2022 Baldwin Funded Projects

Advancing Tribal Cooperatives

Project Leader: 
Dan Cornelius, Outreach Program Manager, Law School

“Advancing Tribal Cooperatives” will partner with Wisconsin’s Tribes to directly support cooperative development by working with Tribal government partners to implement cooperative incorporation codes based on a draft model code. The initiative will convene Tribal partners in forming a steering committee to draft articles of incorporation and bylaws for an intertribal cooperative advancing food distribution and will provide training opportunities and develop a supply chain network to build capacity and strengthen relationships. This effort will provide a model for other opportunities in cooperative development such as health care and broader economic development.

Advancing the Water Resource Goals of the Red Cliff Environmental Department

Project Leaders:
Howard Veregin, State Cartographer, Department of Geography, College of Letters & Science
Anita Thompson, Professor, Biological Systems Engineering, College of Agricultural & Life Sciences

The Red Cliff Reservation is located on the shores of Anishinaabe Gichigami (Lake Superior). Red Cliff’s Natural Resources Comprehensive Plan (Wenji Bimaadiziyaang) identifies the objectives of the Environmental Department’s Water Resource Program (WRP) over the next decade. The Wisconsin State Cartographer’s Office, with other UW-Madison partners, seeks to develop a cooperative project with the WRP to help build its capacity to address its long-term objectives. The project will focus on assisting the WRP to augment its hydrologic Geographic Information System (GIS) database layers and apply GIS-based models to derive new data and evaluate surface water concerns. The project will build hydro-enforced digital elevation datasets, identify priority GIS data layers, create or update selected data layers, and explore GIS-based models of surface water flow and the flood vulnerability of culverts. The project will provide training and tools to WRP staff and Red Cliff community members. A key outcome of the project will be increased readiness and resilience to future climate change impacts for Red Cliff, documented through successful creation of GIS and modeling products. The WRP will also come away with the knowledge and capacity they need to continue their own work in these areas after the project period is over. Another key outcome involves developing a workflow that is cognizant of Red Cliff’s data protection requirements, to ensure that all project data and results are shared on a level that the Tribal Council is comfortable with.

Arts for Everyone, Everywhere: Interdisciplinary Arts Outreach Initiative

Project Leaders: 
Christopher Walker, Director, Division of the Arts
Heather Owens, Communications Specialist, Arts/Administration, Arts Institute, Division of the Arts 

Artists, designers, architects, performers, educators, and creative scholars are essential to solving problems and advancing civil society. They are a source of strength for our economy, annually contributing over $10 billion to the state’s GDP. Yet, our state is falling far behind in its investment in the arts. The National Assembly of State Arts Agencies ranks Wisconsin 48th in the nation in arts funding per capita. Lack of state government support negatively impacts arts programming and arts education research in schools and communities, which in turn exacerbates disparities of race, class, and access.

The Division of the Arts formally launched its “Arts for Everyone, Everywhere” initiative in September 2021, acknowledging its history of leading and promoting arts engagement involving scores of campus units and community stakeholders, and committing to broadening its reach and its accessibility even further. We will expand “Arts for Everyone, Everywhere” statewide, bringing impactful artists to underserved regions, forging new connections, and developing a model for arts engagement that will continue to expand and strengthen access to the arts as a long-term investment in our citizenry. This statewide outreach will be modeled on the highly successful and far-reaching Interdisciplinary Artist-in-Residence Program that the Division of the Arts has managed since 1999. The arts-based collaborative programming and community outreach will take place in various parts of the state with UW System campuses, K-12 schools, cultural venues, in community-based arts spaces, and in other public places.

Building and Sustaining a Food Entrepreneur Ecosystem

Project Leaders:
Barbara Ingham, Professor, Department of Food Science, College of Agricultural & Life Sciences
Lindsey Farnsworth, Outreach Program Manager, Community Development Institute, Division of Extension

The University of Wisconsin-Madison and the Division of Extension will build a food entrepreneur ecosystem that will reach small food and agricultural businesses that are increasingly seen as the backbone of local communities; spaces that will be vital for engineering and sustaining economic growth. Research has found that in Wisconsin, individuals who are Black, Indigenous, or People of Color (BIPOC) have disproportionately lower levels of business ownership and have demonstrably weaker relationships with key people and institutions in the small business development field. Using a Food Entrepreneur Ecosystem Development (FEED) approach, this program will apply knowledge from university research and development to form a training and support network that will design, implement, evaluate, and sustain food and agriculture entrepreneurs, with a focus on BIPOC communities across the state.

