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The eXtension Community of Practice for

Organic Agriculture

Funded by: NIFA Organic Research and Extension Initiative

and eXtension

Presented by Michelle Wander, University of Illinois

eXtension and eOrganic

•eXtension is the national web initiative of the

Cooperative Extension and Land Grant Univeristies.

•eXtension is a publicly available, searchable

collection of articles, videos, webinars, online courses,

news, and ask-an-expert. Content is authored by

different “communities”. eOrganic is the Organic

Agriculture community.

http://www.extension.org/organic_production

•eOrganic is the Organic Agriculture Community that

publishes information on organic farming and research to

eXtension.org

•eOrganic is also a web community of organic agriculture

where researchers, educators, and practitioners

exchange objective, research- and experience-based

information, and collaborate on research projects.

eOrganic.info home page for logged in userFunding

USDA NIFA OREI and eXtension

Leadership funds from eXtension

NIFA subawards

NIFA eXtension proposal type

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eOrganic is brought to you by…. Who is eOrganic?

•800 Members, mostly researchers and extension educators at Land

Grant and other agricultural universities.

•Government agency researchers, farmer collaborators, organic

certifiers, non-profit organizations, ag professionals with expertise in

organic agriculture such as seed company reps, dairy cooperative

leaders.

•Content Leaders in Oregon, Minnesota, Illinois, Vermont, Florida,

California-- new grains group based in Maryland.

eOrganic Audience

•4000 newsletter subscribers, 746 Facebook friends, 805 Twitter followers

Webinar Audience:

22% Farmers

14% Extension

13% University researchers and educators

8% Non-governmental organization

19% Agricultural professionals

22% Other, many of them government agency staff members, certifiers, master gardeners, some

students and home gardeners

Regions:

34% Northeast

24% Central

11% South

17% West

14% Other

6 to 25 Other (more than 1 region, other countries)

eOrganic Resources to Date: 225 Articles

•Science based

•Regulation based

•Practice based

•Vegetable Production

•Dairy Production

•Fruit Production

•Grains Production

More than 750,000 total page views since January 2009

107 Videos

•107 Videos

•Total YouTube views: Over 500,000

•Average: 27,000 per month in last year

•YouTube Subscribers: 693

Two person, anonymous peer review

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Review – Organic Certification Check

Organic agriculture is legally defined by the federal government. To ensure that content is compliant with the National Organic Program, all content is reviewed by organic certification experts after peer review and before publication

Examples of Articles and Videos

Virtual Field Tour

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This video

has been

viewed over

85.000

times

Webinars

Weekly webinars between mid October and March

•42 recorded webinars

•Average number of attendees: 95

•Over 3700 attendees, over 6100 registrants

•Over 5800 YouTube views in Spring, 2011

•Some webinars available for CCA credit

•Collaboration with other eXtension communities, NOP, Michigan SARE,

•Northern Plains Sustainable Agriculture Society, ASHS

•NOP Pasture Rule webinar broadcast

•USDA Organic Farming Systems Research

Conference

•Western Dryland Symposium

•NOFA NY conference dairy broadcast

•International Organic Tree Fruit Symposium

(upcoming)

Broadcasts

Webinar on grafting

project funded by

NIFA/OREI

Ask an Expert

825 Questions answered

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USDA OREI

eXtension Project Type10/01/2010 – 09/30/2014

PIs: Heather Darby, U of VT and Cindy Daley, CSU Chico

COURSE 1: INTRO TO ORGANIC DAIRY PRODUCTION SYSTEMS

COURSE 2: ADVANCED ORGANIC DAIRY PRODUCTION

Module 1: Fundamentals of a sustainable program.

Module 2: Soil biology.

Module 3: Growing organic forages.

Module 4: Pasture management .

Module 5: Integrated Pest Management.

Module 6: Principles of managing calves.

Module 7: Holistic Herd Health.

Module 8: Effective business planning.

Module 9: Direct marketing case studies.

Module 10: Certification & inspection.

Module 11: Course eval. and discussion.

Module 1: Systems in review.

Module 2: Evaluating your soil analysis.

Module 3: Matching forages to your resource base.

Module 4: Managed Intensive Grazing (MIG).

Module 5: Herd Health Programming.

Module 6: Mineral nutrition.

Module 7: Managing your herd data.

