Substantiating the claims that we make about Extension programs’ public value is crucial to Extension’s credibility. However, we don’t always have enough time in a “Building Extension’s Public Value” workshop to assemble the documentation (journal articles, program evaluation reports, etc.) to support the claims embedded in a newly drafted public value message. The purpose of the “Research Agenda” workshop module is to list those claims and create a plan for assembling the supporting documents, or even for conducting new program evaluations or research.
Sometimes, a workshop group is torn between wanting to draft a public value message that is persuasive–but, maybe a bit aspirational–and one that contains only claims for which the team has strong supporting evidence. I usually encourage groups to be creative and persuasive during the workshop and worry about the documentation later, but not to publicly use a public value message until they are sure it is defensible. Understandably, this guidance occasionally leads to draft public value messages that include some pretty far-fetched claims.
Cynthia Crawford, Family Financial Education Specialist and County Program Director for University of Missouri Extension in Saline County, MO, has a suggestion for helping workshop groups stay creative while not veering too far off into “aspirational” territory. Cynthia suggests telling teams drafting public value statements that they don’t have to have the documentation to substantiate their claims today (during the workshop), but they do have to believe the statements are true today. Cynthia reports that this bit of direction has lead to remarkably strong–and credible–draft public value messages in short amounts of work time.
I will definitely adopt Cynthia’s “you have to believe it today” guidance the next time I teach a BEPV workshop. Do you have any other suggestions for helping teams “think big” while staying grounded?