Category: Around IN

Engaging Decatur’s Next Generation: What Young Adults Want in a Place to Call Home

February 26, 2025 by Chrystal Pearson

Recently, Decatur, Indiana hosted an event focused on understanding what young adults—aged 18 to 24—are looking for in a place to settle down. This initiative stems from Mayor Dan Rickord’s belief that for Decatur to flourish, it must be a place where young adults want to live, work, and raise families. He feels that the […]

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Preserving Fairmount’s Historic Heart

February 7, 2025 by Chrystal Pearson

Guest blog by ECAP Ball State’s Center for Historic Preservation recently took on an exciting project in Fairmount, a small town with an outsized cultural legacy. Best known as the hometown of Hollywood icon James Dean and Garfield creator Jim Davis, Fairmount’s historic downtown tells the story of a community shaped by ambition, adaptation, and resilience. First settled in […]

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Best Kept Secret – Turnstone

March 1, 2024 by Jeff Eads

March 2024 by Jeff Eads, Director for Industry Engagement Does every town have one of those “best kept secrets”? You know, the kind of place that no one locally seems to know about but people from around the country, or even the world, travel to that town for? Well, I found one of those best […]

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Innovative Solutions – Wabash County

December 20, 2023 by Jeff Eads

December 2023 by Jeff Eads I recently had the opportunity to speak with Alex Downard, Director of Imagine One 85, about the innovative Wabash County Fellowship Program. This is one of the best examples that I have seen of pulling partners together to creatively address the talent attraction needs of a community. Specifically, their approach […]

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Narrowing the Focus on Career Exploration

December 15, 2023 by Jeff Eads

December 2023 Guest blogger: Chris Walker, Principal Muncie Central High School Remember being asked “what do you want to be when you grow up”? What resources did you have available to help truly answer this question? What experiences did you have that helped shape what you wanted to do after high school? Students at Muncie […]

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Invitation Back Home – Columbia City

November 22, 2023 by Jeff Eads

November 2023 by Jeff Eads Every community is wrestling with the same question “how do we attract and retain talent?” Finding the solution to this problem is critical to the future of Indiana communities. While there can be many factors at play in this conversation the leaders of Columbia City have had a simple but […]

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