Contents
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Reflection & Dialogue Regarding Integration
There has been considerable success with integration into departments.
So far, it is not a full University-wide integration, but the framework
that is in place provides the framework for an Extension presence within
any academic unit. The successful Extension presence in OSU’s College
of Liberal Arts provides a model for future Extension involvement in other
colleges.
Integration of Extension with researchers and with academic departments
can accomplish several things:
- Coordination among the parties that are essential to Extension
program delivery in any particular content area.
- Access to the resources that are crucial to Extension’s
success—information, research, knowledge; experts and their expertise;
and also process-knowledge—expertise regarding educational methods
and information-delivery mechanisms.
In other words, a general operating principle for organizations that
pertains here is:
Assure continuing, well-coordinated access to all resources
that are crucial to the organization’s success.
In Extension’s case:
- Research-based knowledge and the people who are familiar with it are
crucial resources.
- These crucial resources are not all found in a single academic department,
or even a single college, or even within the University.
- Continuing efforts are needed to assure that the most relevant OSU
expertise is being brought to bear on any particular Extension program.
Questions regarding integration
The following questions are offered as potentially productive focal points
for reflection and dialogue regarding integration.
- For any particular Extension content area, are the appropriate linkages
being formed, within the University and beyond it?
- Is there true coordination or just proximity?
- Are appropriate means, including electronic (such as telephone conferencing
or videoconferencing), being used to include field-based Extension faculty
in departmental activities?
- Is the involvement primarily one-way – for example, Extension
involvement in departmental affairs? Or is it two-way – for example,
research and teaching faculty involvement in Extension planning and
programming?
- Is existing knowledge being accessed? … efficiently? … sufficiently?
… and converted into forms that are accessible and useful to Extension’s
clientele?
- Is new research being done on topics that are vital to Extension’s
programmatic priorities?
- When the needs of Extension’s clients suggest that multidisciplinary
efforts are called for, is the appropriate expertise being accessed
and coordinated?
- When client needs suggest that knowledge and expertise from beyond
the University would be useful, is it being tapped?
Recommended indicators of success regarding integration
- Researchers address specific and timely needs.
- Research – both existing and new – is made available to
Extension professionals and, through them, to their clients.
- There is a well-coordinated flow of creative intellectual activity
from research to Extension programming to end-user application of knowledge
and skills.
- The full range of Extension clients – “traditional”
and previously underserved, rural and urban, advantaged and disadvantaged
– find that Extension is serving their needs for research-based
knowledge, capacity building, and positive practical benefits that make
a difference for them.
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