Plan the work. Work the plan.
That’s something that’s stuck with me since I joined Nebraska Extension in 2014. Not surprisingly, my disaster education focus requires me to adopt planning and preparedness as approaches to my work. It’s a critical part of the emergency management cycle, and notably the first one on which most people focus: preparedness, response, recovery, and mitigation.
But our roles in Extension also require us to be actively engaged in strategizing, executing, and managing processes daily. As Extension professionals, we’re constantly leaning into planning and preparedness practices to provide our learners and target audiences with really great experiences. And while many of us aren’t trained in emergency management or have experiences managing incidents, we do have experiences in being responsive to stakeholders’ needs, anticipating new and emerging issues, and convening partners to help Nebraskans live better. As Extension professionals, planning and preparedness come natural to us.
So as we resurrect our Flood Response newsletter for 2020, I’m proud to share that our Extension Disaster Team and I are “planning the work, and working the plan.” Early last fall, we identified priorities related to our organization’s statewide role in recovery and how we can strengthen our internal operations. We want to keep you informed about these processes, and one way we’re doing that is sharing this newsletter.
This year’s first edition is full of useful information – our state’s recovery update, upcoming trainings, a journal article, website resources, and more. In March, we’ll move to publishing our newsletter on the first Tuesday of the month. Our goal is to maintain intentional communication across our organization in the area of disaster education.
So here’s to being intentional in our work – to planning the work, and working the plan.
Until next time,
Ashley
Ashley Mueller
Extension Educator, Disaster Education Coordinator
ashley.mueller@unl.edu