COVID has necessitated that the way we teach or offer educational opportunities changes to meet the needs of safety and to continue our mission of education and outreach.   As a criterion for receiving funding from the Nelson County Agriculture Development Council through the County Agriculture Improvement Program (CAIP), individuals must attain a least one hour of continuing education.  Traditionally this has been accomplished by holding face to face meetings throughout the fall of the year that would qualify for this need.  In 2020 as the program continued to fund farms on a cost-share basis the education requirement remained and creative ways needed to emerge in order to educate in a safe but informative manner.  

In Nelson County, we decided to approach this in a way that we could not only teach, but learn from our students as well.  The nearly 80 participants in the CAIP program were sent a correspondence that informed them on how we would proceed with the educational component of their grant requirements. The group was sent a letter and an email with a list and links to videos from UK specialists on a variety of topics.  (The UK Forages YouTube page alone has more than 300 videos from which to choose.) They were informed that they needed to choose something that would pertain and help with their operations and enjoy at least an hour of education.  At the same time, they were provided a link to a Qualtrics survey that they would fill out after watching their chosen video.  The survey asked:

• What is your name, address, and email?
• What video(s) did you view?
• What are two things you learned from the Video(s) you chose?  
• Identify on practice you will implement as a result of the program you viewed.  
• What would you like to learn more about in the future?

Once they completed the survey we automatically filled out the required form with their answers and sent them electronically to the sponsoring agency (Nelson County Soil Conservation District).  Once this was completed they could collect their money.   

To date, 43 individuals have responded to the survey and provided insight into what they learned, what they plan to implement, and what they would like to learn more about in the future.  Twenty-two unique videos were viewed with Beef Bash 2020 and Winter Feeding being clear favorites.  Many respondents indicated that they didn’t quit watching after their requirement was complete and appreciated the volume of programs available and would continue to investigate.    We plan to continue in this line by customizing a playlist for each individual based on what they would like to learn more about and email this to them.