IDEA Conference

Presenters: Frank Scott & Jorn Seemann

Board games offer an engaging approach to learning about history, culture, strategy, discipline, and critical thinking.  In this session, you’ll discover a game created by Whitely residents that connects different generations while celebrating the neighborhood’s rich history in an enjoyable way.

This game allows you to step into the heart of Whitely, where every street tells a story, and every corner holds a piece of history. The Whitely Way is more than a game – it’s a celebration of the people, places, and powerful moments that have shaped this vibrant community.

As you move around the board, you’ll discover historic landmarks, meet local heroes, and uncover the cultural wealth that makes Whitely a source of pride. From churches that nurture generations to businesses that build resilience, each space invites you to learn, reflect, and connect.

This game was created to honor the legacy of Whitely and inspire a deeper appreciation for its past, present, and future. But its development can be a template for other neighborhoods, businesses, even families as a fun creative way to ensure history, valuable moments, events and notable people are not only recorded and remembered but also appreciated but celebrated.

Presenter: Colby Gray

Muncie’s quality of place didn’t happen by accident, it’s the long-term result of decades of infrastructure growth, rising maintenance responsibilities, and development patterns that change slowly and compound over time. This presentation tells Muncie’s growth story through an infrastructure lens, explains why real change can’t happen overnight, and argues that this reality isn’t hopeless—it’s manageable. It closes with a practical, non-political path forward: create public dashboards and education efforts that make infrastructure tradeoffs easier to understand, require a simple “infrastructure acknowledgement” for major development decisions, archive key decisions for transparency and accountability, and invest in planning and GIS capacity that supports long-term recovery and smarter investment. 

Presenter: Brad King

The OWENA’s Social Programs Signs Project is part informational and part placemaking. The concept was to use existing NO PARKING signs posted throughout the neighborhood and post signs to their backs. These signs would be the same size as the existing signs and are made of the same aluminum material and thickness. There are two tracks of signs: one is information and the other placemaking. The informational signs have QR codes leading to Google maps showing the location of services in the city of addiction, domestic violence (phone only), health food, homelessness, and literacy. The placemaking signs have uplifting sayings and designs like “The Things that Count the Most Cannot Be Counted,” or “Kindness Costs Nothing but Means Everything.” The project was created in order to get resources to neighbors in need, place colorful uplifting art in the neighborhood, and focus on our pedestrian (and bicycling) neighbors, hence using the back of existing signs. The program was supported by Addictions Coalition of Delaware County, the Muncie Mission, Muncie Community Schools, and the City. Kim Miller of Tribune Showprint created the placemaking designs and printed all the signs. The project was a Neighborhoods USA Neighborhood Project of the Year finalist.

Presenter: Donna Browne

Are you new to grant writing? Do you want to brush up your skills? Grant Writing 101 takes you through preparing a typical grant proposal, including preparation, what information to include, developing goals and objectives, writing tips, creating a project budget, and time management. This session will demystify the grant writing process, teach essential skills to get you started, and address some commonly held misconceptions about grant seeking.

Presenters: 25-26 CenterPoint Scholars

Pull up a chair and join a relaxed, neighbor-to-neighbor conversation about what’s happening in our communities. Local stakeholders will be seated at the tables alongside participants to listen, learn, and share perspectives. This session is about understanding each other and figuring things out together.

Presenter: Jena Ashby

Feedback is everywhere—but turning it into something useful can feel like solving a mystery. In this session, we’ll walk step-by-step through the full feedback journey: how to ask the right questions, gather meaningful input, make sense of what the data is really telling you, and turn insights into a clear, actionable plan.

Participants will learn practical ways to organize and analyze feedback without getting overwhelmed, identify patterns and priorities, and decide what to do next. We’ll also cover how to close the loop—reporting results in a way that’s clear, engaging, and builds trust with your audience.

Whether you’re working with surveys, interviews, or informal feedback, you’ll leave with a simple, repeatable framework for listening better, learning faster, and turning feedback into action.

Presenter: Andrew Dale

In September 2025, a voting center plan was adopted by the Delaware County Election Board. Vote center voting is not uncommon in Indiana but is new to Muncie and Delaware County. This session will provide information that articulates how vote center voting works, locations for selected voting sites, as well as early voting locations, and highlights the measures to be taken to inform the public ahead of both the 2026 May primary and November elections.

By way of an unbiased and fact-based presentation, Andrew Dale, Chairperson of the Delaware County Democratic Party, Tim Overton, Chairperson of the Delaware County Republican Party, Linda Hanson, President of the League of Women Voters of Indiana and Rick Spangler, Delaware County Clerk, will provide insight into the process of adopting Delaware County’s vote center plan and the basics of how voters can easily access both information about vote centers and polling sites come election time.

Presenter: Theresa Mince

Connections with our neighbors provide more than just friendly faces and passing hellos; social connection creates positive impacts on our mental and physical health. Social connections are the ties that bind us to one another, to our community, and to our health. Our health suffers or thrives depending on how connected we are.

Research shows that the health impacts of loneliness are equivalent to smoking fifteen cigarettes a day, and social isolation increases the risk of early death by 29%. Social connection impacts community health, too. When there are high levels of social isolation in communities, community safety and economic prosperity decline.

In this interactive session, participants will learn more about the impact of social connections on health, ways to connect with neighbors, and how social infrastructure can improve their neighborhood’s overall health and well-being. This session is ideal for anyone interested in improving their own health and the health of their community.