PACE Dialogue Session – UC Davis, February 20, 2013 – Room # 2
These are the raw notes, representing the sequence of the conversation. Comments cross-over key topics.
ACTION ITEMS
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ANR needs to clarify the ‘Who is your clientele’ question
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Refund Workgroups! – this supports the close advisor/specialist relationships – meet more than once a year
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ANR administration needs to strengthen relationships with Departments’ leadership so that perception of the ANR specialist role is consistent
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Each program area should meet and define their needs such as staffing
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Sub-committee to be formed to develop the visibility of UCCE within the counties/regions/state
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Start out with today’s last question at the state conference (How do we maintain the success and reputation of ANR?)
CLIENTELE
Define:
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Strawberry/cane growers
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Rice: growers and industry; water quality: Sacramento and Delta users
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Group where your expertise makes a difference
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Advisors and specialists – working together: they are each other’s clients sharing expertise
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NR advisors – issues and clientele change, could be public/private folks, educators and youth – subject matter expertise (specialist/advisor as one) maybe specialists don’t exist in the field/area
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State government with policy work – staff and administrators – defined by the perception of the problem
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Low income families, seniors, health educators and leaders that work with them – specialists as colleagues
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Specialists define advisors as clientele because colleague wasn’t identified as a choice. Work targeted to meet their needs
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Clientele expanded from traditional folks to specialists – wording on survey as to the choices of your answers were unclear.
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Youth/families/communities/statewide
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NGO’s (TNC and Audubon) many NGOs are doing the scientific work as there may not be specialists available – increase competition
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Commodity groups – advisors as colleagues except when coordinating statewide efforts (UC and commodity) leveraging resources for them
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Professional societies – CA people – relevant industries – media
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ANR needs to sort out the wording of this question
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Who are you paying me to serve?
1

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All Californians. When you have a specific commodity it is easier to answer this
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Groups of people, agencies
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Who isn’t my clientele? Partly defined by the program – Ag/environmental/society/global
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Nationwide we need to reconsider what the UCCE model is – should we be evolving with the times?
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Commodity is home – specialists bring skills and I don’t have to deal with political issues
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Broad definitions – don’t want to limit the value and effects of my work
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Anybody that will listen
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Whoever calls
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How do you respond to clientele changing needs
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Go to specialists
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Anticipate needs – be ahead of the curve – introduce research early – this will help identify clients
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Hard to anticipate – work with people outside of UC – cobble together anyone who has the info/skills needed
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Prioritize needs and look for areas where needs are increasing
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Develop appropriate collaborative teams, write new research and respond with educational program
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Community involvement necessary – work with them to identify needs
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Continually assess – look at areas that are unique
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Needs don’t go away – look for funding
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Fire/urgent issues drive the identification of clientele – some programs become self-sustaining
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 as government/groups get involved
I’m unsure – will get back to you with answer – build collaborative teams
Work group – core means of integrating across UC o Historical mechanism for responding to changing needs – CORE feature of UC o High functioning working groups o Annual meetings with important clientele groups and discuss funding and needs o How you respond may depend on your expertise
 Degree of specialization – faculty respond only if need fits their expertise, advisors need to respond when problem is important
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Workgroups help establish a phone tree. You know where to go when new issues arise o Do new people have this resource?
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Workgroups can help filter needs up to research and help respond to changing needs. o Sensory networks
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Cleaning house to speak with experts o Regional issues <-> local issues
Are advisors specialists? (Clientele)
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Were Advisors identified as clientele of specialists historically?
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Can specialists be hired and not coordinate with advisors on research?
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Are advisors clientele of specialists?
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100% yes – advisors disseminate info – essential to have (specialist) a close advisor/specialist relationships
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Clientele wrong word – collaborator better
Advisors are generalists – need to have specialists for specifics
What are the implications?
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Support activities to maintain relationships
Workgroups
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How do you maintain conductivity with an absence of specialists?
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Relationships changing so modes of outreach need to change/are changing too (continuum changing)
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Should specialists work directly with clientele or go through advisors?
