2008 MM Diversity
From Extension Collaborative Wiki
6. What efforts have been made to recruit employees and increase diversity?
Oklahoma
Oklahoma struggles to find qualified minority applicants. We are continually seeking to increase diversity within our organization.
Arkansas
Extension recruits at all campuses in state. All minorities that apply are interviewed.
Virginia
Extension is active in university job fairs and has had representation at MANNRS meetings to recruit employees. An active diversity committee at the college level is working to increase diversity in hiring practices.
Florida
Extension Positions are now advertised on the UF Jobs Website. The hiring county normally advertises on their website. CED and hard-to-fill positions are usually advertised in the Journal of Extension, Trade Journals, etc. Specific wording in the position announcement encourages minorities to apply. Screening committee determines which applicants are qualified. All Screening committee members participate in a diversity recruitment training session.
North Carolina
The Cooperative Extension Service at NC State initiated an on-line application process that has greatly increased the number of applicants for our positions. Program assistant and secretarial positions are also advertised locally. We have reduced our participation in career fairs because of the low return for the investment and are discussing the development of a network with key universities and department graduate and undergraduate coordinators to seek earlier identification of potential candidates that can be recruited over time. This is a more proactive approach than current venues. Our greatest challenge in moving in this direction is time.
Georgia
UGA is interested in expanding its recruiting base as it seeks candidates with specialized skill sets to address turnover and rising retirement rates. We have begun utilizing select early career Agents to work with our College HR Coordinator in attending job fairs. These job fairs include minority schools and Puerto Rico. The recruitment into Puerto Rico has resulted in a noticeable increase in applications and at least one hire from that area.
CAES has created a position to give leadership to the diversity efforts of the College. Dr. Ron Walcott (Plant Pathology) will serve a rotating role in this important role.
Georgia’s Internship program has been very successful in its first year. We have had 37 applications for positions and been able to place 17 of these applicants covering all three program areas. This has given us an excellent opportunity to assess prospective employees and offers Interns an inside look at the world of Extension.
Georgia Cooperative Extension continues to maintain relations with Fort Valley State University in our statewide program planning effort and in many of our trainings.
Georgia has introduced a recruitment brochure for use by our personnel in talking with high school students, 4-Her’s and undecided college majors. Each county office has received a supply of these brochures.
Kentucky
We are continuing our minority internship program which has been very successful. College visits to 1890 colleges to recruit has been done. A representative from the Office of Diversity has targeted High Schools in the state with large minority populations to visit their career days. We continue to hire good candidates into an agent-at-large positon to give additional experience and allow time for placement into a positon that might become available.
Alabama
Appropriate advertising strategies will be used to announce vacant positions based on the position attributes. All ACES vacancies will be advertised on the ACES websitewww.aces.edu/hr. Position advertisements will include a brief description of the duties and responsibilities; minimum education, and experience levels required for consideration; specific knowledge, skills and abilities; special licenses; an organizational unit; salary range for Administrative Professional/University Staff classifications; application review date; and instructions for applying. Positions may also be announced in local/regional and national print media, trade and professional journals, bulletin boards, and sent to prospective trade organizations. All advertising strategies will be coordinated by ACES Human Resources and the Alabama A&M or Auburn University Affirmative Action/Equal Employment Opportunity office and the respective Human Resources office, if applicable. Special efforts are made to encourage diverse applicant pools by mailing announcements to Historically Black Colleges and Universities, and in some cases, purchasing advertising in journals specifically geared toward minorities and/or women.
This year we began to use the Latinos in Higher Education website in an effort to attempt to recruit qualified Hispanics. Additionally, for various positions, we have utilized the tiered approach offered through AU Human Resources that includes a regional approach to recruitment in which they assist in posting the vacancies in the following venues: Opelika-Auburn News and Web; Tuskegee News, WSFA.com, WRBL.com, al.com (online newspapers of Montgomery Advertiser, Birmingham News and the Huntsville Times); AJCJobs.com, careerbuilider.com, and HBCUConnect.com.
A steering committee has been formed to identify ways increase that we can increase programming for the Hispanic population, these efforts could also lead to an increase in Hispanic employees.
Texas AgriLife Extension
A recently appointed Diversity Catalyst Team has made significant progress in identifying specific recommendations for enhancing our agencies outreach and inclusion of all audiences. This team has developed a comprehensive training program titled "Improving Lives, Improving Texas - With Respect and Regard for All".
Training meetings will be held statewide for each district and campus based faculty during the Fall 2008. The three main objectives include: increase diversity and pluralism in the work environment; increase diversity and pluralism among volunteers and in their work; and increase the diversity of Extension clientele.
Targeted recruitment at minority serving institutions.
LSU AgCenter
Introduced Summer Internship Program. Increased recruiting on minority campuses.
Tennessee Extension
We have two very successful intern programs. One is directed toward minorities. In addition to that, we collaborate with University of Tennessee, Knoxville, University of Tennessee, Chattanooga, Middle Tennessee State University and Tennessee Tech to have an ongoing intern program in Family and Consumer Sciences. We are developing recruitment teams.
