Sustainability—Lessons learned

Sustainability—Lessons learned

Traditionally, the UI’s family and consumer science educators work directly with families and individuals. Grangeville’s Mary Schmidt is moving the bar, helping to build local institutions to work with families and individuals.

“I see my role as helping build capacity, the social organization of a community,” says Schmidt, UI Extension’s community developer in Idaho County. “There’s a void in this sort of assistance, especially in rural communities.”

She helped three of six participating schools form non-profits to run the programs described at right. She also helped form two other boards that operate within the school district. Her overriding motivation was to help the boards support their operations after her grants ran out.

“It’s unfair to design wonderful programs that go away once grants run out,” says Schmidt. So far so good. Since the big grant ended this summer, all six rural Idaho County communities still have after-school programs, thanks to three revenue streams—participant fees ($50 to $100 a month, or a per-day fee); smaller new grants; and community fundraising.

Riggins started a thrift store/gift shop to earn support funds. Schmidt used a small grant to hire a consultant’s time to help them set this up. She shares the following lessons learned:

Board support Get community leaders to help find “your visionaries, the people with dreams of what your community could be. Start small. Meet monthly.”

Training The 52 paid staffers for these six programs meet monthly for 4 hours of training and idea swapping. Board members also are trained in running effective meetings, and in the importance of marketing, networking, and fundraising.

Marketing Build community awareness of new programs. This is critical to earn community buy-in. Get local media coverage, give frequent public tours, and produce a small video to show local groups what you are doing—all can help.

Evaluations Evaluations that document progress are most believable ways to track actual progress and determine where change is needed. All six communities collect data annually from staff, community leaders, parents, and teachers about impacts on student behavior. Results are shared through local media and guide program improvements.

Collaboration Especially in small towns, join forces with other small communities to provide bigger clout when applying for grants. Also it promotes the sharing of ideas and wards off a tendency toward isolationism.

--Mary Ann Reese