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As advisors roles change to multi-county they will need more assistance from specialists
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Newer areas may not have specialists – advisors may have to act as both – is the continuum there? Have to look at specific positions – may need to retitle positions, advisors retitled as specialists.
ROLES AND RELATIONSHIPS
Ideal roles?
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Advisors identifying specific needs and doing the research
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Specialists incorporating research/work of all advisors (working with advisors should be included in their PD’s)
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Specialists best served by working with advisors – they don’t have to deal with political issues like advisors
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Limit scope of discussion to production – role of advisor and their level of technical expertise has changed
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Academic level research has been focused – new specialists do this – character of relationship changes – many PhDs now – this is an issue for colleges too not just ANR
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Too few specialists and too few advisors – titles getting mixed – you excel in the areas you want or your clients lead you to. How can we bring in more people? Not less people with more responsibilities
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UCCE attractive to new hires – results of research applies – more participation needed by faculty clientele can choose who they talk to (Advisor/specialist/researcher staff/etc)
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Situation specific – we fill the gaps – no ideal role
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A mistake to pigeon hole these definitions of roles – need to adapt and be more flexible
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A unique situation for CA compared to other states – we are not as layered – we are more colleagues
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Specialists encouraged to develop research more like faculty – whole scale has shifted up; specialists more like faculty
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Faculty and a sense of the devaluation of applied research
Ideal relationships?
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Driven by needs – advisors and specialists and work groups are ears on the ground
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Advisors in the “real world” identifying issues -> specialist responding to this -> sending up to
AES if they don’t have the knowledge. AES can address this – this can then go back down the chance
Work groups
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‘Ideal’ is not reality, need a strategic process to map where we need to go – do we need to reinapt the continuum?
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GAP between ANR leadership and departments
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Recognize and honor diverse formats – not just ag perspective
Advisors like specialists in regard to program content, etc?
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ANR faculty need to be seen as statewide conferences – accountability
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They are – yes – this strengthens the service ANR provides
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No – I don’t have the time to focus on specifics
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‘continuum’ is a poor word to use
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Some are – have greater expertise and they should function as a specialist o No – we are geographically constrained o Yes – the definition of specialist has evolved – shift in continuum
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County agents and advisors are different
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An applied research gap
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Commodity boards influencing advisors and specialists research to regional partnerships.
Centers should have regional advisors to meet the specific ends of the counties they serve.
‘Regionalize.’
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Regionalizing is happening – but not always good – some programs need to have 1 person in each county – ex. 4H and travel issues
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Boundaries between advisors and specialists not as meaningful as it used to be. If you regionalize too much we may lose financial support in local areas.
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Are we attempting a ‘one-size fits all’ approach? This won’t work. It needs to be separated.
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There are Bio-geographic needs in some areas that make their situation unique
COLLABORATION
Expectations and how we improve and reward this?
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Can’t force collaboration – needs to evolve organically; bottom up and from top down
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Expectation of collaboration from specialist to advisor not always honored
4

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National level grants all require collaboration – so we need to have the capacity to assemble these teams
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Collaboration = good communication in both directing and a collaboration of equal partners
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Needs based direction of communication – from advisors to specialists
Affects on collaboration from grants, etc.
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Implied more points for more $ in your research account in re. to merit and promotion – you want to be the lead PI – hard to collaborate when you both may want this
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Advisors spread thin and fall back on collaboration but an issue down the road that they need to be PI
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1 st author requirements cause competition not collaboration
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Don’t reinforce silos (programmatic silos)
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Lack of harmonization for collaboration with job description
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Strategic initiatives don’t support collaboration – work groups do
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Collaboration is not the end point/goal but the means to get there
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Some return responses in collaboration are not equitable
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Changing role of advisors to PI, etc. can be a barrier to collaboration as well as reviews and structure of job
PROGRAM PLANNING
What works well? What needs improving?
