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The following success story guidelines are for Field Specialists in ANR, Families, 4-H Youth, Communities, and all County Extension Education Directors. Please submit success stories in the format described below.
Purpose
The purpose of success stories is to record significant accomplishments that can be attributed to Extension output directed toward the state plans of work. The most important part of any success story is the documentation of impact.
Success stories should be written on the most important program efforts a staff person works on during the year. Success stories can cover a single event; a series of meetings; a sequenced educational experience; a more complex, comprehensive approach that builds community capacity. Success stories that produce evidence of long term economic, environmental and or social consequences are viewed as the most complex and challenging.
Examples of typical programs that success stories might be written on:
- A single program event - a one time meeting of varying length, for example, a two hour meeting. Staff are encouraged, if repeating the same event in a variety of locations, to summarize the meetings in one success story.
- A series - a set of events/meetings/learning experiences that over a set period of time build on the same objectives or goal . Participants choose sessions/activities they wish to attend in a series. It is not anticipated that the same people will attend all sessions.
- A sequenced program - a set of events/meetings/learning experiences where participants are expected to gain knowledge and build skills over time in a specific order. Participants are encouraged to participate in all sessions, in order.
- An in-depth comprehensive program approach, that may result in building community capacity. This work involves community groups that Extension works with and/or which may have formed with the help of Extension to solve a local problem. The story may include several of the following; needs assessment, a marketing campaign, coalition work, focus groups, fund raising, applied research projects, meetings/activities/events. This program may cover a longer time frame of six months to a year or more. This type of program will be issue focused and may often require an interdisciplinary response. The work may result in influencing the direction of local, area and or state policy. The work may result in some concrete structure within the community, such as, child care centers, community gardens, value added cooperatives, or improved access to medical care.
Expectations
Success stories are a major form of documentation used at individual performance reviews and should be viewed as part of the annual work contract between employees and supervisors. Staff are expected to meet established deadlines when submitting success stories.
Staff at higher PIQ levels are expected to develop success stories that document higher levels of impact. Often, these efforts will also describe more complex, innovative, multi-disciplinary work.
Submission
Field Specialists
- Field Specialists with full-time appointments are to submit quarterly success stories, due on or before March 31, June 30, September 30 and December 31.
- Field specialists with 1/2 time appointments should submit two stories annually, one on or before March 31 and another on September 30.
- To submit stories,
County Extension Education Directors
- County Extension Education Directors are to submit one story annually on or before September 1.
- CEEDs should send success stories via email (not as attachments) to appropriate field specialists, their AEED and the appropriate Program Director.
Format
Success stories should be less than one page in length, preferably shorter, and follow this format:
- Your Name, Title and Location.
- Date Submitted
- State Plan of Work Number and a Title specific to the story.
- Time Period Covered by this story.
- The Problem facing our clientele - a two or three sentence description, with supportive localized data when possible.
- Extension's Response to that problem - methods, resources (volunteers, external funding provided), participation numbers (input and output).
- The Impact on the clientele/community - reactions; KASA; practice change; economic, environmental and social consequences).
Success stories should be written with the public in mind. Spell out acronyms, reduce jargon, be brief and to the point. When providing impact, do not use % unless sample is over 100.
Evidence of impact*, (listing increases in complexity from #1 to #4)
- Reactions from participants - what people say or write, "general comments" following an event.
- Change associated with Knowledge, Attitude, Skills or Aspirations (KASA) - may be a formal, pre and post evaluation, administered at end of educational experience. May also be a response to a question asked to the group, such as "Identify a change you PLAN to do following this meeting."
- Practice change - adoption of practices and application of new information. Involves follow up evaluation . Answers the general question of, " What CHANGES did you make, after participation?"
- Economic, environmental and social consequences - financial change, policy change, increased community capacity, development of infrastructure, improvement in well being indicators for families and youth.
(* C. Bennett, "Hierarchy of Evidence", 1975. An evaluation model for Extension workers.)
Examples of success stories can be reviewed on the Web at:
ANR -- http://www.extension.iastate.edu/ag/success/
Communities -- http://www.design.iastate.edu/communities/success.php3
Families -- http://www.extension.iastate.edu/families/success/
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