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We held our fourth video conference on Thursday, March 4, and the featured examples about rural urban connections were local food networks and entrepreneurship in southern Minnesota.
Here are some of the great examples that were discussed during the video conference:
Kay Sauck, from Sauck Media Group, has created two successful magazines, Caregiving in America and Women Inc. that are based in Fairmont, MN. She has a staff of 12 people, (half are under the age of 30) and some of whom travel from Mankato and the Twin Cities to work with her on the magazines.
Pam Benike, from Prairie Hollow Farm talked about the Southeast Minnesota Food Network, which is a collaborative of over 90 farms in southeast Minnesota that supply restaurants, caterers, retail stores, food co-ops and institutions in the Twin Cities metro area with meats, cheeses, fruits and vegetables, honey and other specialty items. They are able to offer a one call – one delivery – one invoice system, making it easy for both the farmer and the buyer to source locally grown products. This also allows more time for farmers to do what they love, grow and produce food!
Annalisa Hultberg, from Minnesota Project, explained how the Heartland Food Network works with Minnesota chefs, caterers, colleges, and other food service professionals to help them purchase and use more locally grown ingredients in their establishments. In 2010, the Heartland Food Network received funding from the USDA Specialty Crop Block Grant Program and the Minnesota Department of Agriculture Minnesota Grown Program. They will be hosting several local food learning days to facilitate information exchange among chefs. The first workshop will be held on Monday, March 22. Check out their website for more details.
We also learned how Riverway Learning Community, a charter school in Minnesota City, recognizes the relationship between nutrition, food, and education. Students maintain a close relationship with their food at Riverway, participating in all aspects from caring for chickens and planting seeds to composting. Over the next five years, Riverway Learning Community hopes to farm, grow and prepare 50% of all cafeteria food on site.
We heard a workforce development example that involved several high tech companies in Martin County and along the I-90 Corridor that use the “Grandma network” when recruiting for new and young employees. The companies put advertisements in local newspapers during the holidays and when young people from the Twin Cites, Mankato, Sioux Falls, or other metropolitan areas are visiting relatives in southern Minnesota, they get a “pitch” from their relatives about the great paying high tech jobs in the area. So far, this has worked as a successful recruitment tool for these businesses!
Additional resources that were discussed during the video conference are:
Finding Food in Farm Country: The Economics of Food & Farming in Southeast Minnesota, a study conducted by Ken Meter at the Crossroads Resource Center, that examines how food networks thrive and strengthen local economies.
The documentary, Food, Inc., which examines the way food is produced in our country.
These featured rural urban connections are only a starting point, and we encourage and welcome other examples from you such as health care, education, arts, renewable energy, and workforce development connections, just to name a few!
Share your rural and urban connections with us! Click on the Submit Examples of Rural Urban Connections button on this page or fill out the Rural Urban Connections Form.
We had a lively discussion during our video conference on Wednesday, February 24th . We heard several great examples of rural urban renewable energy initiatives that are occurring in this part of the state. We also heard examples of rural urban connections that involved community-based efforts, higher education and the arts.
Our next video conference will be on Thursday, March 4, from 3:30 – 5:00 PM. Featured connections will be local food networks and entrepreneurship in southern Minnesota. For more information click on our video conferences page.
Below are some of the rural urban renewable energy examples that were discussed during the video conference this past Wednesday. Read the rest of this entry »
2010 Symposium on Small Towns and Rural-Urban Gathering
“Finding Solutions and Redefining Communities”
The theme for the 2010 Symposium on Small Towns will focus on leadership, capacity building, and practical solutions for improving small-town communities and strengthening rural-urban connections. In tough economic times, the importance of connecting with people and ideas outside of our local situations becomes vital.
Participants in the 2010 Symposium will learn about:
- saving money by reducing energy costs and waste;
- filling empty storefronts; and
- creating effective partnerships and collaborations to address issues facing rural communities.
The University of Minnesota, Morris Center for Small Towns and Minnesota Rural Partners, Inc. and their Rural Urban Connections project are pleased to co-host this event. The Symposium will be a one-day event on June 10, 2010.
The Rural-Urban Gathering will be held on the evening of June 9, 2010, hosted by Minnesota Rural Partners, Inc. The focus of the gathering will be on the newly developing Rural-Urban Partnership Council with its emphasis on education, workforce and entrepreneurship to increase innovation and wealth creation. Both events will be held at the University of Minnesota Morris campus.
Scholarships are available to those who might need assistance with the already low cost to attend. Please contact the Center for Small Towns to learn more about the scholarship opportunities.
Young people are the future of our communities, whether they are rural, urban or suburban. The following just came to our attention, so we wanted to share it with you on our blog.
How can we be inclusive of youth in planning for the future of our communities (rural, urban and suburban) here in Minnesota?
The National Rural Assembly will host a National Rural Youth Assembly on April 22-25, 2010, at the Institute for American Indian Arts in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
The Assembly seeks 50 young adults from rural communities across the country who will gather to discuss the issues they see as critical to their lives and communities.
The National Rural Assembly Steering Committee asks rural leaders and mentors to nominate young people who are interested in rural issues and invested in making an impact in their local communities.
The National Rural Youth Assembly will engage young people on the key policy areas of the Rural Assembly including the quality of education, stewardship of our natural resources, investment in our communities, and the health of rural people. Youth will represent the diversity of rural America in geographies, races, cultures, genders, incomes and sexual orientations.
Criteria:
Nominated participants must 18-25 years old and represent a rural community. For further criteria, please review the Youth Assembly application packet.
