January 4, 2008
Topics in today's issue of Extension Update:
NOTICE TO TRAVELERS -- NEW VEHICLE MILEAGE RATE EFFECTIVE 1/1/2008
Beginning January 1, 2008 the private vehicle mileage reimbursement rate will be increased to 50.5 cents per mile from the 2007 rate of 48.5 cents per mile.
Please be sure to double check calculations on your TEV forms when preparing January travel. New forms with the correct 2008 mileage rate are available for Filemaker Pro and Excel. Please contact Kasey Schertenleib at kasey@wsu.edu if you would like a copy of the new form.
For other travel policy questions, please contact Kasey Schertenleib at kasey@wsu.edu or 509-335-2827.
CROP SCIENCE AND SOIL SCIENCE JOINT SEMINAR
John Gardner, Vice President, Economic Development and Extension, Washington State University will present “The Influence of Place and Scale in Shaping Agriculture” Monday, January 7, 2008 at 3:10pm, Johnson Hall 204.
This seminar will be broadcast via WECN to Puyallup, Prosser, and Renton stations. The WECN dial-up number is 1018.
FOUR AGRICULTURAL PILOTS SELECTED FOR FUNDING
In the last legislative session, the Governor and the Legislature provided $500K for a proof of concept phase for the Agricultural Pilots Project. The funding was provided to fund a few select pilots that demonstrate the dual goals of the project: increased profitability to agriculture, environmental benefits.
This past Fall, the Ag Pilot Oversight Committee recommended four pilots for funding to the Governor’s Office. These pilots now have been vetted and approved. A number of WSU Extension and research faculty are involved in the projects: Shannon Neibergs, Lynne Carpenter-Boggs, John Kugler, Steve Van Vleet, Tom Platt, Hans Kok, Diana Roberts, Karen Lewis, Chris Feise and Jay Brunner. Don Nelson is the PI for one of the pilots and WSU Mount Vernon faculty will be involved in monitoring the Skagit Project. Dr. Bill Budd with the Division of Governmental Studies and Services will be supervising a graduate student assisting the Ruckelshaus Center in evaluating and monitoring the projects.
Title: “Direct Seed Mentor Project”
Synopsis:This pilot is aimed at increasing the adoption of direct seed operations through the use of a mentoring program, an on-farm demonstration of direct seeding and the case study of a side-by-side comparison with conventionally tilled ground.
Title: “Farming for Wildlife: A Project to Support Wildlife and Agriculture in the Skagit Delta”
Synopsis: The Farming for Wildlife pilot will test the concept of creating habitat for shorebirds on farmland by implementing “habitat rotations.” Objectives include: 1) completing the economic feasibility study and enterprise business plans for habitat rotations; 2) performing the final soil fertility analysis and macro-invertebrate sampling and; 3) initiating precedent setting research that examines the potential disease and pathogen control benefits associated with habitat rotations/saturated farm fields.
Title: “Beefing-up the Palouse - A Sustainable Alternative to the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP)”
Synopsis:This pilot tests a “total systems” approach to the profitable production of value-added natural, and/or organic, grass-fed beef. It also seeks to develop a replicable strategy to help farmers transition from conventional dry-land wheat production to sustainable alternatives that are profitable, good for the environment, that allow farmers to remain on the land and support rural communities.
Title: “Transition of Insect Pest Management to New Pest Control Technology”
Synopsis: Recognizing an opportunity to move proactively and transition to new technologies that would not only meet but surpass EPA regulations, this pilot aims to institute new IPM practices. These practices will maintain acceptable crop protection, sustain grower profitability, reduce pesticide exposure risks of farm labor, and enhance environmental stewardship. Source: Rob McDaniel
CALL FOR ABSTRACTS FOR 2008 ACADEMIC SHOWCASE
This is another reminder that abstracts for Washington State University’s 2008 Academic Showcase are now being accepted. To review guidelines and submit your abstract, go to www.showcase.wsu.edu.
All WSU faculty, staff and students are invited to present original scholarship, research or artistic expression as part of the university’s daylong World Class. Face to Face. Showcase celebration. Academic projects from all colleges and units and in every discipline are encouraged at the morning event.
The annual Showcase celebration is set for Friday, March 28, 2008, and includes the Academic Showcase, a luncheon presentation of the Distinguished Faculty Address, a reception for WSU retirees, a reception honoring recent patent awardees, and Celebrating Excellence, the University’s recognition banquet for faculty and staff, including those recently promoted or tenured.
Abstracts for Academic Showcase will be accepted now through Feb. 1. The Showcase website is http://showcase.wsu.edu/.
For questions, contact Tena Old (skeen@wsu.edu or 509-335-1467). If she is not available, Janet Herrlinger (herrlingerj@wsu.edu or 509-335-0989) can also assist you.
JANUARY 2008 PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT OPPORTUNITIES
eXtension's professional development opportunities are open to all Extension faculty, staff and employees. No pre- registration. Please share this announcement with others and encourage them to pick a topic and try it out!
