A look at cross cultural learning opportunities within Cornell Cooperative Extension

1. Building CCE’s capacity for cross cultural
learning
Panel Discussion with:
Marcia Eames Sheavly, Margaret Smith, Paul Treadwell
ESP Lambda Chapter Annual Meeting
November 7,2011

2. Why Cross Cultural?
• We encounter different cultures in a variety of
contexts:
– Through international collaboration
– By engaging in service learning
• International
• Domestic
– In our own communities
• In order to solve problems, in common, we have to
work with, in, and across cultures in a skillful and
aware way.

3. Why does it matter?
• Changing communities in New York State
NYS County Percentage Change in Hispanic Pop., 1990-2009

4. Beyond our borders
• Increasing international collaboration is occurring
around issues of common interest that cross borders:
– Climate change
– Food security
– Civic participation
• Immersion in other cultures can lead to shifts in
perspective and deeper understanding.
• The internet is borderless (mostly)

5. Building our capacity for cross cultural
engagement
• We hope to develop a community of practice within
CCE that can:
– Connect existing programs and practitioners
– Support ongoing work
– Engage interested staff, faculty and communities
– Cultivate new and emerging opportunities for cross
cultural learning

6. THREE EXPERIENCES

7. International Opportunities Through
CALS
Margaret E. Smith

8. IARD 4020
Agriculture in Developing Nations I
• Major issues and problems in international
agriculture and rural development
• Demonstrate how problems in development are
being addressed in India and Thailand

9. IARD 6020
Agriculture in Developing Nations II
• Field trip to India, 3 weeks, January
• Observe agricultural development in Asia
• Followed by discussions, written projects, and
oral presentations dealing with problems in
food, agriculture, and livestock production in the
context of social and economic conditions of India

11. IARD 4010: Experience Latin America: Rural
and Urban Realities I
• Fundamental cultural, historical, sociopolitical,
literary, anthropological, health, agricultural, and
development issue
• Establishes the global and regional contexts for
better transcultural understandings

12. IARD 4010: Experience Latin America: Rural
and Urban Realities II
• Field trip to Chiapas, 2 weeks, January
• Observe the rich living
cultures, environments, ecologies, rural and urban
communities, and development issues in tropical
southern Mexico
• Followed by discussions, written and oral
presentations about cultures of Chiapas

13. IARD 4710: Cuisine, Production, and
Biodiversity in Peru, Part I
• Six weeks, in Vicos, Peru
• In the Callejón de Huaylas - UNESCO Huascarán
World Heritage site & State Park
• Peruvian chefs train Andean young people in culinary
arts, restaurant management as a form of economic
development, path to social justice

15. IARD 4710: Cuisine, Production, and
Biodiversity in Peru, Part I
• Vicos is at the base of Huascarán - world’s largest
tropical glacier and a major water source
• Examine rapid disappearance of Peru’s glaciers due to
global warming

16. Global Seminar Series: NIFA Center for
International Programs
• Extension Outreach in Rural Migrant Communi
ties
• Nov. 17, 2 PM, Ernesto B. López,
Volunteer Coordinator, 4‐H Youth Development
, University of Delaware
• How international efforts in extension can en
hance work with rural migrant communities
• http://nifa‐connect.nifa.usda.gov/udelcip/

17. Short Term Consultancies
• Join the CCE international list-serve:
cce-staff-international-L@cornell.edu
• Notices from USAID, USDA-FAS, others

18. HORT/IARD 3200:
Experiential Garden-Based Learning in Belize
An international opportunity for CCE
educators to mentor students, while
engaging in global service learning.

25. Educators…
• Attend several classes, travel over spring break, and
work with students on final projects.
• Interact with, and mentor students, in topics related
to community food security, youth
development, horticulture/agriculture...
• Model facilitation, teaching, positive communication
skills, engagement with children, reflection…
• Multiplier: they extend my ability to teach well.

26. A Sample of Benefits
• “This has been the best thing to happen to me at
work. I feel renewed. I’ve already learned so much
that will help me on my job.”
• An opportunity to interact in a manner and depth
not possible during their daily lives at home. One
mentor indicated how beneficial it was to gain an
accurate understanding of another mentor’s role in
another county in NYS…

27. • Exposure to a diverse set of learning styles and
traditions of communication. This knowledge
contributed to an ability to better serve diverse
populations, specifically audiences from diverse
cultural backgrounds.
• “Principles of community-based work are the
same, no matter where you go. Stakeholder
involvement, transience, and teachers that have no
time, getting parents involved, summer
maintenance…the challenges are the same. So it was
an opportunity to both share and learn from the
Belizeans.”

28. The Role of Technology…
• …is limitless!
• Distance learning via Moodle – engagement of our
educators with those in other locations.
• Opportunity to interact with educators in developing
nations.
• Sharing of resources and knowledge leads to cross-
cultural understanding.

29. Learning with, and through, technology
• On the ground, and online, learning and exchange in
Nicaragua

30. 2 days from our schedule
• Wednesday 05 January, Coffee Camp La
Hermandad
7:00 am Breakfast with host families.
8:30 a.m. Meet at the office of Planting
Hope to go to Coffee Camp Hermandad..
12:00 am Lunch at the camp,together
with the children.
5:00 pm Return to San Ramon.
6:00 pm Dinner with host families.
7:00 pm Meeting with the group for
discussion / reflection in the office of
Planting Hope.
Thursday 06 January, and Matagalpa
Ocalca Day
7:00 am Breakfast with host families.
8:00 a.m. Meet at the office - take the bus
to visit Coffee Camp Ocalca.
12:00 Lunch at Oasis , Matagalpa.
2:00 pm Visit Sol Café.
5:00 pm Return to San Ramon.
6:00 pm Dinner with host families.
7:00 pm Meet at the office – jewelry
workshop and mural work.

31. Digital media work

33. Coffee camps

35. Homestays
Living in community

36. Dialog and reflection

37. Connections
• Facebook was used to
connect participants
before and following
the in-country
immersion.
• These relationships are
ongoing.

38. Leveraging networks and connectedness

39. The Afghanistan connection
• Videoconference
connecting faculty at
Cornell to nomadic
farmers in Afghanistan.

40. What’s next and resources.
• Cross cultural learning webinar – 12/07/2011
• Cross cultural learning within CCE blog:
– http://blogs.cornell.edu/ccecrosscultural/
• CCE international opportunities listserv
– CCE-STAFF-INTERNATIONAL-L@list.cornell.edu