Posts Tagged ‘Miller SD’

Rural Learning Center launches Engage:SD

July 19th, 2010

When I talk to people about rural communities developing a social media strategy, I often have Miller, SD’s Facebook Page in mind.  Over 1100 people have “liked” their page, and people comment on it regularly.

Although one might not notice, the page is administered by the On Hand Development Corporation. It’s a great example of how a rural, nonprofit organization can use a social media platform, like Facebook, to engage people and create a sense of community.   

We’ve enjoyed spreading the news on ReImagine Rural about how Miller and other rural communities (like Ord, NE, and Clinton County, OH) are using social media.  It’s been a good first step in building awareness about how rural organizations and communities are taking advantage of social media. 

But we’ve also been looking for an opportunity to do more.  Today, the Rural Learning Center is excited to announce Engage:SD.

 

What is Engage:SD?

Engage:SD is a “capacity building” project intended to help South Dakota nonprofits learn how to use social media effectively. Thanks to support from the South Dakota Community Foundation’s Nonprofit Enhancement Project, the program is free to all South Dakota nonprofit organizations. 

Here’s how it will work.

First, nonprofit employees, board members, and volunteers are invited to participate in a series of 8 free webinars (view the list of webinars here.)  Intended as an introduction to social media, participants will learn how to engage their constituents with social media. 

Second, participants will learn the skills necessary to operate specific social media tools like  Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, Wordpress, and Delicious at a one-day, “hand-on” workshop.  To make travel easier, we’re offering one workshop in eastern South Dakota, and the other in western South Dakota. Dates and locations are still pending.  Participation in the webinars is not required, but it is encouraged.

And finally, we’re offering an opportunity for five nonprofits in the state to receive in-depth technical assistance in developing a customized social media strategy that works for them.  In addition, these five organizations will receive $2500 grants to develop branding materials with branding extraordinaire Bobbie Gaukel of One8y Creative.  Selections of these organizations will be competitive, and nonprofits will be required to provide a $500 match to be eligible. 

 

Stay connected and learn more

People seeking to learn more are encouraged to check out the details at www.EngageSD.com.  The webinar series will begin July 27, and online registration is required. 

If you’ve got questions, Lindsey and Mike are responding to messages sent to engagesd@rurallearningcenter.org, as well as sharing resources on their Facebook Page - www.facebook.com/engagesd.

It should be a lot of fun, and we’re hoping you will participate.

 

Note:  A special thanks is due the South Dakota Community Foundation and the “South Dakota Nonprofit Enhancement Project” for making Engage:SD possible.

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Posted in Community Development, Community Engagement, Economic Development, Rural | Comments (1)

Tech Trendy South Dakota

April 6th, 2010

Yesterday, Keloland TV in Sioux Falls featured Tea, SD and the Facebook page created for the community by its economic development director, Jenni White.   


 

(Note:  Thanks to Jonathan Garcia  answering the “help request” I posted on Twitter last night.  I initially had to post a link to the Keloland site because their embed code wasn’t working. Jonathan sent me this YouTube file, which I’m able to embed Thanks Jonathan!) 

White says she created the tool as a way to share information with the community’s residents.  Even though it’s only been around for a few months, the page has attracted almost 400 fans.  Nice job Jenni!

But Tea is not the leader in the pack of South Dakota communities using Facebook.  I marvel at how effective Miller, SD has been with their Facebook page.  Any community of approximately 1500 residents that is pushing 1000 Facebook fans is doing a remarkable job.  And there are others. I know of half dozen other communities that are using Facebook pretty effectively, including Lennox, Miner County, Chamberlain, Webster, Deuel County, and Oldham.

But you know what?  Maybe we shouldn’t be surprised that so many communities using Facebook.  After all, South Dakota a national leader in our percentage of Facebook users. 

 

Mashable give us the goods

Yes, you heard me right.  Yesterday, I learned about South Dakota’s high adoption rate for Facebook in research posted by Muhammad Saleem on Mashable. 

In short, the research tells us that South Dakota has the highest percentage of its population with Facebook accounts-coming in at 31.1%.  (Get all the goods with the graphics below or at the Mashable article. )

I’m proud of this statistic! It wasn’t all that long ago that I considered South Dakotans as social media/networking laggards.  When we started ReImagine Rural in the fall of 2008, I conducted an informal survey of rural community development leaders asking about their social media usage.  I didn’t find anyone with a Facebook account (myself included), and only 10% said they read blogs with any regularity. 

 

Why should we care?

The Mashable research has me thinking about what this means for South Dakota.  I’m actually perplexed by why our Facebook usage is so high, especially when compared to our neighboring states. Why do you think that is?

But the bottom line is that Facebook is a great tool for South Dakota communities to use as they attempt to “build community.”  In rural communities, we used to have stronger “third places” that helped build this sense of community. 

In their absence, I think Facebook and other social networking tools offer an alternative for getting people together for conversations that helps build trust.  That doesn’t mean face-to-face conversation isn’t important.  Hopefully, communities with Facebook pages like Tea, Miller, and Chamberlain discover ways to use Facebook to generate more offline personal interaction.   

It’s when this starts to happen, that we will really be able to say “South Dakota is Tech Trendy.”

Note:  Thanks to Hugh Weber at Deep Bench for drawing my attention to this info. 

 

 (source:  Muhammad Saleem , “By the Numbers: Facebook vs the United States (Infographic)” Mashable, April 5, 2010).

 

 

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Can Facebook be used for serious conversation?

October 21st, 2009

Lately, I’ve held up the Miller, SD Facebook Fan Page as a good example of how rural communities can use Facebook.  Because of the spiffy photos, engaging questions, and interesting responses that have been posted on the page, I feel like I’ve gotten to know Miller a lot better.  And you know what?  I like it!    I think it is safe to say, the community of Miller should be proud of how community leaders are using Facebook. 