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Work groups work well – independent of statewide conferences
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Meet when you want and with whom you want
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Statewide strategic conference – we are too big and diverse to meet like this – we need to evolve – often it is too specific on things that don’t relate to me (maybe)
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Collaboration driven by groups – bottom-up
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Working sessions/management useful to get to know your colleagues and learn things
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Professional development meetings/orientation/etc. -> have more of these to strengthen ties
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Better directory – opportunities to meet
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Need to find better and more meaningful ways to connect – virtually?
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Statewide county tours (AES/CE/etc) should be more often
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Annual statewide conferences that are broader in topic
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Relationships built by faculty and specialists going out to the field
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Mentors: faculty – AES – UCCE links
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This needs to be done on a continuous basis – not just for new people
Connecting planning process to campus
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Definitions by departments on what they think is important – not enough input by advisors
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Department – dean’s office – ANR connections – there is more communication with search committees, etc. – an increase in communication and input – for specialist positions
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Greater interaction and convergence between ANR, strategic plans and departments
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Strategic plans for ANR and departments need to be aligned. It’s hard for depts. To plan for future specialists
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Little affiliation felt with ANR in re. to planning and policy
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Who has the final say on hiring specialists? Department Dean or ANR? It is different between
Davis and Berkeley, etc. There is a communication/time/personnel gap with this that needs to be worked out.
+/- for locating specialists outside department?
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Depends on department
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Glue of land grant system with applied research etc. It can work outside with specifically define situations, but in general they need to be in departments
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A bad thing to move them out of department. Impact and ability has strengthened by working with depts. (Use of graduate students, reputation of Dept., etc.)
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What is the difference between non-dept specialist and regional multi-county advisor in job functions? Too many layers is not beneficial
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The physical placement on campus is not as crucial as the affiliation with the department campus. Being off-campus has huge benefits
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Advisors acting as specialists have the credentials with the community – advisors should look at adjunct opportunities with Depts.
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Specialist should be in a dept but doesn’t mean that can’t be physically located elsewhere
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Depts. with few or no specialists have lost something (from AES perspective)
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Specialists on campus are drawn into teaching
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Students that don’t interact with specialists may not have a link to applied research
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Academic senate and ideas that advisors aren’t doing the level of research that is needed – but if specialists are on campus this argument is not necessarily valid
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Why isn’t Academic Assembly Council part of academic senate?
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Need more academic titles for Extension
OPEN TOPIC
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ANR to modify title of specialists so they aren’t required to get authorization from dept. to serve as PI and get a grant
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Doing away with geographic regions is great – makes work more efficient and consistent
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Look at roles of county directors – and they’re administrative work vs. academic work
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ANR spread thin – we need true strategic vision on what we will or won’t do to maintain our reputation
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ANR Press – seen to be slow to respond to digital age o They’re Focus is on hard copy sales
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University Library and ANR Press need to work together
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The inability to disseminate info electronically by ANR Press is frustrating – such as updating items to keep things current
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Lack of bodies and lack of funding – the tension between advisors and specialists over grants effects this
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Increase public awareness of UCCE (physical location), publications, etc. Subcommittee formed to up the awareness
If we don’t have more advisors and specialists we won’t be able to keep up with peer review
Mentorship program for all academics/advisors
MEETING EVALUATION
What Worked Well?
+
Stuck to time
Facilitator and recorder 
Nice mix of backgrounds and expertise
Plates  a few of us had them
Survey fantastic idea, should be done more to keep track
Different dept chairs involved with discussion
Opportunity To provide input
What Would Make It Better?
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No Plates left for our lunch 
Social scientists/AES should participate in the survey
Personal questions on the survey– too many – you can guess who filled it out
Too many redundant e-mails to fill out the survey
– may have filled it out more than once
Outside clientele to provide input on survey
Committee members present to provide clarification
Group was respectful
Difference disciplines here
Dean here
Last question missed – not enough time and steam
Make available a Class list with name/program/email for future contact
Too narrow of definition/scope and advisor/specialist
Meet separately with different programs to address issues
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