September 02, 2005
A Movable Feast
North Carolina Cooperative Extension's annual Horn of Plenty feast was transformed last week into a Horn of Plenty to Go, as North Carolina Extension county directors and administrators greeted funding partners at an annual county commissioners conference and showed them the problem-solving impact of their work in communities across the state.
This year's North Carolina Association of County Commissioners' conference agenda didn’t leave time for the feast. So a group of county Extension directors and administrators worked with Carolina PR and Communication Services at N.C. State University to develop an exhibit that conveyed Cooperative Extension’s impact on North Carolina’s economy, the environment and the quality of life.
Participants who visited Extension’s booth at the meeting (Aug. 25 and 26) in Charlotte received a Horn of Plenty to Go bag, filled with evidence of Cooperative Extension’s impact on the food, fiber and forestry industries.
The bag included apples, shrink-wrapped sweetpotatoes, roasted peanuts, Mt. Olive pickles, a nutraceutical made from muscadine grapes, discount coupons for wine, Christmas trees and a muscadine festival, a CD created by the Department of Family and Consumer Sciences to help families understand the impact of fast food on their diets, and a card of information about Extension’s role in delivering research-based knowledge from N.C. State University and N.C. A&T State University to producers, processors, food industry workers and consumers.
The booth contained banners highlighting Cooperative Extension’s role in delivering research-based knowledge to solve agricultural and environmental problems; a knowledge library of 20 four-page publications highlighting success stories across Extension’s program areas; and a multimedia presentation reinforcing the overall “Knowledge is Power” theme.
Booth visitors were encouraged to fill out cards requesting additional information about their areas of interest, and those cards will be given to county Extension directors for follow up, along with calculators provided by Extension administration.
Among those who helped gather Horn of Plenty to Go contributions and develop and staff the booth were Debbie Bost, Ed Emory, Stan Dixon, Howard Scott, Travis Burke, Sue Counts, Harvey Fouts, Deborah Crandall, Celvia Stovall, David Fogarty, Joe Zublena, Tracy Brown and Christine Barrier.
Posted by deeshore at September 2, 2005 06:02 PM