Nearly 80 participants leave for Bloomington a week from this Sunday. The discussions to be held during the visit should spark some interesting dialogue both during the event and once back in Orange County. The visit is split up into a series of Conversations with topics including: Community Branding, Economic Development, A Thriving Downtown, Student Housing, University-Community Partnerships,Innovations in Government, Community Colleges: Entrepreneurship and Workforce Development, and K-12 Education. There will also be time for one-on-one conversations with our counterparts. On the second day there will be field trips to a trail, theater, high school, museum, or art center (I hope to go visit the Bloomington Community Orchard).
The Twitter hashtag for the visit is #ICV2012. I plan to tweet during the visit (@mollsdemarco), and I imagine a number of others will as well.