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Community Development, Mia Ljung
I am planning Real Colors team development workshops for Outagamie County staff and teams. Participants increase their ability to recognize their own strengths and the strengths of others. The workshop is intended to help teams work together more effectively.
I’ve been collaborating with Winnebago County Extension and community garden volunteers for a Ripple Effect Mapping event in February to showcase the impact of our community gardens. This gathering will bring together volunteers, educators, and garden users to visualize how their efforts ripple through the community. Past studies—spanning rural and urban counties—have demonstrated the gardens’ value, helping donors, local officials, and organizations see why these spaces matter and deserve support.
Planning for Introduction to Plain Language spring offerings in coordination with Cultural Linguistic Services. Registration will open soon for March 18 and April 22. These free virtual workshops offer strategies for word choice, font selection, grammar use, user testing, and more that help us communicate quickly and effectively with both native and nonnative English speakers. Learn more and register at: http://go.wisc.edu/plain
Planning for a statewide bilingual agricultural conference for Hmong farmers in collaboration with local agencies and educators, in Wausau on March 14. The goal is to provide education on sustainable farming, business development, and pest management, so that participants can improve farm profitability, adopt resilient practices, and strengthen community connections.
I’ve also participated in steering committee meetings and planned a session for the statewide annual Connecting Entrepreneurial Communities Conference, held in Green Lake, May 13-15, 2026. CEC is a conference about entrepreneurship in rural Wisconsin, featuring the local business ecosystem for rural economic development leaders.
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Crops & Soils, Kevin Jarek
I conducted a Crop Enterprise Budget workshop on January 27, collaborating with AgShield, CropSource LLC, and First State Bank to help farmers understand how current market conditions for grain commodities (corn, soybeans, and wheat) and forages (alfalfa, small grain silages, and alternative forage mixes) will impact the profitability of those crops in 2026. A full analysis of the input costs and strategies to mitigate risk for the upcoming growing season were discussed. Farmers were provided with example budgets as well as blank copies for those who prefer to do things longhand. Farmers and agricultural professionals can access the UW Crop Enterprise Budget tool at https://outagamie.extension.wisc.edu/crop-enterprise-budget-tool/.
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Dairy, Stephanie Bowers
I’m part of the planning and preparation team for a field day focused on the use of Automatic Milking Systems (AMS) for dairy producers and ag professionals where participants will increase their AMS related knowledge through facility tours, educational sessions, and peer-to-peer learning. The goal of this effort is to help farmers make informed, strategic, and economically viable decisions regarding AMS adoption and use.
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Horticulture, Kaitlin BriccoThe final details for the Landscape Professionals Conference are being set into place. Registration will be held open until mid-February with a cap of 125 people. This one day conference is split into three differing tracks, landscape, hardscape and maintenance that allows participants to receive hands-on training opportunities including planting, pruning, patio laying and insect identification.
January’s Horticulture Headlines highlighted some of the work that I do in the county through services to help residents with plant identification, finding solutions to disease problems and interpreting soil samples and so much more! It also provided information on whether wood ash can be used in the garden as a soil amendment. Read it here: https://t.e2ma.net/webview/b276tl/4cb7929adda23a162bcd90947995b0fc
I am currently working to arrange spring and summer programming with Fox Valley Technical College, and Youth GO! Fox Cities.
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The University of Wisconsin–Madison Division of Extension provides equal opportunities in employment and programming in compliance with state and federal law.
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