But a recent article in the Everyday Democracy newsletter has caused me to wonder if Facebook (and other social media tools) could also be used to develop deeper conversations around the more complex, challenging issues. You know, the type of questions that make the mayor’s job tough.     

That’s what residents of York, Maine (pop. 12,854) are attempting to do on a Facebook Fan Page titled “York Community Dialogue.” 


York Community Dialogue - What’s important to you?

“Have you ever wondered,” the group asks on their page, “what sort of conversations communities might have if public meeting agendas were set by citizens rather than by governments?”

With that in mind, one of the first questions they asked was “What about York matters to you?”

That question, in and of itself, is a deeper question than anything I’ve seen on the Miller page.  And it points to the desire of some community members to dig in and shape the future of the community. 

Interestingly, residents in Howard, SD sought the same outcome back in 1997 when they developed a community dialogue process they termed “Community Vision Meetings.”  As Lindsey explained last week to the folks in Pepin, WI, this process revolved around high school students leading small group discussions, which took place in individuals’ homes. 

While I feel the York model is commendable, I haven’t made up my mind whether or not I think Facebook is a good place for the type of conversation the group seeks.   I suspect two shortcomings.   First, the way Facebook is structured makes it difficult for complex thoughts to be expressed.  Experience suggests to me that a blog is a better medium. (Perhaps this is why leaders intend to create “study circles” in the future.)

 Second, the biggest challenge in holding this type of conversation on-line is that it often degenerates into baseless name calling.  (One advantage of Facebook is that residents have to own up their comments with their name, unlike many blogs and newspaper forums.)

Those questions aside, however, I applaud community leaders for taking on this challenge.  Rural communities need dialogue of this nature, and I look forward to watching the York model in action. 

(And if you are aware of other communities holding conversations like this on-line, I hope you will share.)


Photo credit - Bucklava - Flickr (the Nubble Light House is just up the Maine coast at York Beach)

 

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Why do I write this stuff

September 16th, 2009

 I have to admit that lately I’ve been questioning why I spend so much time writing stuff about rural communities.  After all, couldn’t I make a bigger impact on the rural communities if I spent my daily efforts working in a rural community like I used to? Could I do more if I were an economic development director in a rural community?

But yesterday at the Rural Housing Playbook Conference, Joe Fiala of the On Hand Development Corp. in Miller, SD reminded me that there is value in having blogs where people can dream out-load, and where we can ask questions that seldom get asked.  Questions like “Does your community need a coffee shop?”

 

What Joe told me

I think Joe and I had only meet once before, so I was surprised when Joe came up to me and said that he was both a regular reader of ReImainge Rural and that he occasionally used a blog post to generate conversation with his board members at meetings. 

Instead of uttering, “Seriously?” (which probably showed on my face), I thanked him and asked how he was using it to generate conversation. 

He explained that he occasionally prints off a post, gives it to board members, and asks them to talk about it.  For instance, a while back he gave them a copy of “Does your community need a coffee shop?” and asked them to think about where new residents and younger people in Miller go to socialize and why having such a place would be important.  I was impressed to hear that they were talking about the role coffee shops play in community development work.  It’s the type of stuff most economic development groups don’t think about. 

 

The coffee shop idea didn’t make the cut

Later in the conversation, Joe somewhat sheepishly admitted that they are not actively working to develop a third place in Miller.  I think Joe didn’t wanted to hurt my feelings, but he was honest in saying it did not make their list of projects to work on.

Far from hurting my feelings, I was ecstatic.  Something I had written had caused an economic development group to “reimagine” their work.   They were digging in, conversing, and rethinking what they wanted their community to be like.  To me that’s incredible.  (By the way, that’s the “U Process” at work.)

Admittedly, I think every community needs a coffee shop that serves as a third place. I think they increase the community’s social capital that will in the long run help the community get more things done.  In other words, community members are less likely to waste their time fighting each other over the projects they are working on, resulting in increased productivity. 

But that doesn’t mean that I think Miller’s economic development group should invest their time and energy into making it a reality.  They may have more important stuff to work on, and should be congratulated for just thinking about it.

 

Ok, I am a little disappointed

If anything disappointed me about our conversation, it was that neither Joe or his board have joined in the conversation on ReImagine Rural. 

When we created the tag line “Building a deep conversation about the future of rural” we did so did so because we believe that generating conversations is key to building a brighter future for rural communities. 

Never have we felt that our experiences at the Rural Learning Center provide us with all the answers.  Nor do we believe that others should be “listening” to us.  Rather it’s about raising issues, asking questions, sharing ideas, and rethinking the future.  And that’s where Joe (and you) come in. 

I could tell from our short talk that Joe can contribute to the conversation.  I asked him if he’d consider posting comments about the importance of third places.  I’m hoping that he’ll even write a guest post or two someday about other subjects.  If he does, I’m confident that his contribution will help someone else who is wrestling with similar issues. 

 

It takes time

I know that it takes time to write comments or guest posts for blogs.  And I know that it can take time away from the more immediate projects that everyone is working on.  

In fact, as I reflect on the questions I posed at the top of this post, I think that’s what I’ve been wrestling with.  Is there value in writing about rural community issues as I do on this blog?  Or should I be spending my time “doing” something as I try to help rural communities. 

Only time will bear an answer, but for now, I’m going to keep plugging away.  The one thing that I am sure of, however, is that rural communities across America will benefit from YOU joining the conversation. 

 

Note:  If you want to join the conversation, feel free to send me an e-mail at mike@ruraltransformations.com

 Photo Credit (top right): limaoscarjuliet - Flickr

 

 

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