Final report for ENC23-228
Project Information
Increasing the adoption of sustainable agriculture innovations will require conservation professionals to not only understand and convey the technical aspects, but to understand how to best foster a communication environment that supports behavior change. The project will build participants confidence and motivation to use social science tools in their programming. The training will increase participants understanding of the basic social science and practical tools for reducing barriers for adopting sustainable agriculture practices. They can use these skills to co-create more actionable programs alongside farmers, leading to improved trust with farmers and implementation of more conservation on the land. This project will expand an 8-hour science communication curriculum and train 50 Nebraska Extension, NRCS, and local conservation professionals through two regional workshops. Each region will co-create a communication plan with a focus group of five local farmers.
Educational materials: Complete curriculum for a full day workshop, including agenda, teaching guide, workbook, case studies. The workbook will be provided to all participants for reference both during the workshop and for them to take and use in the future.
Participants: The project will train 50 professionals from Extension, NRCS, and local conservation districts. The workshops will also provide the opportunity to build trust and collaboration between these professionals and their organizations as they learn and network together.
Communication plans: At the end of the workshop & focus groups, participants will have co-created communication plans. Project personnel will create a case study of one plan for each region to share back to participants and more widely through our website. These plans will help provide the basis for shared sustainable agriculture messaging and methods across the state.
Project updates, evaluation, and summaries: Project personnel will synthesize program activities and outcome indicators into general public articles for distribution in the NWC newsletter and UNL newsletters. A detailed report of the activities, outputs, survey results, and outcome indicators will be shared with all project participants and NCR-SARE.
Cooperators
Education
The project used a series of workshops and focus groups to teach hands-on. These varied based on client interests from one hour to 8 hour workshops. Participants were encouraged to have a diverse mix of conservation professionals and growers attend.
Education & Outreach Initiatives
Participants will create their own elevator pitches.
Each participant explored their own story, the story of their work, and how to create it into different elevator pitches. They then practiced their pitches with the group.
This section was taught at the full workshops and at one focused workshop for 32 research faculty & graduate students. The discussion during the workshop was very involved and the project PIs plan to ask faculty to give their finished stories at their next project meeting.
Survey results were not split out by initiative. Overall 95% of respondents gained knowledge and motivation and 90% said they used the content in their work.
Participants will understand and practice motivational interviewing.
Participants will understand and practice motivational interviewing.
Participants learned, discussed, and practiced motivational interviewing fundamentals:
- active listening
- listening for change
- open-ended questions
- reflections
- affirmations
- Conversation basics: engaging, focusing, evoking, planning
This section was given at all full day workshops and at one focused workshop for a team of 12 state agency professionals.
Survey results were not split out by initiative. Overall 95% of respondents gained knowledge and motivation and 90% said they used the content in their work.
Analyze different conservation agriculture practices
Prioritize actions to promote in their local region
Participants narrow the potential actions based on their interviews with farmers using a scoring rubric.
They then analyze the benefits and barriers to adoption, using insights from the previous section of getting to know their local farmers.
Break into small groups:
- Relative advantage: Benefits vs cost of change
- Compatibility: How does the change fit previous values, experiences
- Simplicity: Is the change easy to implement
- Trialability: Can the change be tried in a low-risk
This section was included in all full day workshops.
Survey results were not split out by initiative. Overall 95% of respondents gained knowledge and motivation and 90% said they used the content in their work.
Understand how individuals and systems change
Analyze how to influence individual action
The first section covers individual and systems change theories.
We then work though motivation and ability across three levels: structural, social, and personal.
Small groups work through matrix for the conservation practice selected in the previous section.
This section is included in all full day workshops and two focused sessions. One for a Systems Change graduate course with 12 students. Another for an Extension professional development course for 8 participants.
Survey results were not split out by initiative. Overall 95% of respondents gained knowledge and motivation and 90% said they used the content in their work.
Understand and apply the EAST framework to create impactful messages
Covers message development around the selected conservation practices.
E: Easy. Includes discussion of identifying jargon
A: Attractive: Including discussion of message framing
S: Social: including data and discussion of trusted messengers
T: Timely
Finish with case studies and discussion of four existing conservation agriculture videos
This section was included in all full day workshops and one focused session for six science communication professionals and a lecture for 30 natural resources professionals.
Survey results were not split out by initiative. Overall 95% of respondents gained knowledge and motivation and 90% said they used the content in their work.
Learn and practice answering tough questions, media interviews, and public meetings
Learn principles and a template for answering tough questions, media interviews, and public meetings.
- Evaluate 'threat level' of their messaging
- Practice re-framing
- Use the Message Box
- Practice bridging statements
Plan the layout and organization of a public meeting.
This is a participant requested section. It was added only for the final full day workshop.
Survey results were not split out by initiative. Overall 95% of respondents gained knowledge and motivation and 90% said they used the content in their work.
Educational & Outreach Activities
Participation Summary:
Learning Outcomes
Project Outcomes
During the workshops one of the largest impacts was on-boarding new conservation employees by having discussions with the more experienced. Many new NRCS, NRD, and even some Extension staff have little experience talking with Midwest farmers. All workshops had significant discussion components and learning from those who have been successful communicating with farmers.
95% of participants surveyed said they improved their science communication skills and improved their motivation to use the skills in their work. In a follow up survey 90% of participants said they changed their work practices.
- One group of Natural Resource District participants had an upcoming farmer open house. They developed a new messaging campaign around nitrogen efficiency and tried it out. They then wanted to on-board new colleagues and refine their campaign, so requested a second workshop in the final project year where they also invited all their district NRCS colleagues to join in.
- Another NRD participant had an upcoming presentation and said after the workshop that he would use what he learned to make significant changes to how he presented to farmers.