbook. This workbook and related tools is the start of your team’s collaboration in imagining something extraordinary, experimenting to make it great, and then turning your team’s vision into actuality. A new iteration of the ISBE workbook is interactive to better utilize all the workbook’s tools in a more user-friendly, easy to share, and printable format.

With updated and improved content, more examples to help enhance learning, and newly added features such as note-taking, embedded videos, and links, this workbook is designed to enhance learning and create more results! With this workbook, you have a collection of tools that will guide you on your journey into change and innovation.

Use it as a tool to:

  • Guide your team through a project idea that needs incubation with checklists and methods for documenting progress
  • Learn about Cooperative Extension’s best practices for solving important community issues
  • Measure learning outcomes to improve program/project impact continuously


This ISBE ePub is your device to spark ideas, foster innovation, and ultimately create a local effect.

Check out the workbook link and test out all its features.
New ISBE Epub
Tutorial on how to use Ebooks

Sourced from Connect Extension

Urban agriculture support systems take different forms and promote diverse priorities in different U.S. cities. Some treat farming and gardening as a public good—public spaces that are valued for their community-building, environmental, public health, and other social benefits. Others have sought to extract more economic and redevelopment gains from urban agriculture. The specific ways cities support urban agriculture—and the outcomes city governments, support organizations, and funders expect from it—have significant impacts and implications for social equity and justice.

In an article from JAFSCD, “’The highest and best use of land in the city’: Valuing urban agriculture in Philadelphia and Chicago,” Domenic Vitiello explores these divergent, often opposing expectations of what urban agriculture can yield, and what it should be. Reflecting on over a decade of research and practice, he traces the evolution of urban agriculture activities, support, and policy in Philadelphia and Chicago since the end of the twentieth century. These histories reflect broader tensions among different approaches to governing, supporting, and practicing agriculture in cities.

Read more.

Sourced from Morning AgClips

 

Please join us starting July 15 for the Urban Agriculture Pest Management Webinar Series. This series will run for three Fridays on the following dates and times:

  • Friday, July 15, 2022 at 12:30-1:30 p.m. Topic: Virtual Urban Ag Tours
  • Friday, July 22, 2022 at 12:30-1:30 p.m. Topic: Composting with Arthropods
  • Friday, July 29, 2022 at 12:30-1:30 p.m. Topic: Scouting & Trapping Insects

Flier with complete details.

Please register here, https://osu.az1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_5ioDwp28P2lrMyO Registration provides an option to request the recording if you cannot attend at the scheduled day and time, recorded viewing is only available only for a limited.

This webinar series is coordinated by the Great Lakes Urban Agricultural IPM Working Group. For questions contact, Maggie Rivera.482@osu.edu.

About

Deep Dives, Urban Sabbaticals, and Urban Graduate Fellowships are designed to enhance the impact of Extension, and the broader land-grant university system, in metropolitan communities. Learn more or meet our past fellows at https://metroextension.wsu.edu/fellows/.

Application deadline (11:59 PDT): July 31, 2022

Fellowship Programs

DEEP DIVES:  Deep Dives were created to spur innovation within Extension, address complex issues facing metropolitan areas, and support the organizational needs of urban Extension programs, while providing opportunities for academic and community-based professionals to lead multi-state or national projects. Each WCMER Deep Dive is led by a WCMER Applied Research Fellow.

Anyone may apply. Only participants from WCMER platinum member institutions are eligible for funding which may be up to $10,000 annually for up to two years. See the WCMER member page to find out if your institution is a platinum member.

URBAN SABBATICALS: Urban Sabbaticals allow community-engaged scholars to work with the WCMER and faculty from member institutions to conduct applied research, develop or sharpen skills related to working in metropolitan communities, develop and/or pilot new programs, conduct feasibility studies for new programmatic areas, or co-author scholarly products.

Sabbaticals may range from 2-12 months. Anyone is eligible to apply. Only participants from WCMER member institutions will be eligible for stipends of up to $5,000 for platinum members and $2,000 for silver members. See the WCMER member page to find out if your institution is a member.

