Happy New Year! This is a time of reflection and new beginnings.

Scott Reed and Lindsey Shirley reveal the foundation of outreach and engagement and talk about the year ahead, including accessing faculty, staff and community knowledge in a variety of channels. Innovation has been a prominent theme throughout the division for the past few years. Scott and Lindsey explore possible themes for 2019. Join them by commenting below with the theme you think represents the year ahead for Outreach and Engagement and Extension.

Wishing you a Happy New Year with the hope that you will have many blessings, joy, and inspiration in the year to come.


Lucas Turpin, director of information technology for University Outreach and Engagement and College of Agricultural Sciences, joined Vice Provost Scott Reed for this month’s First Monday Update. As the year winds down, you should ramp up efforts to protect your personal and work data. Lucas shares the five cyber security actions you should take.

Scott would like to know what piece of technology you’d like to receive for the holidays this year. Please share by commenting on this post.

Happy holidays!

The Office of Youth Safety & Compliance is a new department in the Division of Student Affairs focused on policies for all youth programs affiliated with Oregon State University, which includes the more than 270 youth-centered programs within OSU Extension and about 200 more campus-based youth programs.

Interim Vice Provost for Student Affairs Dan Larson, and Marilyn Lesmeister, Volunteer Development and Risk Management Specialist for OSU Extension Service and interim Co-Director of the Office of Youth Safety & Compliance, join Vice Provost Scott Reed for this month’s First Monday Update.

The new Office of Youth Safety & Compliance will provide easy access to OSU youth safety policies, best practices, resources, and one location for links to OSU safety-related forms. The office will communicate with Extension professionals and visit programs to identify ways to support youth safety effectively. The Office of Youth Safety & Compliance will be a valuable partner to Extension programs involving youth.

Learn more by watching the video. And let Scott know how the programs you intersect and work with inspire youth to continue their education, by commenting on this blog post.

President Ed Ray and Eastern Regional Director Natalie Kinion joined Vice Provost Scott Reed at the Pendleton Roundup to talk about the value of community connections through Extension. Both spoke about connecting with local communities as an essential role of Extension and that of Regional Director, and also Extension’s role as a bridge between communities and Oregon State University.

Join in the discussion by posting in the comments below. Share with colleagues how you create a bridge between communities and the university.

Sue Theiss, University Ombuds, joins Scott Reed this month for the First Monday Update. The video shares when it is appropriate to work with the Ombuds office. With its focus on conflict resolution, the University Ombuds office is a resource for faculty, staff, learners and volunteers.


This year’s fair season has come and gone. Thank you for all your efforts to engage youth and the public in Extension activities. Tell us about your favorite fair experience by commenting below.


When people think of Oregon, they typically don’t think of olive trees and olive oil production; that’s been the purview of the Mediterranean and our neighbor to the south, California. Javier Fernandez-Salvador, assistant professor of practice at North Willamette Research and Extension Center, believes Oregon’s growing environment produces exceptional olive oil and he is embarking on research to expand the nascent industry.

Javier is Scott Reed’s guest for this month’s First Monday Update. Learn more about how Javier is responding to and working with the emerging industry. To learn more about the Oregon olive industry visit Olive Growers of Oregon.

Since we’re on the topic of olives, tell us how you use olives in your life by posting a comment on the blog. It might be a garnish for a favorite beverage, an ingredient in a favorite salad, or . . . ?


OSU received the coveted Community Engagement Classification in 2010 from the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, in recognition of our campus-wide community engagement. OSU is reapplying for the voluntary classification, a multi-year endeavor. Co-chairs of the Carnegie reapplication working committee, Lynn Dierking and Julie Greenwood, joined Vice Provost Scott Reed for this month’s update. Click on the video to learn more.

What are your plans for the 4th of July and the rest of the summer? Share your comments below.


You heard it here first! OSU Extension Service and the College of Agricultural Sciences are presenting an event titled “Communities, Food, Resilience” in Portland, Oregon, on September 5, 2018.

Scott Reed’s guests, Lauren Gwin, associate director, Center for Small Farms & Community Food Systems, and Jennifer Alexander, director, Extension and Experiment Station Communications, talk about the important conversations that will take place at the event. Extension offices and Branch Experiment Stations will be encouraged to invite members of their communities to participate in the event via livestream at their locations. Look for more event details in upcoming email communications, the weekly ConnEXTion newsletter, and on the event website: Communities, Food, Resilience.

Comment below and share what your community gathering might look like and who you might invite to have a conversation about community food resiliency and the role of the land grant university.

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Community-engaged work versus community-based work and research is the topic of this month’s video. Joining Scott is Susana Rivera-Mills, vice provost for Academic Programs and Learning Innovation. Susana share’s her aha moment when she began to truly understand what community engagement really means and how that deeper understanding influences her leadership.

Doing research in communities is different from engaging communities in research. Please use the comment section of blog to tell us how your work has improved through the important concept of engagement.

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Co-creation and partnerships are tenets of outreach and engagement work. Tillamook County took co-creation and partnerships to a new level by participating in the Partners for Rural Innovation. Hayden Bush, Open Campus coordinator and Scott Reed’s guest in this month’s update, explains the difference the approach is making in the county.

Tell us about your partnerships and the gaps you are filling in your communities by commenting on this post.