Officers:
| Michael Newman (MS), Chair |
| Roger Rennekamp (KY), Vice Chair |
| Michael Lambur (VA), Secretary |
| Jerry Whiteside (GA), 1862 PLC Representative |
| Leodrey Williams (LA), 1890 PLC Representative |
| Paul Warner (KY), Administrative Advisor |
Attendence:
| Joyce Martin (OK) | Michael Newman (MS) |
| Joe Waldrum (AR) | Ronnie White (MS) |
| Jerry Whiteside (GA) | Howard Ladewig (FL) |
| Leodrey Williams (LA) | Melvin Irizarry-Jusino (PR) |
| Paul Warner (KY) | Earl Johnson (LA) |
| Roger Rennekamp (KY) | Richard Rohs (GA) |
| LaVerne Blount (AL) | Rich Poling (TN) |
| Barbara Stone (NC) | Donnie King (SC) |
| Mitch Owen (NC) | Jerry Gibson (VA) |
| Richard Liles (NC) | Barbara Board (VA) |
| Dave Jenkins (NC) | Michael Lambur (VA) |
The meeting was called to order by Committee Chair, Michael Newman. The agenda was reviewed and attendees introduced themselves.
Minutes of the August 28-30 meeting in San Juan Puerto Rico were approved with no changes.
Jerry Whiteside, 1862 PLC Representative, presented his report.
- Jerry explained the function of the PLC and 1862 and 1890 representatives to the various committees.
- New 1862 and 1890 Program and Staff Development Committee PLC Representatives need to be elected this year.
- The next meeting of the Joint Southern Region Program Committee is in Nashville, TN on August 25-28, 2002.
- The Southern Directors have hired an Executive Director to coordinate activities in the Southern Region. The Executive Director of the Association of Southern Region Extension Directors (ASRED) is Dr. Ron Brown, former Mississippi Extension Director.
- One focus of ASRED is to share resources and work on multi-state projects. Each PLC committee is requested to discuss this.
Paul Warner, Administrative Advisor, presented his report.
- Paul reported that there are many interim Extension Directors in the Southern Region and that much organizational memory is lost in the turn over.
- One important focus of ASRED is competency-based training, as well as risk management and E-Extension. The directors will be discussing these at their meeting in Roanoke, VA in September.
- Dr. Ron Brown, Executive Director, ASRED is in place. The Southern Region is the first region in the US to fund this type of position. This is a major change in how Extension functions.
- The Southern Directors have realized that they are not taking advantage of work groups for multi state efforts. More emphasis and effort on multi state projects with clear expectations of outcomes is expected. Each committee should consider working on one project with regional significance.
Leodrey Williams, 1890 PLC Representative, presented his report.
- Leodrey echoed Paul's observation on the turnover of Southern Extension Directors.
- The Southern Land-Grant meeting was held in Oklahoma earlier this month. Because of low numbers of 1890 Administrators present, they will meet with 1862 Directors in Roanoke, VA in September.
- Emphasis will be placed on: access to information, partnering with non-Extension organizations, the need for staff development, specialized training of agents, 1890 institutions environmental scanning, and multi state programming.
Richard Liles reported on the Southeast Advisory Leadership Conference.
- Based on a proposal submitted by the Southern Region Program and Staff Development Committee (initiated by Judy Groff, NC) during the meeting in San Juan, PR and endorsed by the Southern Region PLC, the first Southeast Advisory Leadership Conference on Strengthening Advisory Leadership took place May 3-5, 2001 in Charlotte, NC.
- Ten states sent teams of Extension faculty and advisory leaders to the conference with approximately 80 total participants.
- The conference was very successful. Outcomes included: proceedings published on the Southern Rural Development Center web site, a recommendation to develop training curriculum for agents and advisory leaders, and consensus to continue the conference on an annual basis with a goal of more volunteers at the next conference.
- Virginia has agreed to host the next conference, pending endorsement by Program and Staff Development Committee and the Southern Region PLC. A proposal for the next conference was reviewed and provided to the committee.
Richard Rohs presented the MAP/SELD subcommittee report.
- A subcommittee was appointed at the San Juan meeting to prepare a response to conducting a regional Managerial Assessment of Proficiencies (MAP) assessment and EXCEL training as part of the Southern Extension Leadership Development (SELD) program. This was prompted by a request from the Middle Management Committee. The subcommittee consisted of Richard Rohs, Chair (GA), Mike Lambur (VA), Mitch Owen (NC), Ronnie White (MS), and Howard Ladewig (FL).
- Richard presented the report and recommendations. A motion was made, and seconded, to accept the report and it was passed.
- States present shared their experiences on the assessment (MAP) and how they implemented the training with the EXCEL materials. Overall, states that participated in the program indicated that the assessment (MAP) was appropriate. However, many of the states that conducted training using the EXCEL materials indicated they had made modifications to the materials to make them appropriate for Extension. Several states created their own training materials and did not use the EXCEL materials. The committee expressed a need to share training ideas and curriculum. Mitch Owen (NC) agreed to coordinate sharing of training materials on the web for the region.
- An additional item that was discussed was use of the acronym SELD (Southern Extension Leadership Program). It was acknowledged that MAP and EXCEL were used just as much in managerial training as well as leadership training. Therefore to label these as SELD might be misleading.
