Agency Communication on Natural Resource Education – Part II

Rick Koelsch

How well are we communicating with our natural resource education opportunities to agencies and organizations addressing water, soil and nutrient issues?  Part I introduced this topic in a June 5 blog (found below).  Do all of us have responsibility for the answer to this question?  A few of my thoughts as to how we can each contribute to future communications with agency staff follow…

 UNL Extension’s outstanding educational programs provide rich professional development opportunities for agency staff, especially our federal partners challenged with significant budget cuts. The upcoming Physical, Chemical and Biological Properties of Soil and Water CMDC, West Central Water and Crops Field Day at the Big Spring Water Resources Lab and the range management programs at the Gudmundsen Laboratory are excellent examples of educational experiences beneficial to our agency partners.  Here are a few ideas on how we improve our communications with natural resource agencies.

Reaching Agencies Statewide

NRCS has identified three contact points for communicating UNL Extension programs with NRCS staff:

·         Renee Hancock (Water Quality Specialist) – lead contact for all UNL Extension communications and programs specific to Nutrient Management. 402- 437-4064 or Renee.hancock@ne.usda.gov

·         Corey Brubaker (State Conservation Agronomist) – lead contact for UNL Extension programs specific to Soil Health.  402 -437-4164 Corey.brubaker@ne.usda.gov

·         Jacob Robinson (Acting State Water Management Engineer) - lead contact UNL Extension programs specific to Irrigation Water Management.  402-437-4030 or Jacob.robison@ne.usda.gov

I will be watching for educational opportunities to share with these individuals.  Faculty are welcome to do the same.  Please copy me on topics that you share so I can avoid duplicating your efforts.

Katie Pekarek, Extension Water Quality Educator, has agreed to be the point person for communicating opportunities with Natural Resource Districts and Nebraska Department of Environmental Quality.  Please share educational opportunities of interest to these agencies with Katie.

Local Agency Connections

There is nothing better than a direct phone call, email, or mailing from a local educator to our agency peers. Your local relationships and invitations are essential to welcoming agency staff to our educational programs.  Do you know who these key individuals are locally?  If not, these resources may help you locate agency staff serving your region.

Natural Resource District:  Staff can be located for your local NRD by starting from http://nrdnet.org/find-your-nrd.php .  The NRD manager and the Information & Education Coordinator are two names that should become a part of your local network.

Natural Resource Conservation Service: You network of local contacts should include the District Conservationist (aligned with Natural Resource District regions) and the Resource Conservationist found in each of the Field Offices.  These individuals can be identified through the NE NRCS Employee Directory found at http://www.ne.nrcs.usda.gov/contact/directory/index.html  or ftp://ftp-fc.sc.egov.usda.gov/NE/Outgoing/Directory/6-24-2013_NRCS_NE_DIRECTORY.pdf .  The first link will also inform you of the priority “Resource Needs and Concerns” identified for your NRD region.

Nebraska Department of Environmental Quality:  NDEQ maintains its field people at its main office in Lincoln and its six regional field offices in Omaha, Norfolk, North Platte, Holdrege, Scottsbluff, and Chadron (http://www.deq.state.ne.us/Gen.nsf/Pages/OffInfo ).  Another option for finding NDEQ field specialists in your region is to contact the Agriculture Compliance Assistance (402-471-8131 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting) or Water Quality Program Assistance (402-471-4220) hotlines.

Nebraska Department of Natural Resources:  DNR maintains field offices in Norfolk, Ord, Lincoln, Cambridge, and Bridgeport (http://dnr.ne.gov/division/division2.html ).  Field Office staff can be located at http://dnr.ne.gov/docs/dnrstaff.html#division .  DNR Field Office Supervisors should be a part of your local network.

What Else Can Be Done?

Have you:

___ Invited these local contacts to coffee at your office to get better acquainted.

 

___  Shared a recent edition of CropWatch, BeefWatch, Acreage, or other electronic newsletter and invited agency staff to sign up to receive these products via their email?

___  Placed your events on the Extension calendar and tag them so they show up on the most appropriate umbrella web site such as http://water.unl.edu? The first place I point individuals to is our Extension calendar system.

Communicating with Agencies on Water & Nutrient Management

Rick Koelsch

How well are we communicating our natural resource education opportunities to agencies and organizations addressing water, soil and nutrient issues? Two recent meetings in which I have participated suggest that Extension may be missing some important opportunities.

A recent meeting with Nebraska NRCS State Conservationist Craig Derickson and District Conservationists suggested that professional development of NRCS field staff is a critical need around several issue areas including irrigation, nutrient management, and soils and soil health. Tight NRCS travel budgets has created difficult challenges for NRCS to meet the professional development needs of their field staff.  They were hungry to learn about existing on-line courses through UNL Extension and eXtension as well as planned producer and advisor targeted workshops. The discussion suggested considerable inconsistency in their awareness of workshops that had occurred this past winter and complete lack of knowledge of our on-line course offerings.

This week Katie Pekarek and I met with the NRD managers and shared a two-page summary of nine water related extension initiatives and highlighted in our oral presentation the Brule Water Resources laboratory and its August field day, the Ag Water Management Network (and the value of the Extension/NRD partnership), and the partnership between Extension and Monsanto’s Water Education Center.  In conversations with individual NRD managers I learned that many of the initiatives we shared were new news to the NRD managers.

So how do we better communicate our Extension educational opportunities with NRCS, NRDs, NDEQ, Department of Agriculture and other organizations?  Here are a couple of thoughts for your consideration.  I would welcome additional suggestions you may have:

·         For programs that address natural resource topics in your county or region, have you connected with regional NRD(s), NRCS, or NDEQ offices as possible partners, co-sponsors, or promoters?  These organizations may be able to help us connect with potential clientele as well as offer to their own staffs these educational experiences as a professional development opportunity.

·         Have you met and established a working relationship with the Information/Education Specialist or Public Relations Director for NRDs in your region.  This is an important point of contact within NRDs with which Extension needs to have a strong relationship.

·         Do we need to have a means of collectively gathering all Extension programs on selected topic areas (e.g. ag water use, nutrient management, soil management, water quality, urban/suburban water issues) and sharing with these agencies?  This was the request that was made of UNL Extension by the State and District Conservationists for NRCS. Suggestions as to how we might implement this are welcome.  Volunteers who might serve as a point person for gathering professional development opportunities around one of the topic areas would be most welcome.

 

Please give some thought as to how we might better engage our natural resource related agencies and organization in sharing of our educational program plans and opportunities.