Turning the Tide on Poverty: The role of the Cooperative Extension Service in the initiative

Turning the Tide on Poverty: Community champions as critical elements of success in economically distressed communities

“…During data collection, immediately before and after a Tide project, community participants were not asked broadly whether Tide had a champion. Instead, participants were asked explicitly to give feedback on the role of Extension professionals during the Tide project (see also Welborn et al, 2016). Most comments about project leadership focused on Extension professionals while also including comments about emergent leaders in the community.…”

“…This speaks to the benefits of an Extension presence in support of Tide programming. Welborn et al (2016) concluded that the Tide approach could be adapted to address many different community issues CES professionals face. In other cases, the champion was an elected official, for example a mayor, taking advantage of an opportunity to be involved in community engagement.…”