Introducing the Voices of Rural Wisconsin Project
The Future of Farming and Rural Life Project is collecting the "Voices of Rural Wisconsin"
Citizen Engagement Opportunites

The new Voices of Rural Wisconsin online audio archive at Portal Wisconsin

Introducing the Voices of Rural Wisconsin Project
The Future of Farming and Rural Life project wants to hear your voice. We want to know what citizens value about their Wisconsin rural heritage, what they want to preserve about it, and how they are thinking about adapting to a rapidly changing present to prepare for a different future. One way we mean to capture all these sentiments-nostalgia for the past, analysis of the present, and both dreams and plans for the future-is through the Voices of Rural Wisconsin project, presented in conjunction with Portal Wisconsin.

We hope you will participate in the Voices of Rural Wisconsin project when it comes to your area. Interviewers will record samples of memories of rural life and hopes and expectations for the future. Help us remember the past as a guidepost for the future. Opportunities to participate will be scheduled at upcoming forums and on other occasions throughout the project. Please watch this Web site for announcements about interview opportunities or contact communications specialist and project coordinator Bill Berry at 715-341-9119.

The Voices of Rural Wisconsin is one of many ways you can be part of this exciting initiative to build a vision for a healthy, sustainable future, not only for Wisconsin's farms, farm families and rural communities, but for all sectors and citizens of the state. Just as the Future of Farming project relies on the broadest possible interpretation of "farming" (forest management, experimental crops, vegetables as well as livestock and cash crops, organic as well traditional, small family operations as well as large-scale agribusiness, and so on), so its definition of rural life is equally inclusive. All factors that influence the economy and quality of life in rural communities are part of the equation for building a successful and vibrant future for all of Wisconsin.

- WILDA NILSESTUEN
Project Director
Future of Farming and Rural Life in Wisconsin
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The Future of Farming and Rural Life Project is collecting the "Voices of Rural Wisconsin"
We want to trace the changes in rural life over a century of yesterdays, cast a keen eye at today's challenges and opportunities, and hear what rural residents would like to see in their dreams of tomorrow.

Would you be willing to sit down with an interviewer for a few minutes to record your thoughts on questions like these?

What changes in rural life have you observed over your own lifetime?
What concerns you the most about the trends you observe around you today?
What trends do you think are healthy for Wisconsin?
What would you change about these trends in your area?
What ideas or recommendations do you have for creating a better future for rural Wisconsin?

The Future of Farming project will be holding recording sessions around the state over the next year. We want to know what YOU think. We want to reach your neighbors. We want to hear from all ages, all perspectives, in all parts of the state. We want to know what dreams and values we share and how we might collaborate to make them happen.

Change is constant. Change is inevitable. But the direction of change is not. Concerned citizens with a common vision can collaborate to shape their future.

Forum participants can arrange to make their own voices heard by contacting Bill Berry, project communications specialist, at 715-341-9119 or billnick@charter.net. Or, see Bill at the forum you attend to volunteer or to recommend resources in your community whose voices and perspectives should be heard.

Watch for announcements of opportunities of where to connect with the Rural Voices of Wisconsin project on the Future of Farming website page at www.wisconsinacdemy.org/idea/index.html.
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Citizen Engagement Opportunites
"Do we have the will to ensure that the future of rural Wisconsin is a reflection of the best aspirations of human nature and a commitment to the building of commonwealth?"
-Stan Gruszynski

How to Connect with the Future of Farming and Rural Life Initiative…

The Future of Farming and Rural Life in Wisconsin project is sponsoring six regional forums around the state between May and October 2006. Each forum has a separate focus, a different agenda and different leaders. All are meant to contribute to the development of a vision that will lead to a healthy, sustainable future not only for Wisconsin's farms, farm families and rural communities, but for all sectors and citizens of the state.

In addition to attending the forums or the final conference in May 2007, there are many other ways to learn from or contribute to this statewide conversation. Below are examples, we invite you to also come up with your own. Local action and local leadership is the best possible first step toward raising the issues, understanding the problems, proposing and innovating solutions, and experimenting with new ideas. We encourage you to find and engage in many kinds of community discussion and action to contribute to the project and to creation of the vision. Please note that these efforts must be locally led and any costs cannot be funded out of the Future of Farming project resources. Following are some examples of entry points into this statewide collaboration.

Post your group's program, events, classes, or cultural opportunities in the Farming and Rural Life section of PortalWisconsin.Org. futureoffarming@wisconsinacademy.org.) Volunteer to sponsor/lead a field trip to a site in your region that could serve as an example/model of innovation, entrepreneurship or promising new trend (e.g., method, equipment, program or product that addresses an issue or solves a problem from which others might learn).

Engage students or youth groups in a project that will help them explore some aspect of the issues that will impact the quality and sustainability of agriculture or rural communities.

Partner with librarians in your local community to develop reading lists and discussion groups about issues that matter to your community.

React to the draft of the Future of Farming project final report (Spring 2007).

Participate in the Voices of Rural Wisconsin project when it comes to your area.

Interviewers will record samples of memories of rural life and hopes and expectations for the future. Help us remember the past as a guidepost for the future.

Create a writing or poetry contest, a performance piece or community production that deals with issues important to the future of Wisconsin's environment, changing demographics, competing land use priorities, the rural/urban interface-or any other issue of importance to you or your community in Wisconsin's changing future.

Work with teachers or youth development leaders to develop a project that illustrates the inevitability of change and the need for thoughtful and intentional management of change in every era.

Provide in-kind support to Future of Farming events, e.g.: Locally produced cheese, wine, beer, cider, or other products for forum receptions or the final conference (May 14-15, 2007, Madison).

Provide art displays, cultural opportunities, or parallel events in conjunction with one or more forums or the final conference.

Sponsor or contribute to funding the Future of Farming final conference, final report, or other project deliverables.

Complete the evaluation form you will receive after the forum and help us to improve upon this experience for future forum participants. (Form is returnable by fax, US mail, email, or from the Future of Farming Web site.

Visit often the Future of Farming Web site:

Consult the Resources section for the developing Future of Farming bibliography (sample copies at the Wisconsin Academy table). Sections of the bibliography will be posted online as they are developed. Both academic and general interests are served.

Other resources on the growing Web site will include:

Photo gallery
Announcements of coming events
Reports from each forum and final conference
Links to other sites
Information about the project and its leadership and partners
FAQs

Look to the Resources section of the Future of Farming website for ideas and background reading. For example, start your own discussion group in your community, church, club, or neighborhood on issues pertinent to sustainability, land use, rural education or health care, social justice-or any topic relevant to the concerns of the Future of Farming and Rural Life and the purpose of your group. Resources will grow over the course of the project.

Share information from this forum with others.
Encourage attendance at other forums.
Forward email announcements to colleagues.
Participate in the exhibits at future forums.
Notify Future of Farming staff about resources, opportunities, programs, or individuals that could inform or enhance the project.

futureoffarming@wisconsinacademy.org) or call 608-263-1692, ext. 12 to speak to Project Director or ext. 15 to speak to Project Coordinator).
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