Award Date

1-1-2008

Degree Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Education (EdD)

Department

Educational Leadership

First Committee Member

Carl R. Steinhoff

Number of Pages

146

Abstract

As part of the Cooperative Extension System, the charge of local Extension offices is to identify priority issues and develop programming which serves the practical education needs of the community. This has been especially challenging in Clark County, Nevada, where population growth and demographics have changed significantly in recent years; The primary purpose of this investigation was to seek and discover the community concerns and the practical education expectations of a random sampling of Clark County residents. Further, public responses were compared to those of Extension faculty and staff, who were questioned regarding the same topics. Finally, the practical education needs of public respondents were studied relative to Extension programming already in place, in order to determine what areas might be added or re-focused in order to better meet the needs and wants of residents; The three issues of most concern to residents were Crime and Violence, Drug and Alcohol Abuse and Air Pollution. The data indicated a strong association between what public respondents and Extension faculty/staff see as major community concerns; The public respondents' top three practical education needs were determined to be Combating Crime, Combating Air Pollution and Water Conservation. Again, the data indicated a strong association between what public and faculty/staff respondents perceive as practical education needs; An analysis of Cooperative Extension programs in Clark County indicated that over 72% of listed programs had some relevance to the practical education topics ranked most highly by public respondents. In addition, 68% of the practical education topics deemed as very useful by questionnaire respondents are addressed, to varying degrees, by one or more Extension Programs. Of concern, however, are the six highly ranked practical education needs for which no Cooperative Extension Programming is listed. Of particular concern are Combating Crime and Combating Air Pollution, which ranked first and third among respondents' practical education needs, but which are not addressed by Extension programming.

Keywords

Citizens; Clark; Clark County; Cooperative; Cooperative Extension; County; Citizens; Education; Extension; Needs; Nevada; Practical; Practical Education

Controlled Subject

Adult education

File Format

pdf

File Size

3225.6 KB

Degree Grantor

University of Nevada, Las Vegas

Language

English

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