Progress 09/01/07 to 08/31/12
Outputs
OUTPUTS: The communities of interest in this project include engagement and agrifood scholars, extension professionals, and non-profit organizations interested in the work of public engagement in the land grant college complex. Our results have been disseminated by professional journal articles, applied journal articles, and technical bulletins. Discussion of these articles in below. We have also begun a Professional Development Community of Interest around Public Deliberation via the National eXtension platform. The initiative is titled "Public Talk, Public Action: Advancing Civic Capacity to Tackle Tough Issues." This eXtension platform will help Extension Educators and Specialists gain the set of skills, competencies, and experiences needed to effectively employ citizen-centered approaches as a core part of their Extension engagement activities. Our goal is to help Extension Educators cultivate a repertoire of community-based deliberation strategies. This proposal has been enthusiastically accepted by eXtension administrators. this effort will extend this work beyodn the life of this project and embed it in National Extension Programming. PARTICIPANTS: Partners in this project consist of faculty across MSU Dept. lines - sociologists, humanities scholars, administrators, and Extension Educators. We also partnered with the Charles F. Kettering Foundation of Dayton, Ohio to advance this work. The Kettering Foundation provided support for this work in the early stages and continues to be supportive. The project also provided opportunities for training Extension Educators in the state of Michigan. Approximately 96 individuals have gone through trainings on public deliberation faciliation. TARGET AUDIENCES: The target audience in this work has been Extension Professionals and others working in the social service sector. These are often those involved with non-profit organizattions who desire skills in faciliation and public deliberation. Our goal has been to help Extension educators and others who work with the public suceed. To be successful, Extension educators and specialists are finding that they need a new set of skills. Primarily, they need to enhance their knowledge and application of community-based deliberation strategies - ones that are intended to empower citizens to share their voices and to pursue action on the difficult issues having important impacts on individuals, families/households, and communities. Our efforts have been aimed at conducting research and engagement programming that assists Extension professionals in gaining this set of skills, competencies, and experiences needed to effectively employ citizen-centered approaches as a core part of their Extension engagement activities, helping citizens make sound public choices amid uncertainty and conflict. PROJECT MODIFICATIONS: Nothing significant to report during this reporting period.
Impacts
The primary outcome of this work is the extension of the research into National eXtension programming. The findings suggest that, to be successful, Extension educators and specialists will need to enhance their knowledge and application of community-based deliberation strategies - ones that are intended to empower citizens to share their voices and to pursue action on the difficult issues having important impacts on individuals, families/households, and communities. We have proposed - and had accepted - an eXtension platform that will help Extension professionals gain the set of skills, competencies, and experiences needed to effectively employ citizen-centered approaches as a core part of their Extension engagement activities. The extension platform is also intended as a place to network with others who share in the challenges of university-community engagement. Our research concluded that few institiional structures were available for addressing many of the pressing problems Extension Educators face. This coincides with another recent survey by eXtension's Professional Development Steering Committee which was conducted to access the relative importance of various core competencies among Extension educators found that community and social action processes (such as identifying and prioritizing community issues) ranked very high. Seventy four percent of the survey respondents reported that such skills were very or extremely important to their work, yet 87 percent said they were not available in their region or were inadequate. This PDCoP can begin to rectify this imbalance and provide the space for Extension professionals to fill this void. Specifically, we will seek to strengthen Extension's capacity to use public dialogue, deliberation, and action strategies that can help residents make sound public choices amid uncertainty and conflict. This initiatve has been accepted and we are currently writing a grant to support this work.
Publications
- Wright, Wynne. 2009. Deer, Dialogue, and Dissension: A University-Community Collaboration to Address Local Ecological Challenges. Journal of Higher Education, Outreach and Engagement, 13(3):17-44.
- Colasanti, Kathryn, Wynne Wright, and Brenda Reau. 2009. Extension, the Land Grant Mission, and Civic Agriculture: Cultivating Change. Journal of Extension 47(4) (Article No. 4FEA1).
- Wright, D. Wynne, Jan Hartough, Elaine Brown, Frank Fear, David Cooper, Steve Lovejoy. 2009. The Rising Cost of Food: What is Our Food Future Issue Guide, East Lansing, Keystone Publishing.
