March 21, 2024
Watch the recording from our conversation with Local Climate Action Program (LCAP) co-directors Brandi Robinson and Peter Buck. LCAP is built on the idea that cooperation can help Pennsylvania’s communities reduce emissions and become more thriving, resilient, equitable places to call home.
February 21, 2024
Check out our conversation with Krista Schneider, PennTAP technical advisor at Penn State Hazleton, about her experiences doing community and economic development work in a dramatically changing and diversifying small Pennsylvania city.
November 9, 2023
Check out our conversation with Doug Swanson, Associate Extension Professional in Labor and Workforce Development at the University of Missouri Extension, about how the Recovery Friendly Workplace Missouri initiative came to be and what engaging with a controversial and emotional public problem looks like on the ground.
October 19, 2023
Watch the recording from our conversation with Katie Chriest, Penn State Sustainability Outreach and Communications for Commonwealth Campuses, about a student-led, community-centered initiative to raise awareness around issues of farmer mental health and stress called "Growing Roots of Understanding."
September 27, 2023
Check out the recording from the September 2023 Rural Community Action Assembly. Presenters shared their perspectives on labor shortages, population changes, and inclusive approaches to labor force participation.
August 16, 2023
Watch the recording from our August 2023 Rural Community Action Assembly to learn more about inclusive workforce models.
July 19, 2023
Tune into the recording from our July 2023 Rural Community Action Assembly focused on how rural communities are starting to assess their readiness to get and absorb soon-to-be-released federal funding for broadband infrastructure.
April 14, 2023
View the recording from our conversation with Maria Luisa Tejada, Penn State Extension Educator, about her experiences working to develop trust for effective community engagement around vaccine hesitancy with Latinx communities in rural and urban places.
March 15, 2023
Check out our conversation with Michael Reid, a practitioner and director with the Agriculture Victoria Australian government agency, about his experiences seeing how government and community can come together and engage to manage invasive species and other biosecurity threats.
February 22, 2023
Watch the recording from our session with Bev Cigler about her approach to conducting research as a “pracademic,” or practitioner-academic. Bev will draw on decades of experience to share stories from her work with intermunicipal cooperation, public finance, emergency management, and more.
November 17, 2022
View the recording from our conversation with Darren Marhsall, Southern Queensland Landscapes’ pest and community engagement specialist, about his work using community engagement as an essential strategy for feral pig management in Australia.
October 12, 2022
Watch our conversation with UMN PhD candidate and Penn State alumna Maddy Nyblade about her experience conducting research through a collaborative, tribally-driven project in the Great Lakes region.
September 22, 2022
Check out our conversation with Lara Fowler about her approach to engaging communities in water dispute resolution, drawing on examples from her work on the West Coast and in the Chesapeake Bay region.
July 13, 2022
Capital access and absorption — systemic opportunity combined with the capacity and technical expertise to effectively leverage and deploy funds — are vital components of revitalization for rural communities. View the recording from the Rural Community Action Assembly.
June 22, 2022
Regional workforce models — leveraging cross-sector partnerships, employer-informed job training, upskilling and reskilling, along with community outreach through trusted institutions — are an important component of revitalization for rural communities. View the recording from the Rural Community Action Assembly.
June 8, 2022
Digital equity and inclusion — affordable access to broadband internet, technology and devices, and skills and literacy — are vital components of economic development for rural communities. Review the recording from the Rural Community Action Assembly.
March 22, 2022
Review the recording from our conversation with Janelle Larson, Associate Professor of Ag Economics at Penn State Berks, about her community engagement work with international partners in Kenya.
February 24, 2022
Review our conversation with Extension Educator Walt Whitmer and collaborators about insights from a five-year collaborative research and engagement project designed to expand the evidence base for the research and practice of community-led stakeholder engagement.
January 26, 2022
Watch the recording from our conversation with Allyson Muth about her approach to engaging private landowners in forest stewardship learning and decision-making.
January 19, 2022
Hear about several data tools developed to help you engage with your local and regional population, quality of life, economic, and agricultural information.
November 9, 2021
Watch the recording from our conversation with Eric Ewell about the community engagement work of the PSU Mon Valley LaunchBox.
October 4, 2021
Check out our conversation with Summer 2021 Community Development Interns Olivia Chau, Skylar McCullough, and Rachel Zimmerman and Penn State Extension program coordinator Suzanne Weltman about their community-engaged applied research in Philadelphia, PA.
September 8, 2021
Watch our conversation with Justine Lindemann about her community-engaged research with Black urban growers in Cleveland, Ohio.
July 15, 2021
This assembly was an examination of the role that equity plays in sustaining entrepreneurial ecosystems, tourism, and revitalization. View the recording from the Rural Community Action Assembly.
June 30, 2021
This assembly examined community capital ecosystems for regional revitalization, with an emphasis on the impact of partnerships between philanthropy, mission-based lenders, and local leaders on quality of life, job and population growth, and attracting external capital to a region. Watch the recording from the RCAA event.
May 20, 2021
This assembly examined rural workforce demand and supply, talent recruitment, a medical assistant apprenticeship model in Washington state, and community health worker models. Watch the recording from the Rural Community Action Assembly.
May 6, 2021
Watch the recording from our conversation with John Byrnes, Extension Educator in Philadelphia County, about his experiences with community-engaged applied research with Philadelphia communities.
April 13, 2021
View the recording from our conversation with Kathy Sexsmith about her experiences with community-engaged research and teaching with immigrant farmworker communities
March 18, 2021
Review our conversation with Dan Azzara about his experience working with the PSU College of Agricultural Science's Entrepreneurship and Innovation (E&I) program.
November 19, 2020
This assembly examined the roles that peer learning networks, intermediaries, and community development finance institutions play in leveraging regional and local tourism for small business development and an equitable rural recovery. View the Rural Community Action Assembly event recording.