Annual Institutes Draw Participants to Jackson Hole, Wyoming

The Heartland Center’s two annual spring training institutes drew participants from 14 states to Jackson Hole, Wyoming, this spring. Skill-Building for Stronger Communities, an advanced program for community leaders and community developers, focuses attention on cases that participants bring from their work back home. Heartland Center Co-Director Vicki Luther and Trainer Leon Sharpe led the institute, which was first held in 1997 with support from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation. Joseph Luther led a one-day workshop on sustainable development, creating a working definition of sustainability applied to their own community work.

A new institute, Strengthening the Rural-Urban Connection, was offered this year for the first time. Led by Heartland Center Co-Director Milan Wall, the institute focuses on issues found in common in rural and urban communities and strategies to strengthen rural-urban connections. It was developed with support from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation and the William Randolph Hearst Foundation.

A third institute, Helping Small Towns Succeed, has been held each fall since 1992. It was also developed with W.K. Kellogg Foundation support. It will be held next October 24-28. Skill-Building for Stronger Communities is scheduled for May 14-17, 2003. Strengthening the Rural-Urban Connection will be held May 18-19, 2003. All three are offered at Snow King Resort in the town of Jackson, Wyoming.

For more information on these programs
go to our web page:
www.heartlandcenter.info/jhsite/jh_home.html.