Community Development & Public Issues Education

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	Community Development & Public Issues Education
	Because Cooperative Extension is grass roots driven, Extension personnel often find themselves dealing with community issues and trying to engage citizens in community driven solutions. Sometimes we see an issue before it becomes apparent and we then try to raise awareness through education and help facilitate change. Sometimes we are asked to help expedite discussion and bring in the "facts" when the community has identified the issue.
	Public Issues Education Cooperative Extension is often in the position to bring professionals and concerned citizens together in order to address family or community issues. We often provide research based information as well as facilitate deliberative discussion so that people with different view points can come together to solve problems. We do this by offering Issue Forums or Leadership Development Programs. Topics vary depending on issues identified by community members. A specific example of this is the Losing Ground - What Will We Do About Delaware's Changing Landscape? This series of open town forums brought people together to discussion four potential options of how to address this issue. Participants engaged in conversation, weighed pros and cons of each choice, and left with a better understanding of the complexity of making the hard decisions that benefit Delawareans and their divergent view points.
	Family and Community Leadership Training Training is offered to community members who are interested in improving their skills in the areas of issue identification, community involvement and participation in the political process.
	National Issues Forum Training Delaware Cooperative Extension provides training in the Kettering Foundation's National Issues Forum (NIF) methodologies. NIF is technique used to engage citizens in structured discussion that encourages them to deliberate 3-4 choice solutions to an issue. The choices are determined by research and reflect differing values. The choices inherently cause participants to weigh costs and consequences. The process forces participants to really identify and verbalize what is most important. In the end, participants identify the common ground and try to determine possible next steps. Each year a training is scheduled that introduces participants to the NIF model and resource materials and provides participants with the opportunity to develop their skills as forum facilitators.
	Websites of Interest Kellogg Foundation Resources National Network for Collaboration Cooperative States Research Education & Extension Service (CSREES) Volunteer Page National Association of Development Organizations (NADO) National Council for Urban Economic Development Utah State University Extension Community Resource Development - good list of Web sites
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