TUESDAY MORNING NOTES - June 5, 2012

Tue Jun 5 11:55:13 MST 2012

TMN submittal:
http://cals.arizona.edu/extension/tuesday/form/submittal_form.html 

Tuesday Morning Notes 

June 5, 2012

FROM THE DIRECTOR:

The Phase III strategic planning document for CALS Cooperative Extension was
recently completed.  I am providing below an outline of the basic
information and goals that were submitted on behalf of CALS Cooperative
Extension.  The complete Phase III initial strategic planning document from
CALS Cooperative Extension will be distributed across the college soon.

We have eight goals presented in this document. The first five goals are
programmatic in nature and the last three are more organizational or
structurally oriented. 

These goals represent the culmination of a series of meetings with CEDS and
visioning sessions held across the state and initiated independently by
Extension faculty during this process.  This document and set of goals
represents a very broad organization that has elements of every department
in our college, every county in Arizona, as well as faculty working at each
of our centers across the state.  In putting this together the Extension
Administrative Team (EAT) and I needed to take into account a lot of
additional input from across this spectrum.  Even at that, I know there are
groups or sets of faculty and staff that were not incorporated in this
process, at least to our complete satisfaction.  Nevertheless, the due dates
come upon us and we needed to move this forward.   Also, we will have
opportunities in the days ahead to gather more feedback from stakeholders
and other elements in the state that will help us refine these goals.

These are good goals for CALS Cooperative Extension and we can get behind
them and use them in strategic planning and implementation as we move ahead.

Unit's Purpose:  

To improve lives, communities and the economy.

UA-CALS-CE 2021 Vision: 

Cooperative Extension is a vital national leader in creating and applying
knowledge to help people build thriving, sustainable lives, communities and
economies.

UA-CALS-CE Mission: 

To engage with people through applied research and education to improve
lives, families, communities, environment, and economies in Arizona and
beyond.

UA-CALS-CE Shared Values:

Accountability, collaboration, collegiality, diversity, exploration,
fairness, innovation, integrity, knowledge-based, lifelong learning,
problem-solving, proactive, productivity, responsiveness, sustainability,
trust.

CALS Cooperative Extension Goal 1: 

Educate and equip people and communities to manage and utilize natural
resources to improve economic sustainability.

CALS Cooperative Extension Goal 2: 

Improve the production of safe, profitable and sustainable food, plant and
animal systems. 

CALS Cooperative Extension Goal 3:  

Strengthen economic vitality of communities by developing leadership,
workplace skills and life skills of youth and adults to assist them to be
contributing community members (greater levels of participation in civic
life).

CALS Cooperative Extension Goal 4:

Enhance the growth and development of Arizona children and youth by ensuring
that they are supported by caring adults, enter school ready to learn, make
adequate yearly progress, and graduate on time so that young people will be
less involved in the juvenile justice system, dropout rates will decline,
and youth will contribute positively back to the community.

CALS Cooperative Extension Goal 5: 

Statewide coordinated program by 2015 for children, youth and adults to
improve the physical, mental, emotional, and financial health of individuals
and families.

CALS Extension Goal 6:  

CALS Cooperative Extension needs to be well-recognized as the primary
element providing the key linkage between CALS and the UA with the general
public across Arizona.  The unique ability of CALS Cooperative Extension to
serve as this vital bridge needs to be clearly recognized within CALS,
across the UA, and in many segments of the general public in Arizona.

CALS Extension Goal 7:  

CALS Cooperative Extension needs to be well-integrated throughout the
college--including the departments, counties, centers, and with the many
stakeholder groups with which we are engaged.

CALS Extension Goal 8:  

Resources in CALS Cooperative Extension need to be allocated and focused
geographically in response to strategic needs.  This will lead to an
"asymmetric" distribution of faculty expertise in relation to the needs
identified among stakeholder groups and regional needs.  A greater use of
non-continuing track (NCT) faculty needs to be implemented to work in
coordination with the regional continuing track faculty.

CALS EXTENSION CONFERENCE - AUGUST 15-17:

Since we've had some questions regarding a future faculty conference, I am
repeating an earlier announcement that we will have a CALS Extension
Conference on August 15-17.  Please mark your calendars.  Both on- and
off-campus Extension faculty, as well as Program Coordinators (at the
direction of their County Directors), are invited to attend.  A planning
committee is being formed and more details will follow.

FOCUS ON FACULTY:

Congratulations to Chris Jones, Tom DeGomez, Mike Crimmins, Gregg Garfin and
Melanie Lenart who were recognized by their peers May 22 at the ANREP
(Association of Natural Resources Extension Professionals) Biennial
Conference in North Carolina.  They earned the 2012 GOLD AWARD for
Innovative Program for their work on the University of Arizona Climate and
Natural Resources Extension Working Group.  This high award is a great honor
within this national organization, whose members are known for their
innovative Extension programming.  

2013 CALS LOGOS:

CALS has a new set of logos!  After extensive discussions between the Dean,
the Administrative Cabinet, ECAT and the UA Marketing department, we now
have officially approved logos which unite both the university and the
college with units and programs. You can view them at
http://cals.arizona.edu/ecat/pubs/2013CALSlogos.pdf.

We are in the process of assembling a number of CALS External Relations
teams which will be building a marketing and public relations strategy for
the college over the next few months.  One of their first tasks will be to
come up with an implementation plan for switching over to these new logos. 

We are also in the early stages of building a digital asset management
system for CALS.  Once complete, it will include all of these logos, making
them available to CALS units whenever they are needed.

OMK PROGRAM WINS NATIONAL AWARD:

Arizona's 4-H Operation Military Kids (OMK) Program supporting military
families was recently selected as a winner of the 2012 National Service
Impact Awards.  The award will be presented at the annual conference
sponsored by the Corporation for National and Community Service in Chicago,
June 18-20.  Because of Arizona OMK's collaboration with AmeriCorps and
VISTA, and its critical work with veterans and military families, it was
selected as one of this year's recipients of a National Service Impact
Award.  Teresa Noon, OMK Program Coordinator, will be unable to attend the
conference as she will be in Alaska with military teens, but Kirk Astroth
will be attending to accept the award on her behalf.  The award ceremony
will include a personal visit with Dr. Jill Biden, wife of Vice-President
Joseph Biden.  This is a great award for Teresa, OMK, and her work with
VISTA and AmeriCorps.  Congratulations!

TECH TIP OF THE WEEK:

When writing content for websites, take some time to edit the content for
the typical general public reader.  Readability is important, as confused
visitors are less likely to return to your site.  Also, readability affects
search engine ranking such as Google Page Rank. Considering that the typical

visitor will have a 9th grade reading ability, writing for PhD levels is not
advisable.  Online readability testing tools are available, such as The
Readability Test Tool <http://read-able.com/> .  Another good practice is to
spell out acronyms which may be confusing to the general public.  This will
reduce confusion and help improve search engine rank.

Jeffrey C. Silvertooth
Associate Dean

Director for Economic Development & Extension
College of Agriculture and Life Sciences
PO Box 210036
Tucson, AZ  85721-0036
520.621.7205
520.621.1314 (fax)

To submit tips, suggestions, ideas for changes and anything that could help
us be more effective, use  the "Director
<http://extension.arizona.edu/state/directors-suggestion-box> 's Suggestion
Box" - all submissions are anonymous.  

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