For August 2020, eXtension’s Impact Collaborative program has two exciting opportunities for eXtension members. Register today to reserve your spot!
Impact Collaborative Innovation Skill-Building Experience Online
August 4, 6, 11, & 13
1:00 PM – 2:30 PM ET
Available to eXtension Members Only
Join us next month for an online Innovation Skill-Builidng Experience (ISBE). The ISBE has been revised with a new block format, fresh content, new activities, and new worksheets to meet the evolving needs of Cooperative Extension professionals. If you’ve participated in an ISBE before, you’ll find new online tools to support your virtual collaboration, checklists to determine where to best focus your energy, and improved methods for documenting progress.
Do you have a project idea that needs incubation, innovation, and ways to get to implementation and impact faster? Are you looking to learn about design thinking and lean experimentation combined with Cooperative Extension’s best practices for solving important community issues? Are you interested in becoming an Innovation Facilitator/Coach for future Impact Collaborative events and to support your institution’s teams and teams across the nation? Are you already an Innovation Facilitator or a team member who would like a refresher on the Innovation Skill-Building process?
If you answered yes, to any of these questions then join us to explore the Impact Collaborative’s Innovation Skill-building experience in a whole new way: The ISBE will meet via Zoom for four sessions covering specific ISBE building blocks to spark ideas, increase innovation, and turbocharge implementation to ultimately create local impact.
Impact Collaborative Innovation Facilitator Training
August 17, 19, 21, 24, 26, & 28
1:00 PM ET – 3:00 PM ET
Available to eXtension Members Only
Become an Innovation Facilitator. The Impact Collaborative’s network of Innovation Facilitators are trained to provide individuals with a new way of looking at program and project development to help new and existing programs across your states and institutions identify gaps in their planning, ensure they are most ready for implementation, and have explored all considerations to maximize local impact. With the updates to our Innovation Skill-Building Experience including the new block format, content, activities, and worksheets – we also encourage previously trained Innovation Facilitators to join us.
Locally trained Innovation Facilitators can be an asset in helping teams develop their projects or programs more quickly, and connect those teams with resources available nationally. They can work locally with teams through our design-thinking process to bring fresh ideas aligned with institutional goals.
There are currently 120+ Innovation Facilitators across Cooperative Extension working locally to catalyze innovation in their own states and institutions, and supporting Extension teams regionally and nationally.
Who Should Participate?
Our recommendations to Extension Directors and Administrators for selecting individuals to participate include:
- Individuals such as a program leaders
- Individuals that work closely with your leadership team
- Already possess strong confidence in facilitation skills
- Can be effective in working alongside leadership teams and other program leaders to catalyze innovation throughout the organization.
About the eXtension Foundation
The eXtension Foundation is a membership-based non-profit designed to be the engine fueling U.S. Cooperative Extension’s advancement in making a more visible and measurable impact in support of education outreach from land-grant universities/colleges located in every state and territory. eXtension is embedded in the U.S. Cooperative Extension System and serves on the Extension Committee on Organization and Policy (ECOP). eXtension provides an array of opportunities for Extension professionals that foster innovation creation, the adoption of innovations at member institutions, and increased impact of Extension programs. This work is supported by your membership dollars and funding from USDA-NIFA, grant no. 2019-41595-30123. For more information on eXtension membership, please visit eXtension.org.
