Brief Summary of Minutes of Annual Meeting

Participants: Provide a list of those who attended the annual meeting with their institutions and email address.  For SERAs, also include their primary functional affiliation (e.g. research, extension, or academic programs).  Note project leadership (chair, chair-elect, and secretary) for the appropriate members. As an alternative, list the URL for the meeting minutes if that report contains the list of those who were present. If available, include the email address for the project's list serve as well.

Please see attached list of participants in the SERA 47 Annual Meeting, held in Atlanta, Georgia, November 28-30, 2016.

SERA 47 e-mail list: sera47@lists.msstate.edu 

Brief summary of minutes of annual meeting:
Rachel Welborn (SRDC) gave an overview of SERA 47. 

Eric Young (SAAESD) described the SERA requirements, the most immediate of which is an Annual Report, which is due within 60 days of the end of the SERA Annual Meeting. Eric must approve the report in order to approve the next annual meeting. The annual report should be sent to Eric. 

Rachel pointed out that, for the annual report, we need minutes for each work group and the large group sessions. 

Dave Lamie (Clemson) presented the history of the work leading up to the approval of the SERA proposal. 

Elizabeth Gregory North (MSU) shared the SERA 47 leadership structure, as described in the proposal. Overall leadership is provided by a chair, a vice-chair, and a secretary, each of whom serve a one-year term. After the first year, the vice-chair becomes chair, and the secretary becomes vice-chair, and new secretary is elected. The SERA 47 leadership team also includes 2 co-chairs, one representing Extension and one representing Research, for each of the five work groups.

Leadership Team

Chair: Dave Lamie

Vice-Chair: Elizabeth Gregory North

Secretary: Iris Cole Crosby

Top 10 Issues: Liz Felter and Jennifer Taylor

Developing Learning Communities: Katie Wright, Liz Kramer, and Iris Cole Crosby

Resource Bank: Elizabeth Gregory North and TBD

Impact: Joseph Donaldson and Zola Knowles Moon

Successful Organizational Structures: Dave Lamie and Kenrett Jefferson 

The Leadership Team will have a monthly call for the first year, and then reassess frequency. Work group meeting schedules will be determined by the groups. The Leadership Team will meet on the third Tuesday of each month, at 2:30 Eastern/1:30 Central, beginning January 17, 2017. 

Rachel requested a one-pager for each work group, which she and other SRDC staff could use to pursue funding opportunities. She asked the groups to include what can be done now, with no additional funds. She encouraged the groups to think, not in terms of how do we get the next grant?, but, instead, to focus on how do we do the next task? 

The AFRI grant that SRDC secured to support the meetings and travel expenses of this group has about $40,000 left in it. These funds must be dedicated to supporting meetings and travel. The funds expire in August 2017, but an extension may be possible.

 Eric shared recommendations regarding Annual Meetings:

• The entire SERA should meet face-to-face every year.
• The annual meeting should be at least one whole day, not just a couple of hours tacked on to another meeting.
• At the annual meeting, don’t spend the greatest percentage of the time in work groups. We need to work together as the whole group.
• Everyone should come to the meeting with a commitment to be there for the whole time.
• We can change the time frame from late November, if desired, but we should stick to the same time frame for the future meetings.
• We can meet more than once a year, if desired—but it is hard to do.

 Rachel explained that, now that the SERA leadership team is established, she will step back from active facilitation of the group. However, she and SRDC will continue to be involved and can help us in various ways, including assistance with hotel contracts, etc., associated with the annual meetings. She recommended that the group look for grant opportunities to underwrite travel for future annual meetings.

Grant Opportunities

Rachel shared information on AFRI grants, and Candace Pollock-Moore (SARE) shared information on SARE grants. More information on SARE grant programs can be found on the web site: southernsare.org under the Grants tab. 

Communications

The south-foods e-mail list is a large group that includes many people who are not officially part of the SERA. The group expressed a desire to have a separate list for the SERA 47 group. Rachel will get this set up.

 Additional Goals 

• SARE Professional Development Program (PDP) grant proposals 

• Funding strategies (SARE, AFRI, others), SNAP-Ed Policy Systems & Environmental Approaches—should we have a group to focus on this? 