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Progress 01/01/08 to 12/31/08
Outputs
OUTPUTS: This work encourages a public agriculture, whereby citizens are engaged in the decision making around food, agriculture, and natural resource management. The goal of this project is to play a catalytic function engaging local people on matters of interests and helping them form collective understanding around agriculture and food system issues. Specifically, my objective is to infuse public dialogue and deliberation in efforts being undertaken by grassroots groups and organizations, public policymakers, decision makers, and civic professionals across a range of fields associated with agriculture and natural resources. This is a joint collaboration bringing together MAES, MSU College of Agriculture and Natural Resource Faculty, MSU Public Humanities Collaborative, and MSU Extension personnel to fulfill a learning agreement (grant) funded by the Charles F. Kettering Foundation. OUTPUTS: a. Conducted university framing workshop on the rising cost of food b. Conducted community framing workshop on the rising cost of food c. Developed an issue guide to be used within communities to encourage citizens to deliberate the reasons for the rising cost of food and local responses d. Published issue guide (These will be distributed to Extension educators in 2009). e. Presented the findings of the rising cost of food issue guide and taught extension educators ways in which to use the guide in their community. f. Presented the findings regarding the process of issue guide development to the Kettering Foundation, Dayton, Ohio. g. Presented the findings regarding the process of issue guide development to the National Outreach Scholarship Conference, Penn State University. h. sponsored community forums on deer management and interviewed participants, i. sponsored and interviewed participatns in raw milk working group, j. Wrote one manuscript and submitted for publication on the role of citizens in natural resource management, k.submitted engagement manuscript for publication to Journal of Higher Education Outreach and Engagement PARTICIPANTS: Partners were the Charles F. Kettering Foundation who financially supported this work. MSU personnel were CANR Senior Associate Dean Frank Fear, Janice Hartough, MSU Extension, David Cooper, MSU Public Humanities Collaborative, Steve Lovejoy, MSU Associate Director of Extension, Elaine Brown, Director, Michigan Food and Farming Systems. These members served as an advisory group. Janice functions as the state trainer for dialogue and deliberation among extension educators. Elaine facilitates the fresh milk dialogue. Educators are given the chance to receive training in deliberative dialogue techniques about 2-3 times per year. TARGET AUDIENCES: Target audiences are the citizens of Michigan. Thus far we have worked with members of the raw milk community (dairy industry, MI Dept of Agriculture representatives, Healthy Traditions network, and farmers and other citizens). We have work with the government of Ottawa County and citizens in the deer management case. In the case of rising food costs our audience has been scientists, specialists and activits in the agrifood system. Later the Issue guide will attract citizens to community forums. PROJECT MODIFICATIONS: No modifications are expected at this time.
Impacts
Scholarship and practice have been undertaken pertaining to: 1) The consumption of fresh, unprocessed, whole milk; 2) Deer management in urban settings; 3) the rising cost of food. FRESH, UNPROCESSED, WHOLE MILK. Conflict over legal access to fresh, unprocessed, whole milk in Michigan led to citizens pressing for change. A working group of diverse stakeholders was organized to deliberate alternatives to access to fresh milk. Observation and interviews have found: OUTCOMES: The primary outcome from this initiative is the learning that transpires when citizens engage in meaningful dialogue and deliberation over contested agrifood issues. Learning, or the multiple ways in which participants are able to critically reflect upon their own values and ideals, as well as those of others in the working group, can be seen when group members break down walls that typically divide and constrain alternative ways of knowing, and begin to compromise, or reach consensus on topics that formerly divided them. DEER MANAGEMENT. Grand Haven public officials asked MSU for support in addressing a growing deer population. Community forums were held for citizens to share experiences with deer. OUTCOMES:My role as researcher in this work was to observe and analyze interactions. Findings show that wildlife issues are socially constructed. Participants did not experience deer in the same way but engaged in the active and on-going social construction of nature as they articulated diverse ways of knowing and interacting with the deer. RISING COST OF FOOD. A workshop of diverse and key agrifood stakeholders was organized to frame the issues surrounding the rising cost of food. During this one day framing workshop, three approaches were identified: what individuals can do; what communities can do; and what changes in the global agrifood system are needed. Information gleaned from the day is being used to write an issue guide on the rising cost of food. Issue guides are 30 page booklets that present an overview of a subject along with three different ways to approach the problem. They will be used as reading material to inform citizens who participate in deliberative dialogues in their community. Community forums will be sponsored by Extension once the guide is complete (early 2009). OUTCOMES: My role has been to observe and analyze stakeholder and scientists interaction in these settings. During these framing workshops and immediately following, it became clear that some of the social scientists were conflicted as to the utility of asking citizens to engage in this topic. They felt that such issues require the authority of experts. It is common to find scholars who feel that the answers to social problems are already known by scientists. Either they (as scientists) are harborers of the truth or solutions elude us because they have yet to be discovered through science. We discovered that scientists were concerned that citizens would not have the capacity to understand the complexities of markets and the international political economy of food, and therefore act, irrationally.