Module 8: Financial planning.

Module 9: Transitioning farms.

Module 10: Course eval. and discussion.

Moodle Courses

Fruit Production Groups Currently on eOrganic

•Fruit Production Group: Currently linking to OrganicA content, but other

tree fruit groups and members are welcome to join.

•Blueberry production group

•David Granatstein, WSU has an OREI planning grant for an

international fruit tree symposium which is working with eOrganic.

•Stone Fruit research project group based at Utah State University, led

by Jennifer Reeve

•Carol Shennan of UCSC is leading an OREI project group that is

developing information about organic strawberry production in

California.

What do research and outreach groups get on eOrganic?

Group workspaces

•Co-author articles, proposals, and reports

•Share data

•Share images

•Store meeting minutes

•Make announcements

•Have discussions

•Share a group calendar

•Make your group homepage public

•Privacy settings

•Technical support of the eOrganic staff

eXtension publishing

Publish directly from your group workspace to eXtension

Content and certification review

Technical support with formatting, copy editing

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Group Workspace Example: NOVIC

Evaluation

IRB approved surveys :

Articles, videos and webinars reviewed by experts

Post webinar surveys

Follow up webinar surveys

Webinar polls and reports

Google Analytics

Videos

eOrganic will offer groups training on capturing videos and

will assist with editing and uploading them to eXtension

and Youtube

Web Conferencing: eOrganic offers groups

webconferencing tools.

Public Project-Specific Websites: eOrganic

has designed some project specific websites in addition to core services.

NOVIC Interactive Website: project participants and farmers can upload trial results Learning Community for Organic Researchers

Ask questions of members and groups

Learn about other projects

Networking

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How to include eOrganic/eXtension in grant proposals

Development and group support of eorganic.info

Technical support for groups

Editorial management, publication

Ask an Expert coordination

Webinars and webconferences

Outreach

Contact: Alex Stone, Oregon State University Dept of Horticulture

stonea@hort.oregonstate.edu

eOrganic Core services

•Development and member/group support for eOrganic.info

•Editorial management and publication to eXtension and Youtube

•Coordination of Ask-an-Expert

•Coordination and technical support for webinars

•Support for webconferencing and other networking tools

•Evaluation of webinars and other public content

•Outreach to farmers, extension and other agricultural professionals,

researchers, and others through booths and presentations at farmer

conferences, ads in farmer publications, activities at professional meetings,

eOrganic’s public and community newsletters, and eOrganic’s Facebook and

Twitter sites

•Simple public project website at eOrganic.info based on template

Annual ‘Core’ Plan of Work for an Integrated Research/Outreach Project

First project year:

•Set up and develop project workspace •Describe project in workspace (to network with other groups)•Describe yourselves on your personal pages (to network with other members)•Learn to use workspace for more efficient project management, communication and publication•Engage project collaborators/stakeholders via web meetings•Coordinate a virtual networking meeting with peer members and/or groups•Train project members in video capture (eOrganic staff edits and uploads)•Deliver a webinar!

eOrganic Core Services Subaward Budgets

Project direct costs:

<150K151-250K 250-500K501K-999K1-1.5M>1.5K

eOrganic subawardDirect costs:

10K (year one only)15K (year one only)10K/5K/10K (first, mid, last)20K/10K/20K (first, mid, last)25K/13K/25K (first, mid, last)30K/15K/30K (first, mid, last)

These project budgets also support core eOrganic functions:

editorial oversight (peer and cert review, copy editing), outreach,

evaluation, Ask-an-Expert, and web platform development and support

Beyond Core Services

Short course: 4-10KWebinar series: $1500/webinarManual (e.g. Organic Seed Resource Guide):1-5K Interactive or complex public websites: 5-10K

For these content types, contact us to discuss your plans, and we will

work with you on a plan of work and budget

Additional information about eOrganic

Find eOrganic publications at:

http://www.extension.org/organic_production

Join eOrganic at

http://www.eorganic.info

Proposal Contact: stonea@hort.oregonstate.edu. Find proposal

information, sample project narratives at http://eorganic.info/proposal

Information on NIFA RFA from eXtension:

http://create.extension.org/node/2057

2011 OREI Request for Applications

http://www.nifa.usda.gov/funding/rfas/pdfs/11_orei.pdf