Rising poverty, shrinking economic opportunities, disengaged citizens and contentious public discourse, and racial inequality have become some of the greatest challenges communities are confronting. In efforts to maximize participation in addressing these issues, universities, community organizations, corporations, local government entities, and foundations are, independently or collaboratively, devoting resources to develop local leadership capacities. This chapter examines these community leadership development efforts and details two cooperative extension programs in a Midwestern US state. Through analysis of these case examples, the chapter offers a vision for how to reimagine community leadership programs so that they are more responsive to the complexity of current and emergent community challenges. An argument is made that US university extension services, because of their strong ties to local communities and networks nationwide, are well placed to support community leadership development that promotes community-identified strategies to address a wide range of local issues among diverse stakeholders. Insights from this chapter can inform future research and influence the design and implementation of community leadership development programs around the world.

Drug discovery and development is a long and arduous process and is particularly challenging for Alzheimer’s disease given the incomplete understanding of molecular mechanisms, variability in clinical presentation, relatively slow disease progression, and heterogeneous patient population. The lack of predictive preclinical models combined with the long and expensive clinical trials raise additional barriers to therapeutic development. Tens of thousands of academic publications identify potential biomarkers, molecular mechanisms, preclinical models, and interventions, yet very few have led to industry-sponsored drug development programs. In this chapter, we will describe one academic program’s approach to bridging the “valley of death.” The Stanford University SPARK Program helps academics advance their projects through the applied science stage of development, reducing the risk to potential industry partners. SPARK uses simple and easily replicated principles to ensure that more academic discoveries find their way to impact patients and to benefit society. Approximately 60% of SPARK projects advance to industry partnerships or directly into university-sponsored clinical trials.