Publications
- JOURNAL Wright, W. 2009. Deer, Dissension, and Dialogue: A University-Community Collaboration to Address Ecological Challenges. Journal of Higher Education and Outreach. Pending.
- ISSUE GUIDE Byrum, J., K. Olender, S. Smalley, W. Wright. 2009. The Rising Cost of Food: What is Our Food Future Michigan State University. Pending.
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Progress 01/01/07 to 12/31/07
Outputs
OUTPUTS: The thrust of this reserach initiative is to forge a "public agriculture". Our goal is to provide the context for citizens and stakeholders to become involved in their agrifood system. In partnership with the Charles F. Kettering Foundation, four MSU entities--the College of Agriculture and Natural Resources, MSU Extension, the Michigan Agricultural Experiment Station, and the Public Humanities Collaborative--have undertaken a 3-year research initiative designed to help Michigan citizens frame issues of concern in agriculture, natural resources, and other community challenges. We are training extension educators to employ public dialogue and deliberation so citizens can meaningfully explore these controversial issues and become integrated into contexts for solving these contested issues in agriculture. Two issues in particular that have been undertaken are controversy over raw milk consumption (statewide issue) and urban deer management (community issue). My role is to
engage in scholarship about how citizen engagement in agrifood issues is transpiring. This is being done via observation, interviews, and citizen forums. We have agreed to undertake a total of 10 such issues over the next 3 years. We are launching a Kettering Roundtable at MSU in the Spring of 2008 as a semester long colloquium to explore how we might renew our institutional commitment ot the land grant mission. A second project integrates civic engagement into the emerging bio-economy. This research project is a part of a multi-state project (NC506) on biofuels. I am a part of a social science team exploring the social and economic impacts of biofuels (ethanol) on rural communities. My contribution to this work is exploring the social impacts of biofuels on rural communities including how citizens can become more engaged in this process in order to exert control over their community's futures and plan renewable energy development that provides benefits to rural development. We have
selected our research site for investigation (in consultation with our multistate colleagues) We have begun to embark on content analysis of secondary data and soon we will begin conducting semi-structured interviews with key informants in the community. In early spring we will embark upon Community Forums to engage stakeholders and citzens about how they see ethanol plant development impacting their community and how they can strategically vision for a sustainable future. I am also preparing to organize community forums for pubic engagement in community food system development in partnership with A Ruth Mott Foundation grant (with Mike Hamm) in the Flint/Genesee County area. These projects are contributing to a common understanding of agriculture and natural resources as a public good and as such necessitating a shared civic commitment to their renewal and sustianability.
PARTICIPANTS: Individuals: Frank Fear, Senior Associate Dean; Jan Hartough, Extension Educator; Steve Lovejoy, Associate Dean of Extension; David Cooper, Director of Public Humanities Collaborative; Mike Hamm, Mott Chair for Sustainable Agriculture. Partner Organizations: Charles Kettering Foundation, funder; Ruth Mott Foundation, funder; MAES/MSUE/Public Humanities Collaborative(providing staff and fin. resources); Collaborators: Iowa State University, Kansas State University, Uni. of Wisconsin (contributing faculty). The Kettering initiative has developed training workshops for Extension educators and community developers to learn techniques to guide and stimulate public dialogue and deliberation around contested issues in agriculture.
TARGET AUDIENCES: Our target audience has been citizens of the state of Michigan interested in becoming involved in issues pertaining to agriculture and natural resources. Our goal has not been to 'deliver' knowledge in a way that disempowers and faciliates passivity, but to empower and animate citizen engagement with scientists to work collectively to solve issues of concern.
Impacts
At this point, there are few findings, results, techniques, etc developed from this work as it is early in its development. In regards to the Kettering work, we have begun to train Extension Educators and community development professionals in the practice of dialogue and deliberation around contested issues in agriculture and natural resources. We are seeing these professionals begin to use the techniques learned in workshops on dialogue and deliberation in their counties. The other two projects are in the very early stages of development.
Publications
- No publications reported this period
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