Early Success for New County Extension Educators- Part 1

Darrell A. Dromgoole, Associate Professor and Extension Specialist, Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service.

Jeff Ripley, Associate Director- County Operations, Texas Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service.

Scott Cummings, Associate Department Head and Program Leader; Professor and Extension Specialist, Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service.

Success in Extension does not happen by accident- it happens by design. It is critical that Extension educators have the ability to plan, implement, evaluate, interpret Extension educational programs as well as have technical expertise.  All of these skills are predicated on the Extension educator’s ability to build relationships and partnerships, develop or enhance technical skills and their expertise in executing the Extension program development model. There are several steps Extension educators can take in order to realize some “early wins “and lay the foundation for future success.  These steps can be compartmentalized into some broad categories which include relationship and partnership building, subject matter expertise, and engagement of the program development process.

In this blog post, we will review some steps that will enhance the Extension Educators ability to build meaningful and productive relationships and partnerships. Today’s contemporary county-based Extension programs benefit from over 100 years of visibility, especially with respect to institutional and political relations at the county level.

Extension educators can enhance their visibility and creditability early in their careers by taking the following steps associated with developing important relationships in the county:

• Schedule a meeting with each member of the County Commissioners Court and County Judge early in your tenure. Request that they introduce you to key leaders in their precinct/county. This opportunity can serve in assisting new Extension educators to learn more about the county and provides the opportunity to get more familiar with the elected officials. This is also an excellent opportunity for the Extension educator to find out what the elected officials view as critical issues in the county that can be addressed through Extension educational programs.
• Schedule a meeting with the chairperson of your Leadership Advisory Committee, Program Area Committees, Task Forces, Coalitions, and/or 4-H and Youth Committees that you have responsibility overseeing. This meeting should serve as a precursor to scheduling a committee meeting. Extension educators should discuss agenda items and determine how to pose questions to committee members that will solicit innovative ideas in terms of programming.  Remember, these committee members are the lifeblood of Extension programming. These committee members provide a vision for the program and serve in an advocacy role for Extension. This should be done early in the tenure of an Extension educator.
• Schedule committee meeting for the committees that you have responsibility in providing leadership for. This meeting should be utilized to familiarize yourself with issues and begin to developing educational interventions to address those issues. This meeting should take place early in the tenure of an Extension educator.
• Meet with key leaders in the community including hospital administrators, school officials, mayors, city council members etc. Again, this is an excellent opportunity to increase visibility and sends the message that you sincerely want to learn more about the community.
• Agriculture and Natural Resource agents should schedule meetings with U.S.D.A. representatives in their county to become acquainted with various joint agency responsibilities that may exist.
• Agriculture and Natural resource agents should schedule meetings with commodity group leadership residing in the county. The interaction with commodity group leadership can play an important role for new Extension educators in terms of expanding their knowledge related to issues impacting commodity groups such as industry trends on the statewide, national and international basis. The development of this type of relationship can be beneficial to county programming in terms of heightening awareness related to various commodity groups’ issues. Each county has a Texas Farm Bureau Board of Directors and is served by a Farm Bureau Field Representative.  These individuals can provide tremendous resources and partnership to Extension programs.
• Family and Community Health Agents should meet with health organizations in the county to determine if there are opportunities to enhance programming efforts through the establishment of partnerships and collaborations. This also provides the new Extension educator the opportunity to become more familiar with members of these health organizations. These organizations will vary from county to county but could include local chapters of the American Diabetes Association, American Cancer Society, American Heart Association, County Health Department, local Hospital’s continuing education directors, local Hospital’s director of community outreach, etc.
• Establish a good working relationship with effective County Extension Agents in your county, district, and region. Associate with other agents who are positive, creative and innovative.  Just like your parents stated, “you become who you hang out with.”  If you hang out with the positive, creative and innovative Extension educators you’ll be positive, creative and innovative.
• Meet with local media representatives early in your tenure in a county. These contacts will build a foundation of trust that could enhance Extension educator’s capacity to utilize the media as an educational venue and in promoting the local Extension educational program.

These steps will enable new Extension educators to begin to develop their professional network that leads to positive partnerships, more effective programming and advocacy for Extension. In the upcoming Next Step to Success for New Extension educators blogs, we will discuss how new agents can enhance their subject matter expertise.