KRC hoping to capitalize on Youth Leading Through Service

The Kimball Recruitment Coalition is looking to tap into the skill sets of local youths in their efforts to add a web presence to Kimball.

The Kimball Recruitment Coalition (KRC) held a meeting Thursday, July 31, at which time they reviewed the films that had been made by University of Nebraska-Lincoln interns Emilia Woeppel and Jessica Bartak highlighting different businesses and recreational activities throughout the Kimball area.

The eight videos created by Woeppel and Bartak, which each had a run time of approximately 30 seconds, highlighted Kimball events, dining options, the High Point Welcome Center, Kimball Health Services, Oliver Reservoir and the Four Winds Golf Course, the local parks and baseball fields, Panorama Point, Sisters Grimm and Larsen’s Jewelry and the Kimball swimming pool. All the videos were tied together by the theme “Welcome to Home”.

After reviewing the videos, members of the KRC turned their discussion to creating a Youtube channel upon which to upload the videos so that people from outside the Kimball area can start to see what Kimball has to offer and add a level of web presence to the city.

However, discussion quickly turned to the question of who would take over the video project now that Woeppel’s and Bartak’s internships have come to an end. According to Woeppel and Bartak, they have left behind 15 gigabytes of raw video from their time in Kimball and working on the project. However, the KRC acknowledged that the group could only use so much of the footage left behind and needed to find someone who could shoot video of upcoming events such as the fair and rodeo and Farmers Day.

“The thing I’m thinking at least from my perspective thinking about what KRC wants to do, we need to try to get a couple people willing to work on some of this stuff who can go out and take videos and learn a little bit of this stuff,” Shaun Evertson, KRC Chair, said.

Jo Caskey, Kimball County Tourism Director, pointed out that there is a source that the KRC has overlooked for potential volunteers: the Kimball Jr./Sr. High School.

“I bet we’ve got talent at the high school which are much more tech-savvy than I’m ever going to be,” Caskey said.

Evertson also pointed out that both Woeppel and Bartak along with Dr. Tom Field, Director of the Paul Engler Chair of Agribusiness Entrepreneurship, have advised the KRC to seek out local youths in order to help head the video project in the future.

“Some of the things that Emilia and Jessica mentioned to me and things that Dr. Field was talking about the other day makes me think that we’re really dumb if we’re not trying to recruit these high school kids to help out with KRC,” Evertson said.

This push to get youths involved in the KRC and helping to address the needs of the Kimball community coincides with the first year of a new initiative funded by a Rural Futures Institute grant in partnership with UNL Extension, DuPont Pioneer and the Engler Agribusiness Entrepreneurship Program called the Youth Leading Through Service Initiative.

The initiative is aimed at helping community youths start a grassroots effort to address issues in their community, according to Jordyn Lechtenberg, Graduate Assistant for the Rural Futures Institute.

“The underlying purpose and what we are hoping to accomplish is for young leaders to identify challenges and then empower them to help address those challenges in their community by reaching out to adults or whatever there might be in creating partnerships,” Lechtenberg said.

Once a group of youths is accepted to the program, they receive a $500 grant to help fund their efforts along with program and technical support from the entities awarding the grant money.

“After we award these groups, we can offer whether it’s through webinars or, depending upon the certain project, hopefully help create some more connections to resources, maybe it’s about that certain project or maybe a community has done a similar project and these are their best practices,” Lechtenberg said.

The process of applying for the grant is also simple with students having to identify what community they represent and give their contact information along with listing the community problem they would like to address, project goals, the project budget, the project timeline and the method in which they plan to address the problem identified.

Lechtenberg also states that the process of selecting the groups to be awarded is very open concerning the challenges that applicants can identify in their proposal. She also says that project leaders are willing to work with students in order to help them refine their ideas and methods after the initial application.

“We don’t necessarily have a list of priorities. What we can offer, even if there’s a group that’s interested, we love that and we’d be happy to lead students through a process of identifying what their action plan is after the submission process and different proposals. There could be a multitude of ideas that come up, and that’s great if they want this group to help narrow down what’s most realistic for them,” Lechtenberg said.

At its core, the initiative is a tool to help communities start addressing issues in their own community that they see as a point of focus instead of project leaders narrowing the potential applicants that could be awarded financial assistance by having the grant be specific to only one category of issues, according to Lechtenberg.

“We started out with an issue in mind of food insecurity. Part of that was kind of the partnership that was created that was a priority. But we didn’t get a lot of pick up from that so we decided to take a step back and say that we shouldn’t be prescribing problems to rural communities but rather let it be a very grassroots effort and allow communities to self identify things that are of importance, particularly young people in the community,” Lechtenberg said.

Lechtenberg also points out that applicants are restricted to teams of middle school and high school students. However, there is not a set limit as to how many students can participate on each team.

“Depending upon the project, the team might change or students that are interested may evolve, there’s no limit necessarily on teams. I know initially we talked about three to six students, but if it’s a project that would require more, that’s great,” Lechtenberg said.

The deadline for applications is September 19, 2014. There is also a stipulation within the initiative which states that projects must be implemented by May 1, 2015. According to Lechtenberg, this is to ensure that after the money is awarded, the project will not simply fall by the wayside but instead will continue on at a steady pace.

“We feel like in October we’ll have announced our teams and our end we’re ready to roll at least. And so we think that throughout the school year there should be some movement happening or at least have those projects implemented. Now, if it’s a long-term project that’s not going to be completed in a six to nine month time frame, that’s not a problem. But we do want to see action take place within the communities by that time,” Lechtenberg said.

Lechtenberg also stresses that the teams of students will not be left on their own to complete the project. They will have continual support from project leaders and the entities involved in creating the initiative throughout the entire process of working to solve the problem identified in their community.

“We are happy to do what we can to help make those connections or offer suggestions about best practices or resources to look at. But it’s definitely not going to be, ‘Oh, here’s the money, but that’s all we want to do with it.’ That’s not the approach we’re taking. We definitely want to serve as a resource in addition to awarding the $500 as well,” Lechtenberg said.

Though the initiative is in its first year and there are a lot of factors and potential problems that will have to be addressed as they work with it this coming year, Lechtenberg is optimistic that it will serve as a great benefit to communities who choose to take part in it.

“It’s evolving, and we’re learning as we go. But I’m really excited that [people] are interested in this project. We think it can accomplish a lot of really cool things for each community that’s a part of it,” Lechtenberg said.

Anyone interested in applying for the initiative can do so by visiting engler.unl.edu/youth-leading-through-service.

In the meantime, the KRC is looking for both youth and adult volunteers to take videos at upcoming events, and anyone interested in volunteering their time can learn more about what’s needed by contacting Shaun Evertson at 308-241-0878.