Editor's Page

Dear Reader,

Evaluation and impact are "hot buttons" in today's Extension world and this issue of your Journal of Extension certainly reflects that.

From New Jersey comes an article dealing with money management programs and how to show the impact such programs are having. By the way, the author, Barbara O'Neill, and her colleagues will receive an Epsilon Sigma Phi team award at the 1998 conference for their work in this area.

From Ohio comes some suggestions about how to deal with the open-ended questions included in many surveys.

Several other articles fall somewhere between evaluation and program planning, such as the piece from Utah about targeting Extension efforts for adopting sustainable farming practices, or the one from Iowa about developing educational programs for beginning farmers.

Program planning is probably a better category for another article from Ohio that urges Extension professionals to take a leaf from the private sector in evaluating new educational programs, or the article from New Jersey about using the forum- discussion method in developing program priorities.

Parent education is the focus of two articles. North Carolina shares information about how to get parents involved, while Montana offers a slightly different take. They have been working with adults who serve as "significant others" in the lives of young people.

Persons working with Master Gardener programs should be interested in the article from Virginia. It focuses on Master Gardeners serving as resources to classroom teachers.

Of course, there are other articles of interest to 4-H youth development professionals, about using electronic media to deliver information, and about working with volunteers, among other topics.

Enjoy and learn!

Len Calvert, editor