The Top 11 Things to Do…In Your First Year as an ANR Educator
Find an excellent mentor
- You will be assigned a mentor when you start your job.
- As you develop your specialization, you will likely identify a new person.
- Use them both! It is acceptable and encouraged.
Identify and visit the influencers in your county
- Farmers, Industry Personnel, Advisory Committees, County Commissioners, and…
- Identify a key person to help you get to know the ANR influencers in your community.
- Set up round-table discussions (outside of advisory time) to talk about important ANR issues. Listen.
- Make sure you have some of these key people on your program advisory committee.
- Connect with these folks about marketing, public relations and how to get connected to media in the county.
Observe, listen, learn about “what is” and “why”. Identify opportunities for change – after your first year
- You are there to continue and/or build an excellent program.
- You need to understand “what is” before effectively making changes.
- Your list will include all kinds of things, but after the first year you will have a clearer picture of which are important enough to take on and which are better left to someone else.
Identify 3 excellent Educators and spend a day or two with each
-How do they get things done?
-How do they identify opportunities?
-What resources do they use?
-How do they track their work for reporting?
-How do they generate funds?
-How do they plan, promote, and deliver programs?
-What program committees do they use, and how do they work with them?
-Consider developing a personal in-service after 3 months on the job. Area Leaders will support this.
- Identify the best educators in your specialization and in areas where your county has needs and you need more training.
- Spend a day with each person. Ask the questions above, listen to the answers, take notes.
- Get copies of files, presentations, management systems that help them do their work effectively.
Learn where you can find information and resources
- Start using One Drive and sync your folders. Don’t reinvent the wheel on presentations, etc. Get familiar with Microsoft Teams.
- Use “University Extension” in your on-line searches.
- Use the CFAES Branding site for templates for flyers, thank you notes, etc.
- Use the agnr.osu.edu website and u.osu.edu/agnr blog to connect to specialists.
Get to know your office coworkers and learn about all programs
- Be part of your office team, look for opportunities to work together, have each other’s back.
- Be part of what makes your office great. Tell your story to commissioners, work with the auditor (CAUV, etc.) and other county/township officials as you grow your program. Learn the marketing plan for the office.
- Know what money you have for ANR (non-appropriated and release-time accounts), and learn how you can generate more for inviting big-name speakers, covering travel, doing projects. Learn how grants work, but focus on sponsorships, local gifts and local foundation requests during your first year or two.
Seek out opportunities to program, teach and serve
- Work with committees to identify needed programs.
- Look for opportunities to team teach, plan/organize programs with neighbor counties.
- Take advantage of programs and curriculum that you can bring in.
- Not everyone comes in with full-blown expertise to teach at every event. Plan a short teaching activity at events/field days where you can share what is happening in the county. This will get you local exposure and a teaching event for your reporting.
- Be fully prepared!
Join a program team
- Choose a team that addresses an identified need in your county.
- This will help to develop your specialization.
- Part of your support system –
- Opportunities to write, team teach, learn.
Build a support system
- Support staff, program assistants and coordinators, other Educators, colleagues in your region.
- Be sure that the support staff in your office understands your work style, your programs, and the importance of all of these.
- Send emails to office coworkers when changing your schedule, changing a scheduled program, along with program registration instructions, etc. Don’t wait for office staff meetings.
- Share every program with office staff and your neighboring counties.
- Update your supervisors (Area Leader (AL) & Associate Director (AD)) about successes, impacts, concerns, etc. Keep it short!
Get a good computer system set-up and use technology!
- Two monitors (3?) – you’ll wonder how you ever worked with just one!
- Consider options for syncing phone/computer.
- Learn to make “factsheet videos” – the wave of the future!
- Use resources, such as your regional computer tech and the Teaching & Learning Resource Center.
Take a deep breath – this is your job, not your whole life!
- We have all been there before.
- If you are overwhelmed, seek out support from your Area Leader and Mentors.
- Call another Educator in their 1st, 2nd, or 3rd year.
- Promotion is not mandatory. It is reasonable to think ahead towards promotion, but it is not your first priority as you learn how to be an excellent educator.
Page content developed by:
Dianne Shoemaker, Field Specialist – Retired
Eric Barrett, Extension Educator (contact: barrett.90@osu.edu, 330-533-5538)
Rory Lewandowski, Extension Educator – Retired