The Department of Natural Resources is deeply committed to extension education on natural resources and environmental management topics for youth and adults, as well as outreach to policy decision makers and natural resource/environmental management professionals. Several of our extension education programs involve learners living across the state, from inner city communities to the most remote rural communities of northern New York, but other programs extend across North America. Extension and outreach efforts launched from our department also engage communities around the globe, from sub-Saharan Africa to China.
Our extension/outreach program is among the more innovative nationally for the following reasons:
- we work in both rural, natural‐resource dependent communities as well as in cities and other heavily human‐dominated social‐ecological systems
- we collaborate with our traditional county Cooperative Extension offices as well as with stakeholder organizations; local, state and federal government agencies; nongovernmental organizations; and international bodies (such as UNESCO) that share our mission of natural resource and environmental conservation and sustainability
- we work across disciplines in developing and delivering programs
- in addition to conducting conventional extension program evaluations, we collaborate with social scientists to conduct research on program approaches and outcomes, and in so doing test program models and social sciences theory and thus contribute to a larger body of scholarship.
For more information about the many extension education programs and educational resource materials available from the Department of Natural Resources, visit the links on the left hand navigation or go to the DNR CCE Homepage.