Engaged Community Members
Organizational and Leadership Development Program
Engaged Community Members
We support meaningful engagement and the capacity of individuals and organizations to take action for the good of Wisconsin communities.
Community Engagement & Civic Health
Just as physical health can affect your ability to do everyday things, civic health can impact a community’s ability to provide quality healthcare, education, housing, and job opportunities. By improving community engagement, we improve civic health, impacting the way that communities are organized to address public problems.
What does civic health look like?
Deliberative Engagement
Fostering Deliberative Engagement
Deliberative engagement is a structured, in-depth process where a representative group of people learn about, discuss, and weigh evidence on complex issues to provide informed recommendations for decision-making. There are a variety of deliberative engagement methods communities can use. Here are a few examples of how Extension is helping communities with deliberative engagement.
Civic Assemblies
Civic assemblies are small-scale forums that bring people together to learn and make recommendations about specific issues.
Green County Addresses
Groundwater Quality Concerns
This case study traces the deliberative process established by Green County to address concerns about nitrate contamination of drinking water wells.
Spotlight:
Civic Assemblies
A civic assembly – sometimes known as a citizens assembly – is a small-scale forum in which a representative group comes together to learn, deliberate, and make recommendations about a specific issue
or proposal. While these assemblies hearken back to ancient Greece, they have regained popularity in recent years as a way to engage communities in addressing complex issues, ranging from affordable housing to digital safety. With guidance and facilitation from UW–Madison’s Division of Extension, local communities are using this tool to address some of their most complex issues.
Organizational & Leadership Programs
Community Leadership 2.0
An advanced statewide leadership development program designed to catapult motivated, high-potential leaders from across the state into solution-based collaboration that will have significant impact on issues that matter.
Workshops
From grant writing and fundraising to communication and action planning, our workshops provide relevant guidance, customized for small to mid-sized nonprofits.
Local Government Leadership Academy
Participants enhance leadership skills and gain tools to address issues impacting local government.