Project evaluation will ensure that outcomes are effective and sustainable. Knowledge and best-practice guidance from university research and development will inform training. Working with partners such as the Wisconsin Women’s Business Initiative Corporation and the Food Finance Institute, we will build a network of informed educators who can support training and provide on-going mentoring and support for thriving, local food ecosystems in all parts of the state. An ecosystem approach to entrepreneurship will: build awareness of best-business practices, increase knowledge of resources available to support business development, and support decision-making that sustains business development and improves business profitability and livelihoods.

Inclusive Tai Chi: Promoting Leaders of Color to Adapt Tai Chi for Latinx & African American Elders

Project Leaders:
Kristine Hallisy, Associate Professor, Department of Family Medicine, School of Medicine and Public Health
Betty Chewning, Professor, School of Pharmacy

Wisconsin is a leader in annual falls (1 in 4 adults) and number one in deaths from falls in older adults. As the most ethnically and racially diverse city in Wisconsin, Milwaukee’s Latinx/Hispanic and African American population struggle with falls and health disparities.

Tai Chi Prime (TCP) is a National Council on Aging certified evidence-based falls prevention program. Despite its health benefits, limited dissemination of tai chi has occurred in communities of color. We need inclusive tai chi delivered by leaders of color to meet the needs of Latinx and African American elders. We will collaborate with the Community-Academic Aging Research Network and community partners and leaders to build capacity and train peer-concordant TCP course leaders in Milwaukee’s Latinx and African American communities. Over two years, two Advisory Boards will inform this project as TCP course leaders are trained and TCP courses are implemented and evaluated for fit, feasibility and sustainability in Latinx and African American communities.

Odyssey Beyond Bars

Project Leaders:
Peter Moreno, Academic Program Director, Liberal Arts & Applied Studies, Division of Continuing Studies

Higher education in Wisconsin prisons is expanding, and the UW Odyssey Project (Odyssey) is at the forefront of the effort through its prison-based program, Odyssey Beyond Bars (OBB). Now in its 19th year, Odyssey empowers adults living in poverty to recast their futures through college jumpstart programs that integrate free credit-bearing courses in the humanities with academic advising, tutoring, success coaching, and support for over 500 program alumni. Odyssey Beyond Bars extends Odyssey’s successful jumpstart model to students incarcerated in Wisconsin prisons.

Many OBB students finish their courses with a deep desire to continue their higher education journey, but few resources to support them. Odyssey has long recognized the importance of alumni support for our community-based, non-incarcerated students and has tried to offer similar support to the alumni of our prison program, but with limited success due to lack of staffing and adequate partnerships with re-entry service providers, particularly in the Milwaukee region.

Spanish Translation of Advanced Life Support in Obstetrics (ALSO) Provider Course Material

Project Leader: 
Lee Dresang, Professor, Department of Family Medicine, School of Medicine and Public Health

The Advanced Life Support in Obstetrics (ALSO) program teaches pregnancy care providers how to manage emergencies which may arise during pregnancy, delivery, and in the postpartum period. Developed by the University of Wisconsin Department of Family Medicine and Community Health, the ALSO program has been run by the American Academy of Family Physicians (AAFP) since 1993 and has been taken by over 160,000 physicians, midwives and others in over 60 countries. A simplified Basic Life Support in Obstetrics (BLSO) course, taught since 2010, helps prepare prehospital personnel and medical students for normal deliveries and complications. The Baldwin Wisconsin Idea Project Grant will fund the professional translation of the latest edition of ALSO and BLSO, allowing the Wisconsin curriculum to continue to grow and save lives in Spanish-speaking communities around the world.

Youth-Driven Research and Evaluation for Systemic Change in K12 Schooling

Project Leaders:
Annalee Good, Scientist, Wisconsin Center for Education Research, School of Education
Shahanna McKinney-Baldon, Special Assistant for Diversity and Inclusion, Wisconsin Center for Education Research, School of Education

Our K-12 schools require change driven by those closest to the inequities and inadequacies of our current system. Yet, educational reform rarely engages the expertise and power of young people. Through the creation of a Youth Research and Evaluation (R&E) Team, we will establish an operational infrastructure that fosters youth-driven research and evaluation. The Youth R&E Team will coordinate capacity-building efforts, conduct training in youth-driven research and evaluation, and consult on studies and grant proposals at UW-Madison. This project serves youth in the two largest school districts in Wisconsin, Milwaukee and Madison, by expanding opportunities to take advanced training or coursework in research and evaluation, build their experience in a professional field and policy advocacy space, and build coalitions with other young people doing the same. With support and engagement from the Wisconsin Center for Education Research, the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction, Milwaukee and Madison school districts, and community-based organizations (Centro Hispano of Dane County, Goodman Community Center, Urban Underground, Warner Park Community Center), this project seeks to engage youth with the capacity and resources to lead change in their communities and schools.