Bovill, ID

You may have noticed her walking around town, peering into old buildings, and poking at shrubbery….She’s Bovill’s graduate student summer intern from the University of Idaho! Angie is a student in Bioregional Planning and also has a degree in landscape architecture. After gathering background information and meeting and talking to Bovill residents in the past few weeks, Angie has come up with many ideas for improving Bovill, which she presented at the Bovill Horizons graduation celebration on June 21st at the community center. She surveyed community members to determine what the community would like to see accomplished and which items should take priority. So far, it looks like there is a lot of interest in seeing better signage for the community and in renovating the old corner gas station into some sort of a cooperative business/community space for coffee and groceries.

Angie is also investigating the Rails to Trails program and has been networking with various regional resource providers to determine the best way to make things happen.

This internship opportunity came about because the Bovill Horizons Community Pride group saw a need and made a request to the University of Idaho Extension for a student intern.

At the Rural Schools Trust conference in Alabama this spring, Sabrina Myers and Erin Stevenson worked with rural community folks from all over the country to form the Rural Schools in Challenging Circumstances group to continue the work begun at the conference and to provide support and networking. Sabrina and Erin also helped form a subcommittee of that group, the Student Success Committee. Sabrina is chairing this subcommittee and its goal is to define what success is in rural communities (it is not necessarily the same as in urban schools) and to determine what is needed to see that success occur. The committee is made up of rural community representatives from different states, including North Carolina, South Carolina, Arkansas, and Washington D.C.

Erin and Sabrina reported what they learned to the Horizons steering committee. This conference was a great opportunity for Bovill - Let’s support Sabrina and Erin in the their continuing efforts!

Karen Eggers and the Community Pride action team came up with a great approach to community action: in their meetings, they each “pick a part” to play in the actions they want to accomplish rather than “picking apart” each other and the community.

This is a wonderful way to reinforce the importance and power of cooperative teamwork! And this also reminds us of the power of positive thinking and constructive work.

Bovill Horizons has been working to get a cell tower in Bovill.We don’t know if this will happen but we are keeping our fingers crossed. One of our State Representatives is working with us toward this goal. He has already helped Upriver and Emida get an agreement to have towers installed and has graciously agreed to help us as well. Stay tuned.

-Shirley

· Erin Stevenson, Hope Hobbs, Shirley Easterday, Sabrina Myers, and others have all taken on leadership roles for the first time as part of the Horizons program and they are learning a lot.

· Hope Hobbs was not getting anywhere for four years but now, through Horizons meetings and Horizon’s sponsored workshops, she has found out where to seek resources, how to network, and how to build her skills. She is currently learning how to create a business plan for a craft business that has been sitting on the back burner for many years. She has learned to constantly ask questions and seek solutions. Keep it up Hope!

· Bovill Horizons is helping build leadership in our community, even beyond the Horizons program. For example, Shirley Easterday has been inspired by her involvement in Horizon’s Leadership Plenty and by what she’s learned serving as a Horizons Community Builder to become involved in community government. She ran for Bovill city council (something she had never tried before!) She lost to the incumbent but got one third of the votes. Congrats for putting yourself out there Shirley!

. Sabrina Myers, who is fairly new to Horizons, recently agreed to serve as a co-chair of the steering committee. Thanks Sabrina!

· We can continue to improve the organization and structure of our efforts. Erin Stevenson has enjoyed learning leadership skills, such as getting things organized. She is learning how to organize steering committee meetings, including taking important steps such as calling the treasurer and others ahead of time to set the agenda and make sure they are ready to participate. Thanks Erin!