Recent decades have spurred dramatic demographic and economic global changes that are profoundly affecting cities and regions across the United States.  For development practitioners, this means they must have greater understanding of their region and its linkages to the surrounding areas and the Global Economy and be able to convert this knowledge into a comprehensive regional vision and strategic plan that can lead to long-term regional prosperity and competitiveness.  However, in many regions across the nation, development professionals have not fully maximized the opportunities afforded by regional solutions.  

To address this discontinuity, the U.S. Economic Development Administration partnered with Western Carolina University ’s Institute for the Economy and the Future to create the Know Your Region Project.  During the first year of the project, the Institute for the Economy and the Future worked with the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign’s Regional Economics Applications Laboratory , and The Council for Community and Economic Research  (formerly ACCRA) to develop a  curriculum that enables practitioners to understand and apply core concepts of regionalism and clustering to the strategic planning process.  During this second year of the project, the Institute for the Economy and the Future is focused on delivering the Know the Region curriculum and developing and disseminating additional resources for development practitioners across the nation.

The curricula and resources developed through this initiative provide concrete outcomes that support the Economic Development Administration ’s efforts to foster effective regional development in the Knowledge Economy and the Institute for the Economy and the Future’s efforts to promote economic, community and policy development.