URBAN GRAD STUDENT FELLOWSHIP: Urban Graduate Fellowships will allow post-graduate students pursuing Master’s or Doctoral degrees to work with the WCMER and faculty from member institutions to conduct applied research, develop new or sharpen existing skills related to working in metropolitan communities, develop and / or pilot new programs, conduct feasibility studies for new programmatic areas, or co-author scholarly products.

Graduate fellowships may range from one quarter up to a full academic year including summer terms. Anyone is eligible to apply. Only participants from WCMER platinum member institutions will be eligible for stipends of up to $2,500. See the WCMER member page to find out if your institution is a member.

2022-23 Topics of Interest

The WCMER will accept applications on any topic of interest that addressed the goals and mission of WCMER, However, for the current round of funding, WCMER is especially interested in applications that address or relate to the intersection of diversity, equity and inclusion and the following topics: 

  1. Climate Change
  2. Workforce Development 
  3. Health Equity 

Timeline

  • June 15, 2022: Application period opens
  • July 31, 2022: Application deadline (11:59 PDT)
  • August 31, 2022: Awardees notified
  • January 1, 2023 – December 31, 2023: Period of performance
  • June 30, 2023: Final report detailing accomplishments and use of funds due.

View / Download the Application Instructions 

For additional information, contact Brad Gaolach, Director WCMER
425-405-1734 | gaolach@wsu.edu

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) announces significant investments to support urban agriculture, including $43.1 million for grants and cooperative agreements as well as six new urban county committees to help deliver key USDA programs to urban producers. These actions support USDA’s efforts to strengthen the food supply chain and transform the food system to be fairer, more competitive and more resilient. Read more.

Sourced from Morning Ag Clips

A recent report and executive summary on regional food systems entitled A Regional Imperative: The Case for Regional Food Systems has been published by the Thomas A. Lyson Center for Civic Agriculture and Food Systems which is a project of the Center for Transformative Action. Read the report and summary.

Sourced from the Thomas A. Lyson Center for Civic Agriculture and Food Systems.

There is an exciting resurgence in critical public scholarship: a push for universities to reach beyond their academic audiences and build stronger partnerships with community-based organizations and others to address pressing social issues (Burawoy 2006, Hartmann 2017). A particularly rich vein of engaged scholarship is the involvement of students and community partners as equal knowledge producers. The special issue brings together university scholars, community-based practitioners and researchers, and undergraduate and graduate students to highlight new trends in community-based research. The articles in this special issue of Social Sciences center community-engaged work on justice-related issues such as: immigrant rights, housing, labor, education, and schools - magnifying the multiple assets and collective power that diverse scholars and community-based practitioners bring to collective approaches, particularly in growing urban spaces. The special issue is split into two sections: articles about the *process* of conducting community-engaged scholarship – it's theory, methods, epistemology, ethics; and articles drawing *from* community engaged research projects. Explore this special Social Sciences issue.

Guest Editors: Dr. Steven McKay & Dr. Claudia Lopez

In Columbus, Ohio a group of high school students exchanged dialogue, documented their experiences, and developed calls to action to improve conditions in society. Based on the prototype from Metro High School, and previous work with teens in Marion, Ohio, Project DREAMS was born. Watch the 8-minute video here.

Sumitted by Whitney Gherman

 

National Urban Extension Leaders (NUEL) invites you to visit the updated NUEL website (nuel.extension.org). At this site you will find resources for Extension professionals working in and/or supporting urban communities and audiences. At the website you’ll also find information on how to further engage in NUEL through regional NUEL Networks, Action Teams, and connecting with the NUEL Steering Committee.

Additionally, NUEL has launched a new Connect Extension NUEL Subgroup to connect urban based Extension professionals across the country. We invite you to join this new NUEL Connect Extension Subgroup. A tab to join the subgroup can also be found at the top of the NUEL website. The Connect Extension NUEL Subgroup will serve as NUEL’s new main communications platform, and will be retiring the email listserv.

As a member of the NUEL subgroup you will receive access to:

  • Blog posts from NUEL executive and steering committee members
  • Urban Extension job description templates
  • Urban Extension journal articles and research briefs
  • Information on upcoming NUEL events, both national and regional
  • Opportunities to communicate virtually with urban Extension professionals
  • Virtual Chats-Interactive communication with other Extension professionals working in urban areas or those affiliated with urban audiences

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