Improve the Quality of Life for Kentuckians through Extension, Outreach and Service

Agricultural, environmental, economic, and societal issues create an unprecedented demand for knowledge- and research-based educational programs applicable to the needs of all Kentuckians. Economic development, leadership development, family, nutrition and health issues, opportunities for youth, and a rapidly changing agricultural landscape in Kentucky require a vital, progressive and responsive College of Agriculture and Cooperative Extension Service system.

Most Significant Challenges

• Budget cuts combined with turnover have created critical capacity shortages in key areas, including family and consumer science, health/wellness, community and economic development, and program and staff development.  
• Extension’s role in health programs such as the National Extension Primary Health Care initiative should be carefully reviewed.
• Cuts in state funding of mandated programs and increasing burdens on alternative funds sources, including county extension funds.
• New communication/information tools are available, but have not been adapted and incorporated fully into Extension programming.
• The expectation for graduate education for agents has been established. Now more accessible and appropriate graduate degree options must be developed.
• Operating funds for extension, teaching and some applied research becomes increasingly limited.  Reliance on extramural sources necessarily increases. Not all faculty and staff have successfully adjusted to this shift.

Strategies

• Sustain traditional Extension strengths while offering innovative new programs in health and wellness, business, engineering, and humanities to serve increasingly diverse stakeholders.
• Promote new Extension and outreach partnerships within and outside UK.
• Increase the deployment of new information technologies such as eXtension, YouTube, and enhanced web effectiveness.
• Enhance recruiting, retention, training, and support for outreach personnel statewide.
• Establish clearly understood measures to assess and communicate the impact of Extension programs.   
• Engage key constituencies – including alumni – to help the College achieve its objectives.
• Enhance the service capacity of the Livestock Disease Diagnostic Center and Regulatory Services.

Key Indicators, by 2014 the College will have:

1. Enhanced and refined an accessible, easily understood database of Extension outcomes, with annual data reported for each priority program area of Cooperative Extension.
2. Sustained or increased grantsmanship in Extension or Integrated Projects as evidenced by numbers of proposals funded and total funding amount.
3. Sustained Cooperative Extension Service contacts at or above 6 million.
4. Increased or sustained accession and sample numbers at Livestock Disease Diagnostic Center and Regulatory Services.