Communicating on the Capitol

The past few days, I had the opportunity to travel to Washington, D.C. for my internship with Ohio Farm Bureau. This trip is for farm bureau county presidents to learn about agricultural policy and interact with legislatures and organizational leaders at the Capitol. The idea of sharing a personal agricultural story was a primary message shared throughout the sessions. But the fact is, there is more work to be done than just sharing a simple story. We must act upon our communication efforts and then we can truly see the impact we can make for our causes.

I met with Congressman Bob Latta from my congressional district to discuss current topics relating to agricultural policy like a new farm bill, energy expansion, water regulations and more. What was most beneficial about this visit was the fact that since he is from my area of the state, all of these issues directly related to him and his family at home.

One of the key points Latta made was that it is not merely up to him to communicate our thoughts, but for us to get in touch with other organizations and governmental leaders to ensure our voice will be heard.

I think Latta does a great job of connecting with people in his district besides frequently traveling back home. He is very active on his Twitter and commented during our meeting that he "must travel and connect with the people who put him in office to do his job right". The county presidents and I enjoyed interacting with Latta and he encouraged us to reach out so he could visit their farms and stay connected with the local communities.

In addition to our congressional visits, participants had the opportunity to hear from different speakers at the Food and Drug Administration, United States Department of Agriculture, and more congressional speakers like Speaker John Boehner, congressmen Paul Ryan, Sherrod Brown and Rob Portman, as well as other legislative leaders from Ohio. From this trip, I was able to learn more about my interests in policy making and potential job opportunities that await me in DC. Learning how to communicate on the Capitol has been an exciting experience that I am eager to share with others. So now, it is your turn.

What is stopping you from communicating with your congressional leaders to turn your messages into actions? How do you think policy makers can enhance their understanding and use of communication to make a greater impact for our country?

Advocating at Ag Day at the Capital

This spring, I am interning with Ohio Farm Bureau in their public policy department. For this position, I have been able to focus on some event planning projects in the area of agricultural policy.

On Tuesday, we hosted our first event of the year, Ag Day at the Capital. Ag Day at the Capital is an annual event that focuses on bringing farm bureau members to Columbus to learn about updates in policy and regulations that relate to the agricultural industry. These agriculturalists have the opportunity to meet with legislatures during a luncheon and also schedule individual meetings with their congressional districts to discuss pertinent policy topics for their local areas.

I assisted with the pre-event planning and logistics and worked with legislatures and farm bureau employees to help the event come together. During the day, I had a few minor responsibilities like assisting with check-in and seating legislatures in the Statehouse atrium for a luncheon. Because I did not have many ‘big’ tasks, I was able to do one thing I love: tweet.

Twitter has become one of my main resources of information and favorite ways to communicate with people! Not only does it allow me to enhance my creativity by stopping me from using over 140 characters, but I can also follow events and people in a timely way.

For Ag Day, Ohio Farm Bureau created a Storify account to piece together all of the details from the event in a fun, technological way. This helped guests and others who were unable to attend see some of the event from a unique perspective. To the right is the Storify story that was created for Ag Day.

You can visit the farm bureau Storify and see more tweets and posts from Ag Day.

I think the use of a Storify was a very innovative action for farm bureau to take. Not only is it unique, but also it is an easy way to piece together all of the thoughts and activities that were shared during Ag Day. If other companies and organizations begin to implement the use of platforms like Storify, it could help them standout in the public relations realm.

How do you think farm bureau did in their PR for Ag Day? What are your thoughts on Storify and other similar technologies?