Heritage Conference Successes, Part 2

The Theme of the 2009 Flint Hills Heritage Conference was:

Celebrate our Festivals!
Celebrate our Heritage!
Make the Connection!

Marci Penner, Inman, KS, Executive Director, Kansas Sampler Foundation, spoke to the conference assemblage on celebrating our heritage by celebrating our communities and festivals. She reminded us that our rural Kansas communities have a lot to celebrate.

Marci suggested that successful festival planning focuses on special attention to four groups: the audience, the volunteers, the media, and the planning committee. Each of these four groups require focused attention in order for our festival to be all it can be. In addition, each element benefits if each year, something new can be added for each element.

Following her presentation and a break, Marci moderated a panel of festival representatives. This was not a panel sitting in front of the group! Marci took the portable mike around the entire room, in four or five passes, asking the panelists to respond to a series of key questions - then asking for responses from other audience members about their festivals on the same topics. It was a highly informative, high energy, audience participation event. Neat! Most of the 90 registrants had the opportunity to take part. We each learned a number of things to take back to our local festival planning committees for consideration. Panelists represented, among others, the Hedgeball Chunkin' festival in Eureka, the Tulip Festival in Wamego, the Symphony in the Flint Hills, the Outhouse Festival in Elk Falls, and the Native Stone Festival in Alma.

See you in the Kansas Flint Hills! ;-)