Present:
Nina Boston, IT, University of Arkansas Cooperative Extension
Charles Cox, 4-H, Oklahoma State University
Carla Craycraft, COMM, University of Kentucky
Tim Cross, ANR, University of Tennessee
Thelma J. Feaster, PSD, North Carolina A&T State University
Beverly Howell, FCS, Mississippi State University
Thelma Hunter-Sanders, PLC Chair-elect, FCS, Tennessee State Univ.
Ed Jones, PLC Chair, CRD, North Carolina State University
Dan Lyons, MM, North Carolina A & T University
Gloria Mosby, Past PLC Chair, Chair of PLN-EC, COMM, Prairie View A& M University
Roger Rennekamp, PSD, University of Kentucky
Louie Rivers, ANR, Kentucky State University
Kent Rorie, MM, University of Arkansas
Shirley Calloway-Pope, 1890 Advisor, Alcorn State University
Dorothy Wilson, 4-H Youth Development, Langston University

Ex-Officio:
Ron Brown, ASRED
Kathy Ibendahl, SRDCAbsent:
Michael Bratcher, IT, North Carolina A & T University
Paul Coreil, ASRED Representative, Louisiana State University
Ernie Hughes, CRD, Southern University Ag Center
Larry Turner, 1862 Advisor, University of Kentucky
Noland Williams, AEA Representative, Kentucky State University

Welcome:
Ed Jones, PLC Chair welcomed and thanked everyone for taking time from busy schedules to participate in this call.Advisor's Reports:
Shirley Pope reported that Dr. Lorenzo Lyons has assumed the role of Executive Director of AEA. He is doing some preliminary planning for the AEA meeting in August. AEA is in the process or reorganizing program teams. They are forming a similar structure to the PLN program teams.eExtension Updates:
Carla Craycraft told the group that the eExtension staff and governing board have been meeting and working on developing state work teams and "Communities of Practice." A national video conference will be held on May 4 at 2:30 p.m. Eastern. This conference can be viewed through video streaming, satellite, or the archives on the website. She encouraged this group to attend. It will be aimed at administrators, program leaders, and faculty. They will be discussing the responsibilities of the Communities of Practice and the state team development. Questions may be submitted via e-mail and answered during the conference session.They will be asking each institution to form an eExtension team made up of people from a variety of groups within the institution. These will be 4-5 member teams selected by the director/administrator. They should include representatives from communications, IT, content specialists, and an administrator.The eExtension long-range strategic document should be made public the first part of June.They will soon be issuing a call to form the Communities of Practice teams. The teams will begin with determining client needs and move into content development.The eExtension team is seeking support from various sources. Presentations are being made to various Extension groups. Carla and Ron will be meeting with senators and staff to solicit their support for the project in the president's budget.Committee Reports

4-H Youth Development
Charles Cox reported that 4-H held its national meeting of state 4-H leaders last month. CECP updates were given at the conference and leaders were recruited beyond the region for serve on CECP development teams. Jeff Howard (the 4-H representative to CECP) is meeting with these teams.While at the meeting they had an opportunity to meet with staff from the 4-H Council and CSREES to discuss 4-H's involvement in e-Extension and CECP.FCS
Beverly Howell and Thelma Sanders-Hunter updated the group on several obesity conferences that have taken place recently.The SERA Health conference was held in Lexington, KY last week. Over 230 people attended. There were five conference tracks. This is the first conference in which they expanded their target audience to others in the health field. They had fantastic speakers.ANR
Louie Rivers and Tim Cross announced that the national ANR conference will be held May 10th - 12th.A regional tobacco buyout meeting will be held May 19th Somerset, KY. This is a train-the-trainer event.Significant progress is being made on CECP modules.COMM
Gloria Mosby shared that Communications is making progress on CECP module development. In addition, they are finalizing the PLN logo with input from the committee. Members will be attending a conference in San Antonio, May 31 - June 4. This is an international group and IT folks as well as communications people will be attending.CRD
Ed Jones reported that the National Association of Community Development Extension Professionals (NACDEP) held its first meeting in Las Vegas in February. The Southern region will host the 2006 meeting. Dates and locations have yet to be announced.Four CECP courses are being developed by the CRD group: CARE, Asset Mapping, Cashing in on Business, and Watershed Management with ties to EPA.Information Technology
Nina Boston said the IT Committee continues to work on their CECP modules. She and other committee members will be attending the meeting in San Antonio.Larry Lippke has discussed the possibility of Texas A&M hosting the Centra Symposium for the rest of the region. This would be a significant reduction of cost for our institutions.Middle Management
Dan Lyons and Kent Rorie reported on the Middle Mangers conference in New Orleans last week. It was an excellent conference. Various relevant topics were explored. It was well attended. The group visited a research station conducting research on white tailed deer and they toured the campus of Southern University.The 4th National Small Farm Conference will be held October 16 - 19th. This is a change of dates. Currently, they are soliciting presenters and supporters. PSD
Thelma Feaster and Roger Rennekamp said the PSD Committee continues to work on CECP modules. They have not held a meeting since the last PLC conference call; however, a committee call is scheduled for May 24th.The group finished a white paper benchmarking outreach regional indicators. This was distributed to directors and administrators and it is hoped that they will discuss this during their next conference call.

ACTION: Roger or Thelma will distribute copies of this paper to the PLC.

Roger announced that he will be leaving the region and going out to the west coast to take a position Oregon State University. As a result, we will need to find an 1862 rep for the last two remaining years of his term.

Annual Conference in August

Kathy Ibendahl shared the 2005 PLN conference website with the group and asked for comments. She explained that the site will be made available to the entire PLN/AEA/ASRED membership early next week, but that the registration process won't be available until next month. The registration process has been cumbersome in the past. We are trying to streamline the process by writing a new computer program. Hopefully it will make everyone's live's easier. The committees have the same agenda as last year. The only changes to the agenda were the opening session and the round table discussions. She noted the early bird deadline and the deadline for hotel reservations.http://srpln.msstate.edu/conferences/05pln/index.html

ACTION: Please submit ideas for round table discussion topics to Roger Rennekamp or Ernie Hughes. Facilitators are needed. Roger will work with Ernie and possibly another interested individual (to be announced) so they can take over this project in his absence.

The next meeting of the Program Leadership Committee will be held Thursday, July 21 at 9 a.m. Central.