The purpose of this paper is to provide an alternative operationalization of amenities that does not privilege certain kinds of natural resources and climatic conditions and that can be used for assessing the quality of life in small towns. The amenity inventory presented here extends previous literature by including a broad range of amenities…

The Uniontown, Alabama Community Health Project trained and facilitated Community Health Advisors (CHAs) in conducting a theory-based intervention designed to reduce the risk for cardiovascular disease (CVD) among rural African-American women. The multiphased project included formative evaluation and community organization, CHA recruitment and…

Including youth in the evaluation process can enhance the quality of the inquiry and be empowering for the participants, but it is not without challenges. In this article, several principles for youth-involved research and evaluation are outlined. These come from those who are pioneering this approach and from current research on the dilemmas of…

Describes the evaluation training method developed by the San Francisco, California Youth in Focus program and presents three case studies illustrating this organization's approach to bringing youth and community development together. (SLD)

Describes how the All Stars Talent Network, a youth development program, transformed a pilot donor-acquisition project into a combined site visit and evaluation that engaged youth participants, donors, and adult volunteers in a unique community-building partnership. (SLD)

In 2000, a study entitled "Youth in Decision-Making: A Study on the Impacts of Youth on Adults and Organizations," examined organizations that actively involved youth in decision making roles and found that adults and organizations had experienced significant positive changes as a result. Building on focus groups and interviews conducted…

Presents community development as a strategy for achieving goals of prevention in small communities in Appalachia. Emphasizes the organization of social structures and collective efforts in problem and enhancing levels of physical and mental health in these vulnerable communities. (Author)

Presents a case study of participatory evaluation which suggests an evaluation method which not only provides meaningful data for decision makers but also provides important feedback to the community. Shows the steps leading to self-evaluation workshops and reviews the evaluation methods that were utilized. (Author/CT)

"International Programming Issues for Extension Education" (Rosson, Sanders) describes a survey of extension personnel identifying global competition and agriculture as a key issue. "Expanding Our Horizons Internationally" (Richardson, Woods) discusses North Carolina Extension's staff development on global issues. In…

Nineteen Wisconsin counties were the site of the four-year Rural Development Demonstration Project, one of five such projects in the nation. Among the project's objectives were to accelerate sound economic, social, cultural and environmental development and to provide alternatives for living in non-metropolitan areas while providing greater…

Within a program of training system evaluation, optimal training system development cannot occur without evaluation development, and evaluation cannot be very effective in the absence of an optimal approach to training system development. Therefore, the goal of the Community Affairs Training Evaluation (CATE) project was to develop a set of…