- Three motions were made, seconded, and passed concerning this topic:
- That program sponsorship for MAP and SELD efforts in the Southern region be transferred to Georgia from Texas (including all resources and equipment).
- That a Southern Regional MAP workshop be held if sufficient interest is shown (to be coordinated by the existing subcommittee).
- That the acronym SELD not be used anymore to describe MAP and EXCEL efforts.
The committee toured the Georgia Port Authority facilities and discussed training with Dr. Elizabeth Hoit-Thetford, Training Manager.
Elections were held with the following results:
| Secretary - Rich Poling (TN) |
| 1862 PLC Representative -Joe Waldrum (AR) |
| 1890 PLC Representative -Carolyn Reedus (AL) |
Richard Liles, Dave Jenkins, Mitch Owen, and Barbara Stone presented an update on North Carolina's Competency-Based Education and Learning Management System. Items presented included:
- Background on the development of the system.
- How the seven core competencies were developed.
- An overview of County Extension Directors competencies.
- An overview of the Learning Management System to manage the effort.
- A review of the Texas Cooperative Extension competency-based professional development system.
- Richard indicated that he, Barbara, and Mitch had been invited to make a presentation on the system to ASRED in Roanoke, VA in September and requested that the committee consider this as a possible regional project.
Joe Waldrum, new 1862 PLC Representative, presented his report on Wednesday morning's PLC meeting.
- States were encouraged to send representatives to the CSREES Listening Session in New Orleans in October.
- More networking between the committees needs to occur at these meetings. Perhaps reduce the general sessions and allow more time for committee work and networking.
Michael Newman encouraged states to submit on-line orientation materials to him for posting on the web in the same manner as the evaluation materials posted by Roger Rennekamp last year.
The discussion on competency-based training continued.
- Most states agreed on the importance of a taxonomy or profile of training competencies and are moving in that direction.
- Standards for curriculum peer review are needed.
- Multi state teams need to work on some competency-based curriculum.
- The following motions were made, seconded, and passed:
- That the committee supports competency-based staff development in the Southern Region.
- That the committee supports the second Advisory Leadership conference proposal (submitted earlier).
- That states in the Southern Region will partner with North Carolina and Texas to develop cored standards for inservice training for Extension educators.
Richard Liles will develop a proposal for motion "c" above to be presented to ASRED at their September meeting in Roanoke, VA. The proposal is to be circulated for review by the committee before the meeting.
Three subcommittees were formed to address development of multi state curriculum for core competencies.
| Advisory Leadership Systems: |
Barbara Board (VA) |
Judy Groff (NC) |
|
| County Directors: |
Mitch Owen (NC) |
Jerry Whiteside or designee (GA) |
| New Agents: |
Jerry Gibson (VA) |
Bernadette Watts (NC) |
Julie Sexton (MS) |
Michelle Martin (AR) |
Mary Ellen Blackburn (GA) |
Randol Waters (TN) |
Michael Newman conducted a discussion of questions the PLC asked each committee to respond to concerning multi state efforts.
Michael Newman presented a report on the Extension Cares Initiative.
- The initiative is not very well funded, yet a lot of work has been done and states could benefit from becoming involved.
- A reporting system needs to be developed on child care for the initiative.
- If interested in participating, get in touch with Michael.
State reports.
- Virginia is doing well in program and staff development. The Extension Educational Programming unit has merged with Agricultural Education to form the Department of Agricultural and Extension Education. A packet of information was passed out highlighting MAP/EXCEL training efforts, their New Agent Training Program, their Extension Leadership Council system and collaborative training initiative, their Volunteer Development System, and evaluation training materials.
- Tennessee has gone through a state-wide re-staffing plan and is looking at the feasibility of forming a new department with Agricultural and Extension Education and 4-H.
- Puerto Rico has reorganized their program and evaluation unit and is working on an on-line plan of work system.
- Louisiana will be restructuring in the coming year and is going to an Extension research center concept. They are looking at multi-parish agent assignments with specialty assignments and training.
- Oklahoma has dropped the Masters requirement for agents. They have established a state position for staff development (Joyce Martin). Joyce will be coordinating county director training, annual conference, and new educator training.
- North Carolina is experiencing budget problems. PODS is very active with the competency based training system and is becoming very entrepreneurial in its work.
- Kentucky reviewed their new agent orientation program using the Blackboard course software.
- Mississippi reviewed their web-based Exploring Extension multimedia learning resource program.
- Georgia has orientation materials on the web, developed two skills courses, have a mentoring program and workshop, and developed a coaching checklist. They are experiencing budget problems and have an early out program (35 people have left the Extension system).
- Arkansas has a new director and established a staff development unit with two new people. In the future, they will be adding additional people to the unit (staff development, evaluation, and organizational development). The unit will eventually operate on a cost recovery basis. Future programs will include Extension Leadership, core competencies, secretarial training, and program impact sheets.
The committee discussed and made several suggestions for increased communication in the future. These included conference calls, an email discussion list, a resource list of individual expertise in the region, and an additional face-to-face meeting during the year. Michael Newman agreed to develop a prototype for the resource list.
Respectfully submitted,
Michael Lambur
Secretary