Strawman/Papers

DRAFT 11/17/99

IMPLEMENTATION PLAN

Based on the Nine Recommendations from the First External Review of the Northeastern Multistate Research Portfolio

The Northeastern Regional Association of State Agricultural Experiment Station Directors (NERA), in collaboration with the Partnership Office of the Cooperative State Research, Education, and Extension Service (CSREES) of the USDA, engaged in an external review of the region's multistate research portfolio in September 1999. The final report of the panel (with their terms of reference and the panel's membership) can be found at:

http://www.agnr.umd.edu/users/nera/workroom/strawman/NERAReview.cfm

The panel confined its evaluations to the terms of reference provided, and focused its attention on programmatic issues, rather than on individual projects that make up the portfolio. Nine recommendations were listed in the Executive Summary by the panel. This Implementation Plan directly addresses those nine recommendations with a statement of planned activities that are each intended to address the points made by the panel.

  1. Stakeholder listening: the panel recommended revisiting earlier admonitions to base stakeholder listening activities at the state level, giving more thought to regionally-organized stakeholder listening for multistate research program management. The Chair of NERA will, by January 1, 2000, form a task force of NE directors and survey specialists to explore, inter alia, the following options, and make a recommendation to the NERA membership at its March 2000 meeting on:
    • a standardized process for state-based stakeholder listening designed to permit the aggregation of information across our political boundaries;
    • a regionally based stakeholder listening process that allows decomposition of information into state-based information (e.g., phone surveys); and,
    • any alternative sources of stakeholder information that may be suitable for use by the region in determining stakeholder needs with a regional perspective.
  2. System dynamics: the panel recommended that strong consideration be given to the successful integration of teaching, research, and extension activities as a strategy for success, by building on opportunities for fulfillment of the Land-Grant University’s fundamental paradigm of functional integration. The NERA Office of the Executive Director (OED) will be requested by the Chair of NERA to prepare a Staffing Plan for consideration of the NERA Executive Committee. The intention of the Staffing Plan will be primarily to allow more staff support for attending to the needs of all of the regional sections that are, or potentially could be, functional partners in NERA-supported activities. This Staffing Plan should have an associated budget, and shall be made available to the NERA Executive Committee by January 1, 2000. Subsequently, attention to the Plan (revised with input from the Executive Committee) will be given by the entire NERA membership at the March 2000 NERA meeting.
  3. Communications plan: the panel recommended that NERA consider developing and adopting a strategic communications plan that would address three broad constituencies: users, customers, and patrons. The Chair of NERA will instruct the NERA Executive Director to include in the OED's current strategic planning process a component on communicating with stakeholders. The Chair will suggest that the ED give consideration to direct liaison with Northeast Council for Agricultural Research, Extension, and Teaching (NE CARET) members, and the use of contemporary communications technologies (e.g., WWW, video, CD-ROM). The Chair will also suggest that links with the newly created Experiment Station Committee on Organization and Policy (ESCOP) Core Committee on Marketing and Advocacy would be an ideal strategic partner for collaboration on this item. This too should be built into the OED's Strategic Plan, as it relates to constituent communication and public relations.
  4. Project approval processes: the panel recommended reengineering the project approval processes to reduce the time required from the present two years to three months, and more frequent use of the Series 500 authority. The Chair of NERA will instruct the OED to include in the proposed NE Multistate Research Manual procedures for rapid approval of projects, including emergency responses. The first phase of this change over has been agreed to by CSREES' leadership (done in Memphis, in September 1999). In effect, the approval of multistate research projects is soon to be delegated to the regional associations; a great first step in implementing this recommendation. The regional manual drafting must await the development of the National Multistate Research Manual (underway) and the formal delegation of authorities and responsibilities to the State Agricultural Experiment Station (SAES) directors by the Secretary of Agriculture (now drafted). In turn, the SAES directors must collectively agree to share decision making through their regional association. This process is, hopefully, going to be completed by the March 2000 NERA meeting.
  5. Role of participants: the panel recommended better definition of responsibilities of the participants in multistate research projects, supplemented with training and educational efforts. The Chair of NERA will request the ED to prepare a training video (15 to 30 minutes) on the purposes and expectations of the Multistate Research Program. The video will need to build on the 1998 AREERA requirements, and should include interviews with CSREES and SAES leaders. The video's distribution will be targeted for July 2000.
  6. Priority setting: the panel recommended implementation of the NERA document on criteria for setting regional priorities, perhaps through inclusion of statements on the four criteria in future project outlines. The four criteria on the "Rossi Report " on priority setting (i.e., importance of the issue; stakeholder need; technical feasibility; and likely impacts) are being incorporated into the revised project outline that will be found in the National Multistate Research Manual. The proposed strategy will be to use these four criteria as an optional prescreen for proposed research topics. For fast tracking, the four criteria would be imbedded in the project outline. For topics approved through prescreening, the authors would be requested to add the same information in the appropriate section of the full project outline, thereby not losing this important rationale.
  7. Exit strategies: the panel recommended establishing a policy that no project be allowed to be renewed; and, as a corollary, all projects receive approval for an amount of time appropriate to complete its objectives; and additionally, that all projects be held to the high standard of having focused objectives with well defined outputs, outcomes and milestones. The Chair of NERA will instruct the ED to be sure that these provisions (i.e., no renewals; appropriate duration; focused objectives; well defined outputs, outcomes, and milestones) are incorporated in the supplemental NE Multistate Research Manual, if it is not found in the national Multistate Research Manual. One remaining question is on the authority to allow projects of greater than 5 years duration. CSREES is currently exploring this question with legal council at the USDA.
  8. Current portfolio assessment: the panel recommended that a close look be given by the NERA Regional Research Committee to the apparent redundancy of some projects; and it recommended, as related to NE-009, that CSREES be asked to study comprehensively the management of all germplasm resources, with a view to establishing a National Research Support Project (NRSP) for germplasm management. The Chair of NERA will assign this task to the Regional Research Committee for their oversight, with the assistance of the OED. However, already there has been progress on this recommendation. One multistate project in poultry science has been identified for combining with a similar project in the North Central Region (William Saylor, personal communication on 11/16/99). Additionally, Dr. Will Blackburn (USDA/ARS) has agreed to host a meeting to develop a comprehensive national strategy for efforts in germplasm, in partnership with his agency. Dr. Blackburn is Area Director for the Great Plains, and is administratively responsible for the National Seed Storage Facility in Ft. Collins, CO. No date or agenda has been set at this time, but when developed, it will be with the concurrence of the NERA leadership and perhaps the ESCOP Core Committee on Science and Technology (through its Subcommittee on Germplasm).
  9. Follow-up: the panel recommended that NERA commit to the development of a plan to implement appropriate recommendations found in this report; and schedule an accomplishments report for the panel at some interval in the future.

Once approved by the NERA Executive Committee, this Implementation Plan will shared with the External Review Panel members for their comments and suggestions. In addition, semiannual progress reports will be prepared by the OED, to be shared with the Panel in July 2000 and December 2000, at which time it is anticipated that all of the above recommendations will have been implemented.