My experience with Cooperative Extension

1. Oldham County
4H Intern

2. 
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Program funded by the USDA and Land-Grant
Universities. (University of Kentucky and
Kentucky State University)
Provides Community Based Learning
Provides resources to communities
Conduct educational programs for children,
adults and senior citizens
There is an Cooperative Extension office in
every county in Kentucky.

3. 
Cooperative Extension is the educational
resource for all Kentuckians that serves as a
catalyst to build better communities and to
improve the quality of life.

4. 
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Their mission overall is to “advance
agriculture, the environment, human health
and well-being, and communities
Cooperative Extension serves as the link
between the counties in the Commonwealth
and their surrounding land grant universities.
They help to better the lives of others
through an educational process focused on
wants and needs.

5. 
Cooperative Extension is broken into three
different components.
 1)
4H and Human Development
 2) Family Consumer Science
 3)Agriculture/Horticulture
I was chosen to be the 4H and Human Development
intern.

6. 
Youth Development Organization
 4H
is the largest Youth Development
Organization. There are more than 6 million
4Hers across the Nation.
 Their Mission is to empower children to reach
toward success and to promote positive change.

7. 
Project Days
 For
a week the children came to the office and
created Bird Houses, Basket Weaving, Sewed purses,
Gumball machines

Kids Cooking Camp
 Everyday
for a week children made a different dish
featured from a different country around the world.

Summer Camp @ Lake Cumberland
 Week
long summer camp. We stayed in cabins and
took part in activities such as obstacle courses, zip
lining, swimming, hiking, arts and crafts, and lots of
camp fires.

“Special Project” –Fashion Revue
 Children
sew their own outfits, and model them while
being judges. Whomever wins first and second place
get to enter their pieces in the State Fair

8. 
Budget Meetings
I
was able to sit in on plenty meetings regarding
funding and how Cooperative Extension works as
a business.
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Judging @ The Statewide Horse Show
 Able
to Judge my first ever horse show, to see
who would be able to show at State Fair.
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Event Judge for the County Fair
 Judged
projects at the County Fair to determine
who moves on to the State Fair.

9. 
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When I researched their Mission and Purpose,
I felt as if working for something like
Cooperative Extension has many of the same
principals that CLD has taught me while
being here. The classes that I’ve taken, and
the Leadership Development principals that
I’ve learned are things that I see
incorporated through this service.
I didn’t really chose Cooperative Extension.
It kind of chose me because of how it fits so
well with my helping personality and career
goals.

10. 
4H uses Facebook a lot for their advertising
and upcoming events.
 If
you look up the Oldham County Facebook
page, parents are able to see the calendar of
upcoming events.
 They are also able to view pictures of what their
children are doing during their time in 4H.

11. 
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It would be helpful if 4H used other forms of
media.
New media forms such as Twitter could be
helpful in reaching out and recruiting older
members.
For the most part parents whom have
children in 4H are very involved. Most of the
communication happens to the parent rather
than directly to the child until they are
older. Since ages range 6-18. Marketing 4H to
younger age groups can be challenging.

12. 
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I think Facebook does its job as it pertains to
keeping parents updated involving the
different activities that their children are
involved in.
The fact that Facebook allows parents to
actually see what their children are doing,
may be somewhat fulfilling for parents as
well, especially during camp when their
children are away for almost a week.

13. 
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Since there are a lot of older agents that
work for 4H, they are not always “hip” to the
latest technology trends.
The problem is not refusing to add a new
media element, the problem is more due to
lack of education surrounding new media.
With counties beginning to hire younger
agents, and a lot of agents retiring, we may
see more new media incorporated with 4H.

14. 
http://oldham.ca.uky.edu/