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Making A Difference in Our County

University of Georgia Cooperative Extension is working hard for its constituents. The following are examples of Extension’s impact in the county over the past year.

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4-H YOUTH IMPACT

Summary
The Gordon County 4-H Homeschool Club program was supported by the 4-H agent with a focus on emergency preparedness with monthly field trips to public safety organizations for all enrolled homeschooled youth and their families, as well as an intensive training in the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s Community Emergency Response Team training for middle and high school homeschooled youth and their families. The homeschool club has nearly tripled in enrollment and the focus on emergency preparedness is an important one in service to the community.

Situation
The Gordon County 4-H Homeschool Club has been active in the Gordon County 4-H program for over a decade. Because Gordon County 4-H has in-school programs for public-school youth, they also offered a community club for youth who are homeschooled. The goal of the program is to offer an educational club setting tailored to homeschooled youth, open to K-12th graders, providing a time, space, and structure for homeschooled families across the community to meet together and engage in educational and recreational activities. In the seven previous years, the number of enrolled 4-H’ers that were homeschooled ranged from 33-46, with an average of 38 each year. In the past two years, following the COVID-19 pandemic, the 4-H homeschool club numbers have nearly tripled with 97 youth enrolled in 2021-2022 year and 107 enrolled in the 2022-2023 year.

In a separate vein, according to the National Weather Service, 40 severe weather events have occurred across North and Central Georgia in the past 5 years. These events range from tornadoes, winter weather, hurricanes, flooding, and thunderstorms. Of these, about half have directly affected Gordon and surrounding counties. In the last year, Gordon County Fire and Rescue responded to over 3400 calls, including fires, medical needs, and motor vehicle accidents. From severe weather to fire to medical situations, emergencies can occur at any time, and youth and families need to be prepared to respond to those emergencies until help arrives.

Response
With the rapid increase in demand of programming for homeschooled youth, the Gordon County 4-H agent conducted an evaluation of the currently enrolled families in the 2021-2022 program year. Fifteen families responded, representing roughly 33-50% of the youth in the homeschool program. Common responses included that they liked having a theme for the year, social interaction with the whole family and with other families was important, they preferred field trips for the learning experiences, and making community connections with experts in the field was a priority. Parents also asked for opportunities for youth to be separated based on age for additional opportunities, and meeting more frequently than once a month. Based on the evaluation and community need, the Gordon County 4-H agent created a homeschool club program prioritizing these items.

The theme for the 2022-2023 year was Emergency Preparedness. Monthly, all homeschooled 4-H’ers and their families were invited to attend a field trip to a local entity that deals with emergency preparedness. Field trips included the Gordon County Fire Department, North Georgia Electric Membership Cooperative, Gordon County E-911 Center, American Red Cross, Advent Health Gordon Emergency Medical Services, and the Gordon County Emergency Management Agency Mobile Command Unit.

Middle and high school homeschooled students make up nearly half of the youth in the homeschool program. As the year began, the Gordon County 4-H Agent held a separate meeting of these older youth to allow them a voice in deciding in what educational programming they would like to engage. These students were vocal in that they enjoyed the field trips, but they did want separate programs for themselves without the “little kids.” To address this need, the middle and high school youth had an additional program offering for them, receiving the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) training through a joint collaboration with Gordon County Fire and Rescue, Gordon County Emergency Management Agency, and Calhoun Fire Department. The Gordon County Fire Chief and the Gordon County Fire – Training Chief are both 4-H screened and certified volunteers, and have implemented the My Preparedness Initiative program with 4-H’ers before, and agreed to host a teen Community Emergency Response Team training specifically for our homeschooled families. Parents were encouraged to take the class alongside their child(ren), so the class consisted of twenty youth and six adults. Participants completed the CERT training and corresponding modules focusing on Disaster Preparedness, Fire Safety and Utility Control, Disaster Medical Operations, Light Search and Rescue, CERT Organization, Disaster Psychology, and Terrorism and CERT, and engaged in a full disaster simulation as the course’s capstone session. ?

The 4-H agent created the program based on all of the feedback provided by homeschool families: the program had a theme for the year, the whole family was able to participate in field trips and make community connections, the older youth had a separate additional program just for them, providing the opportunity for those youth to meet more than once a month. By being responsive to the homeschooled youth’s needs, Gordon County 4-H has continued to see high numbers of homeschooled youth involved in the program, and the monthly club meetings see an average of 35 youth and adult participants. In addition, interest in the homeschool program continues to grow, with additional inquiries into the program coming every week, even from outside of the county, with four additional counties currently being represented in the Gordon County 4-H homeschool group.

Impact
Youth participating in the homeschool program are becoming more engaged in other 4-H programs as well, with 20% of the youth participating in 4-H Project Achievement being homeschooled, one serving on district board, three on the county council officer team, and many more on county shooting sports and judging teams, as well as 57% of the Cloverbuds program.

At each homeschool club field trip, the enrolled 4-H youth (any K-12th grader) as well as at least one parent/guardian attend the program. Youth numbers are between 22 and 29 per meeting, with typically at least ten adults in attendance as well. These families are able to see the “behind the scenes” workings of the community organizations, and receive hands-on and “eyes-on” experience and get to ask all the questions they want to learn about how to be prepared for emergencies. Youth attending the field trips are receiving significant exposure to community organizations and career fields, particularly in public safety this year, increasing their understanding of leadership roles in these organizations.

Completion of the CERT training enables youth and adults to respond proficiently to local disasters, taking appropriate actions to protect themselves and their families and neighbors until professional emergency services arrive. Twenty-six youth and adult volunteers received the training and are now certified as Gordon County CERT team members, available for deployment by Gordon County Fire and Rescue as needed. Additionally, the benefit of the CERT class is more than just what the youth and families receive. Youth are better prepared, as well as their families, but it also helps with community readiness, and, because these youth and families are trained as emergency preparedness leaders, they can assist in community response to disasters. As Nathan Saylors, Gordon County Fire and Rescue Chief of Training?stated: “I am good with as many as we can get into the class. The more people we can get trained the better off that we [Gordon County] are.”

Agricultural Impact