SPECIAL TOPIC -- PREDICTION MARKETS
Join us at 11:00 a.m. on January 30 to learn how organizations are using prediction markets to chart their strategic future. Adam Siegel, co-founder of Inkling Markets
(http://inklingmarkets.com/) will share how prediction markets are being used to forecast the answers by buying and selling shares in stocks representing alternative outcomes. Using a stock market-like mechanism allows people to express their opinion as a "weighted vote" over time in response to new information or a change of opinion. Unlike a poll, a prediction market is asking "what will happen?" vs. "what do you want to happen?" Join us to learn how progressive organizations are using prediction markets to guide their decision making.
30 MINUTE SESSIONS
This month we are offering "30 Minute Sessions" on a several topics including the collaborate wiki and search engine optimization. Give us 30 minutes and we'll teach you something useful! These sessions will be held at our Web Conferencing Center at http:// connect.extension.iastate.edu/learn and your telephone. Plan to join the session 5 minutes before the starting time. Each session will be held at 11:00 a.m. PT unless otherwise noted.
* January 8 at 11:00 a.m. PT, a “30 Minute Session” on eXtension’s Collaborate Wiki: the place for the whole Cooperative Extension System to work. This session will show you what you need to do to get started working in the collaborate wiki and show you some examples of how others are using it today. (For all Extension)
* January 15 at 11:00 a.m. PT, a "30 Minute Session" on Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Tips and Techniques by Brian Webster, Iowa State Extension, in conjunction with the ACE IT SIG. A large percentage of the hits to your web site come from search engines. This session on search engine optimization includes tips and techniques that will help people find your pages. We'll talk about things that you can do on your pages to help boost its ratings, things you should never do and things that other people do that help your site. (For all Extension)
* January 17 at 11:00 a.m. PT, a "30 Minute Session" on Collaborative Search Engine. This session will show you how simple it is to use Google search technology to create a free Custom Search Engine that reflects your knowledge and interests. It will also show you the Cooperative Extension CSE, teach you how to place a custom widget on your own site, and show how you can participate in a collaborative environment to further customize and make it better. (For all Extension)
* January 24 at 11:00 a.m. PT, a "30 Minute Session" on Tagging by Kevin Gamble. It seems like everywhere you go on the Internet today someone is asking you to tag things. This session will discuss the philosophy behind the tagging and compare it to the older methods of taxonomies and controlled vocabularies, how and why it works, strategies to help you tag more effectively, and the power of collaborative tagging.
This session is targeted for people just getting started with social networking software, and is designed to get you off to a good start, and to help you avoid the most common pitfalls. (For all Extension)
OTHER SESSIONS
In-MoodleMeets: January 7; January 21. Held the first and third Mondays of every month from 10 – 11:30 p.m. PT, in the chat of the Moodle 101 course. Enter as a guest. During the In-MoodleMeet we get together in Moodle text chat to share stories, ideas and provide support for Moodle. To join go to http://courses.extension.org/mod/ chat/view.php?id=96. Past chats are also available from the "View past chat sessions" link from within the chat. To get a course shell to begin developing in or get more information about Moodle email moodlehelp@extension.org. The recording of last month's “30 Minute Session” on Moodle is at http://about.extension.org/wiki...search on Recordings.
Second Life Round-table: January 10. We will have our next meeting, using Web conferencing, at http://connect.extension.iastate.edu/Learn
at 10:00 a.m. PT. Please add discussion to the Collaborate wiki at http://tinyurl.com/ytsp2s
Second Life Meet-ups: January 11 and January 25. On the 2nd and 4th Fridays of every month the CES Second Life educators meet in-world to learn new skills and visit interesting educational builds. The learning parts of the meet-ups are led by fellow participants, and are designed to be lightweight and appropriate for all skill levels.
Meet at in Second Life at http://slurl.com/secondlife/Morrill/
165/136/29.
ADD these dates & topics to your calendar, and plan to join us on for one or more of these sessions in January!!
TO PARTICIPATE in any of the sessions held in our Web Conferencing Center...
1. Five minutes before the start time, go to our Web Conferencing Center meeting room at http://connect.extension.iastate.edu/learn.
2. You will be presented with a login screen that has an "Enter as Guest" option.
3. Enter your first name, your last name, and your institution/ university, and then click the "Enter Room" button to join the conference.
4. To hear the audio of the workshop and participate in the Q&A portion of the workshop we will be using a built-in teleconferencing capability of Adobe's Connect Pro conferencing software. Once you log into the meeting you will be presented with the option to enter your call-back number, your phone will automatically be called. After entering your number you will be automatically called and joined into the audio portion of the Web conference on your phone.
RECORDINGS:
Recordings of many past professional development sessions can be found at the main eXtension wiki at http://about.eXtension.org/wiki and scroll down under Professional Development heading and find "Recordings of eXtension Professional Development Sessions", or search on the word Recordings.
Looking forward to having you join us to learn something new in
January!!
SCHEDULE
Linda will be on leave all week. John will be in Pullman Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. He will be attending the CAHNRS Administrators’ Retreat on Friday at an off-campus location in Pullman.
Linda Kirk Fox, PhD
Dean and Director
Washington State University Extension
411 Hulbert Hall, PO Box 646248
Pullman, WA 99164-6248
509-335-2933 Office
509-335-9223 Desk/Voicemail
509-335-2926 FAX
lkfox@wsu.edu
ext.wsu.edu
WSU Extension programs are available to all without discrimination. |
