by Danielle Franck
If you’ve never canoed down the Niobrara River on a beautiful day with a bright blue sky and white puffy clouds with an eagle soaring by, it’s an amazing experience and I think the value it can offer people is absolutely incredible,” said Connie Reimers-Hild, associate executive director and “chief futurist” at the University of Nebraska Rural Futures Institute (RFI). “It’s about this global community of rural and all the value it adds to people’s lives. Also, our food, fiber, water and fuel come from rural places.”
The RFI works to bring leaders together in new and innovative ways to evolve the narrative and story of their towns, but also to aid them in getting things done in their communities and sharing the stories of what people are already doing, she said. People aim to create a full life for themselves and their families; Reimers-Hild believes that rural communities are part of the answer to that fulfillment. “Each community has its own culture and its own attitude. The RFI supports a culture of discovery and innovation from a lens of possibility and positivity. We want to help foster a great future for rural people and places.”
Rural Treasures
Reimers-Hild said living in a rural community provides camaraderie, tranquility and peacefulness for her family and that her children’s education is high quality and adds to the benefits of living in a rural community.
“Sometimes there is a negative stigma or misperception of rural areas. Our role is partly to change that conversation to one of positivity, opportunity and building a bright future,” she said.
Experiencing rural communities
Items people wear, eat and consume in everyday life often originate in rural areas. Where they come from is important and can help rural areas connect with consumers.
“When we drink our coffee in the morning, we don’t think about the fact that it comes from a rural place; maybe not here in Nebraska, but globally. We don’t always think about the importance of rural when we are sitting in a wooden chair or at a wooden dining room table enjoying our meal; everything from that experience comes from a rural place. We don’t always think about the value of rural communities when we slip into our cozy cotton pajamas at night. Cotton is grown in rural communities. We really need to reconnect people with rural communities. Our conversation doesn’t just include rural, it’s a combination of rural and urban because we know all of these communities rely on one another, especially in a global economy,” Reimers-Hild said.
Reimers-Hild’s work has demonstrated that people look for a sense of personal fulfillment and purpose. She believes that rural areas can provide a sense of fulfillment, connection and satisfaction if people choose to seek unique experiences. “If you go out to western Nebraska, you can take a drive through the Sandhills, you can go watch wildlife in the many wildlife refuges throughout Nebraska and around the nation, which you can’t do in an urban setting. Rural areas afford people unique, fulfilling and fun opportunities to get out there and explore their life from a different lens,” she said. “I think for people to really understand rural, it’s important for them to actually go there and have their own unique experience.”
Most of the RFI team is centrally located on the East Campus of UNL; however, team members also are located at the University of Nebraska at Kearney, the University of Nebraska at Omaha, and in Scottsbluff. The Rural Futures Institute has a strong presence throughout Nebraska and partners with other organizations to strengthen its reach, Reimers-Hild said. One partner is Nebraska Extension. “The Nebraska Extension faculty members help connect programs to the communities. They live there, they’re connected there, they’re the eyes and ears of the university in our communities,” she said. The partnership between Extension and the RFI has resulted in a number of successful programs, such as Marketing Hometown America. The program is a multistate effort that focuses on the positives of rural communities and the treasures they hold through a lens of opportunity, hope and change.
Looking to the Future
The Rural Futures Institute is working hard to serve Nebraska while growing its national and international presence through partnerships and technology. Reimers-Hild looks to the future on how to work with rural communities. “I’d love to see us connect more virtually. How do we engage the global audience of people that may never have worked in rural communities? Getting those minds together is really important so we look at niche areas, physical communities and also communities of purpose. The RFI is committed to engaging online stakeholders and partners in both physical and virtual communities. We want to find opportunities and solutions in this globally connected world by bringing new partners to the table.”
Connecting with people from all different backgrounds is important, she said, because great ideas can come from those not connected to rural communities. “Diversity comes from a wide range of things. It’s not just skin color, it’s gender, it’s experience, it’s age, it’s physical ability, it’s mental abilities. It is critical for us as we think about how we help move rural people and places forward in a way that they want to move, that all those groups are engaged and that people from those diverse backgrounds are engaged. The best innovation can happen from people outside the industry. It also happens when those diverse minds, those people from diverse backgrounds and cultures come together.”