March has already been full of many excellent opportunities to build and nurture our relationships in Extension, and more are forthcoming in the next few weeks. I just returned from the APLU Council for Agricultural Research, Extension, and Teaching (CARET) and Administrative Heads conference with our government affairs team and CARET reps (Nate Andre and Tony Logan) in D.C., where we met with eight of our congressional members’ offices to discuss the importance of continued support of the Farm Bill and appropriations for Smith-Lever Act and Hatch Act (as well as other lines of funding). We were able to share many of the successes of our college and OSU Extension; and we received a lot of great feedback and verbal support on the importance of our work, particularly as it relates to rapid responses to community needs such as the East Palestine train derailment (kudos again to Haley Shoemaker and our knowledgeable and agile rapid response team). We will continue sharing our strengths and successes at the CFAES Legislative Luncheon this week at the statehouse, where we have representation from many of our experts in the areas of water quality, rural broadband, workforce development, and behavioral health (including mental health, child and family work, and prevention education).
Extension participated in two departmental external reviews (Agricultural Communication, Education, and Leadership; Food, Agricultural and Biological Engineering). We were able to share some information regarding our collaboration and partnerships with both departments and identify additional opportunities for achieving the missions (teaching, research, and Extension) in the future.
The CFAES State of the College is this Thursday, as is the CFAES awards ceremony and emeriti luncheon. I hope that you will participate (in-person or online) to learn more about what has been achieved this last year and where the college is headed. We will be sharing own State of OSU Extension in mid-April (more information coming soon).
Next week, we will be meeting with our Extension Internal Advisory Council, State Extension Advisory Council, and Extension Partnership Advisory Council. Our input from our advisory councils is so very important to us, and we have tremendous champions for Extension on each of these councils.
I had fabulous Lean-in Tour visits with Henry and Fulton counties earlier this month and enjoyed meeting with our team as well as key stakeholders in both places. I topped that tour off with a visit to Camp Palmer and time with about 80 camp counselors from the region. This week, I head to Noble County. I am over halfway through my tour and so very grateful for all the amazing work being done in each and every community. You are truly changing lives through Extension scholarship, research application, and stakeholder relationships!
Ramadan begins this week; it is the Muslim holy month, and nearly 1.6 billion Muslims worldwide will observe it in some form. More information about how to support OSU Extension participants in Ramadan is shared by Whitney Gherman below.
Thank you for taking part in the baseline ETI survey. We had 76% participation and look forward to receiving the preliminary results with our taskforce on April 21. We will be sharing more about this as details become available.
I hope you have a month full of additional fulfilling relationship building that brings you joy both in your professional and personal lives. We have much to be proud of and grateful for in Extension.
Thank you, Jackie