• Strategic positioning of our local foods network 

• Think beyond USDA—health, obesity, economic development foundation, etc. 

• Economics (economic impacts) and behavior change impacts 

• Food equity, accessibility, social justice

Funding Opportunities

AFRI

2016: announced January 7, proposals due March 24

• Education & Literacy
• Food Safety
• Food Security
• Foundational
  • Plant health, production, products
  • Animal health, production, products
  • Food safety, nutrition, health
  • Renewable energy, natural resources, & the environment
  • Ag systems & technology
  • Ag economics & rural communities
• Water
• Sustainable Bioenergy & Bioproducts
• Childhood Obesity Prevention
• Climate Variability/Change

Large Group Homework

1. One-pager for each Work Group to Rachel by December 15.

Include:

• What could a student do? (and what level: undergrad, grad?)
• What expertise/resource is needed?
• What are the low-hanging fruit? What can you get done within 6 months?
• How are you addressing equity, access, and opportunity?

2. Send one paragraph summary for each Work Group to Elizabeth.

Accomplishments: In this section focus on intended outputs and outcomes. This information should be built around the activity's milestones, as they were identified in the original proposal. The report should also reflect on the items that stakeholders want to know, or want to see. Also, describe plans for the coming year in no more than one or two short paragraphs.

As a group, we have developed one-paragraph descriptors for each of the Work Groups, and three of the Work Groups have developed one-pagers to be used in seeking additional resources and support to further the work. We have also developed templates for Microsoft PowerPoint and Word, so that members can present information in a consistent manner to brand the SERA in a professional manner.

The Work Group on Strengthening Impact Measurement has launched a survey of existing literature related to objective measures of impact of local foods work. They have received 16 citations, sources, and recommendations so far and are currently analyzing these submissions. The Work Group leaders have also enlisted the aid of the agriculture librarian at the University of Tennessee, who will be networking with other librarians at SERA 47 institutions to add to this body of literature.

The Work Group on Top Ten Issues has initiated a Delphi Study to identify to most pressing issues facing our institutions related to local foods systems. They have asked each institution represented in the SERA to identify faculty and staff most knowledgeable about local foods issues to be included in the study. They have also developed a draft of the first round of questions.

The Work Group on the Local Foods Resource Bank has developed a survey to identify desired attributes, content, and features of an online resource database related to local foods. A link to the survey will be sent to Extension and Research faculty and staff throughout the region and results will be used to design the database. Also, the members of the Work Group are developing a guide to local foods programming for Extension agents and an online training based on that guide.

The Work Group on Successful Models has developed an interview protocol to conduct key informant interviews with administrators and faculty and staff to identify, document, and evaluate the current organizational and staffing models at member institutions to address local foods issues.

The work of the Work Group on Learning Communities is, of necessity, delayed until the work of other groups is further along. The learning communities will be organized in response to the top ten issues and/or the staffing groups identified by the other Work Groups.

Plans for the coming year include completing and sharing the literature survey related to impact measurement, conducting the Delphi study to identify the most pressing issues facing our institutions, to complete the survey of desired characteristics of the resource bank and designing the database, and beginning the interviews to identify successful models. We plan a face-toface Annual Meeting in August 2017 in Atlanta, Georgia. At that meeting, we will further the current work of the Work Groups and consider the “Additional Goals” identified in our 2016 Annual Meeting and decide how to address them.

Impact Statements: This section should include at least one statement describing the economic, environmental, health, or social impact of the project?s activity.  Ideally the statement should describe a quantifiable economic, environmental, health, or social change that occurred due, in part, to the project?s activity, including data related to that change.  Frequently this is not possible because the data is not available or the activity is too recent or preliminary to have had a recognizable impact.  In these cases, provide a statement describing potential impact or an anecdote describing a single documented occurrence.

Because we are still in our first year, we do not yet have impacts to share.

Publications: List publications for current year only (with the authors, title, journal series, etc.). If the list exceeds the maximum character limit allowed, an attachment file may be used.

Because we are still in our first year, we do not yet have publications to share.