CSU Extension El Paso County Latinx Community Outreach
Primary Topic:
DEI
Other Topics:
4-H & Youth, Community & Economic Development, Horticulture, Natural Resources, DEI
Internship Overview:
We are requesting an intern to help us increase our outreach to the Latinx community in El Paso County, as we are working to make progress towards our participant and advisory board parity goals, as defined by USDA-NIFA. El Paso County has approximately a 19% Hispanic/Latino population, and this percentage is growing rapidly (38% in the last 10 years). We recognize that this is not a monolithic community, and that it is comprised of American-born citizens and newer immigrants, as well as people that speak only Spanish, are bilingual, or are only English-speaking. The primary goals for this internship would be to identify key stakeholders within underserved communities, assess the barriers to participation from this population, discover what types of programs are of most interest, and determine the best ways to market our offerings. The intern will work with all of the different programmatic areas in our office to make connections in the Latinx community and recruit them to participate in our courses. The internship will require time spent in the county doing site visits and interviews and program marketing. Funds to help defray travel from CSU to El Paso County will be provided.
Goals, Scope and Objectives:
The goal of this position is to connect Colorado State University Extension in El Paso County with the Latinx population of El Paso County. During the course of the internship, the intern will meet with each programmatic area in the office (horticulture, 4-H, local foods, agriculture, family and consumer sciences and community development) to determine goals. The intern will interview individuals and groups with the Latinx community to determine barriers to participation, programs of interest, and the best avenues to market programs. For this reason, an individual with pre-existing local networks–not to mention the linguistic and cultural competencies needed to respectfully engage with El Paso’s Latinx residents–is crucial. The intern will then market aa minimum of three programs, recruit participants, and evaluate the program to ensure that participant concerns and suggestions are heard. A primary objective would be to develop a document that would identify the best ways to advertise programs to reach this audience, summarize barriers to participation, and provide recommendations for future programs. While the document will be county-specific, it may offer help to other CSU Extension programs in similar situations.
With which stakeholder group(s) will the intern work?
CSU Extension El Paso County staff
Latinx/Hispanic residents of El Paso County
Latinx/Hispanic residents of El Paso County
What student learning outcomes do you anticipate and what are the opportunities for professional development?
The intern will learn about CSU Extension by working collaboratively with Extension staff and will build connections within El Paso County. This position will afford an intern with leadership skills, community engagement, extension experience, marketing, audience analysis, especially within the context of a diverse audience. The student will build professional relationships and grow their professional network to obtain additional opportunities in the future.
