Overview of Community and Economic Development Programming in Southern Land-Grant Universities

Modern budget constraints make it imperative to measure contributions made by community and economic development (CED) extension programs. As a first step, this research project surveys CED programming in continental land-grant universities associated with the Southern Rural Development Center. Comparing program information from the universities\u27 Plan of Work and extension websites, this project identified regional trends in eight CED focus areas, finding widespread emphasis on entrepreneurship, emerging interest in environmental planning and differences in specialization between smaller and larger universities. Additionally, this research found that 81.8% of universities surveyed included CED programming in their extension portfolio. This overview provided the analytical framework to highlight innovation and areas of future growth in CED programming throughout the Southern region