Deadline for Applications:
All application packets are due Friday, February 26th by 5 p.m. EDT. http://www.ruralstrategies.org/national-rural-youth-assembly
We are at the Home Grown Economy Conference today, February 16, in Marshall, MN. This regional event, sponsored by Congressman Collin Peterson, is discussing rural and urban connections that are related to local foods. This event is happening via five video conference sites in northwestern, western and southwest Minnesota and has drawn over 300 people across the Congressman’s District. Approximately 1/3 of the people at the conference are from the Twin Cities metro area.
We heard inspiring words from Congressman Peterson and from the Honorable Tom Vilsack, Secretary, U.S. Department of Agriculture, about the need for small and large farmers to collaborate together and inspiring new programs from the USDA, such as the innovative Know Your Farmer Know Your Food program.
A big part of the discussion today is the need to create a community based food system to help keep the decisions related to food production and consumption on the local level. Another idea that has been discussed is to create a food policy council. We are making great connections and spreading the word about Rurb.MN. We look forward to receiving submissions of some of the many examples of rural urban connections that we have heard here today. Local food is an important rural urban linkage.
What are other examples of rural urban connections happening in your area?
Be sure to submit your examples of rural urban connections with us! Click here to fill out the rural urban connections form.
We know that rural urban connections are happening every day across Minnesota and we want to know more about them. We need your help! Please share examples of rural urban connections occurring in your area.
We will use these examples to help us create an inventory and develop a mapping system that will track rural and urban resources and connections across Minnesota. This inventory can be used to identify regional connections and gaps, for strategic planning and governance, and as background information for rural urban policy development.
Share your rural and urban connections with us! Click on the Submit Examples of Rural Urban Connections button on this page or click here to fill out the Rural Urban Connections Form.
Don’t be left out! Subscribe to our blog and stay updated on Rurb.MN. Enter your email address in the Email Subscription box in the left-hand column of the blog, and receive notifications of new posts by email.
Join in on the discussion and share your insights and comments on the blog!
Last month we had our first rural urban connections video conference. The topic of that video conference was Innovative Education Initiatives in SE Minnesota. We had 5 video conference sites with presenters in both Adams and Houston, Minnesota. They discussed successful online, interactive learning programs in their communities and the connections that have resulted from these projects.
Below is a brief summary about their respective initiatives.
Minnesota Virtual Academy, Houston, MN
The Houston Public School District serves over 450 local kids. In 2002 they started their 1st online school, the Minnesota Virtual Academy, with grades k-2. Now they have K-8 and High School online learning programs and they serve 1600 students across MN. While the majority of their students live in the Twin Cities Metro area, in 2009, they served students in all but three counties in Minnesota.
In 2009, the Minnesota Virtual Academy was approached by a community leader in NE Minneapolis, to assist them in learning how best to reach out to and serve the growing Somali population in Minneapolis.
For more information, contact Kim Ross, Superintendent, Houston Public Schools
Southland High School, Adams, MN & Riverland Community College, Austin, MN
Since 2008, Southland High School has been part of a pilot study with Riverland Community College to show the effectiveness and cost savings of implementing Distance Learning Interactive Television into their regular school setting. They have found it to be a very successful partnership both academically and financially for both institutions. They have just completed their first semester with all of their students achieving grades no lower than a B+, while saving the school district about $25,000 in Post-Secondary Enrollment Options (PSEO) costs for their first semester. They believe that this model can be applied across Southeastern Minnesota, not only to PSEO courses, but also in their regular high school curricular areas.
For more information, contact Ryan Luft, Principal, Southland High School in Adams, MN
What types of rural and urban education connections are happening in your community?
Check out our video conference page for future video conference dates, locations and topics.
Share your rural and urban connections with us!
80% of Minnesota’s school districts educate children who speak a language other than English at home. 24 languages are involved… everything from Hindi (2 districts) to Spanish (181 districts).
Here’s a map that shows the Diversity in Minnesota students’ home primary language, in 2007-2008. The smaller Minnesota map titled Percent of students that primarily speak a language other than English at home paints an interesting picture of where the growing pockets of diversity are located across Minnesota.
How has the boom in Minnesota’s diverse population impacted your community’s schools? Has this been treated as more of a challenge or an opportunity?
How has it affected workforce development — opportunity & challenge?
Kate Searls, from the RurbMN Team
Thanks to Ann Treacy and the folks at the Blandin on Broadband project for sending us the following information. Blandin is collecting advice and stories for legislators to post on the Blandin on Broadband blog. We wanted to pass on this information. Here’s the original post/request:
The Minnesota Legislature will be back to session in a matter of weeks. According to Politics in Minnesota, broadband will be a hot topic this year.
Much of the conversation will revolve around the Minnesota Ultra High-Speed Broadband Task Force Recommendations. The Task Force heard from many people in preparing the report – from broadband experts to users in the field. We wanted to open up the public discussion again. So we are asking folks,
“What would you like your legislators to know about the importance of broadband access for you and your community?”
We are planning to post responses on the Blandin on Broadband blog http://blandinonbroadband.org on February 5.
If you want to share your two cents please send it to broadband@blandinfoundation.org, with a subject line: BB Leg comments. We ask that you keep it to 100 words or so – however if you want to say more, feel free to post your response online and send us a link. Same applies to videos or podcasts, simply send us a brief synopsis and link.
While our intention is to include all responses, we reserve the right to filter responses, especially if they include inappropriate language or veer from the topic of broadband.
We look forward to hearing from you!
