Agricultural environmental programming in Pennsylvania: Increasing visibility and relevancy of extension

Penn State Cooperative Extension Dairy and Livestock Nutrient and Environmental Education Days (NEEDs) is a multi-disciplinary collaborative educational program for government conservation professionals working with producers. The objective of this program is to provide participants with an understanding of the links among community concerns, agricultural air and water quality impacts, changing policy, and farm-level environmental management tools. This article describes the development of the NEEDs program, evaluation results, and future program plans. As Extension's role evolves to address the educational needs of conservation professionals, evaluation results indicate the use of a multi-disciplinary approach can serve as an effective educational method.