Our Impact
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.
Agriculture and Natural Resources
Agriculture pays approximately a quarter of Ben Hill County’s tax base, making it a significant contributor to all services produced for its citizens. Ben Hill County is proud of its agricultural strength, diversity, and history of excellent producers.
University of Georgia Extension extends lifelong learning through unbiased, research-based education, helping producers maximize profits and production while being good stewards of land and the environment. Production meetings are a major resource for agricultural programming in Ben Hill County. Through commodity-specific production meetings, producers learn about new technologies and recommendations for the coming year.
Ben Hill ANR conducted educational sessions and updates for youth and adults alike. Ben Hill Extension was able to host and present 12 adult educational programs reaching over 720 participants with topics such as agronomics, economics, diseases, insects, weeds, and precision applications for major row crops, as well as nutrition, parasite control, and forage management for beef cattle.
4-H Youth Development
Belonging: Building Relationships Through 4-H Summer Programming?
Summary:?Ben Hill County 4-H implemented a diverse plan for summer programming during summer 2024. Activities were crafted with a focus on developing a sense of belonging among youth. Summer programs are an ideal time to focus on relationship building between peers, youth and adults, and youth and their communities.?
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Donlan, Lynch, and Lerner (2015) explain that positive relationships among youth is vital to their development. Youth crave time with others, and how that time is spent can greatly impact their lives. From January 2024 to May 2024, Ben Hill County Police Department reported 65 incidents of gunshot violence, most associated with gang activity. Gang members are being identified as young as high school students in this community. However, Carl Taylor (2003) argues that youth gangs can form for nonviolent reasons such as mutual protection in dangerous or challenging living situations. The 4-H Thriving Model shows that 4-H offers youth a place to gather as a group of peers and work on goal setting, having a growth mindset, hopeful purpose, and more (Arnold, 2018). These skills learned from positive adult leaders can lead to positive academic attitudes, personal responsibility, and contribution to their community (Arnold, 2018).?
To provide a positive atmosphere for youth, Ben Hill 4-H implemented a diverse plan for summer programming. The plan was developed to meet multiple age groups, expose youth to out of county activities, and foster positive relationships with adult mentors. Youth activities included on a county level: Sewing Exploration Club, Junior Social, and Land Judging, multicounty level: Georgia 4-H Certified Teen Leader training, a Farm to Fork field trip that focused on? blueberry production and cooking, Georgia National Fair preparation workshops, 4-H Night at the Macon Bacon game, Under the Sea Summer Day Camp, and 4-H2O, and state level: 4-H Summer Camp a week-long residential experience for elementary, middle and high school students. High school students also participated in State 4-H Congress and State 4-H Council.?
Among the 14 summer programs offered, 72 youth were directly impacted from 4th to 12th grade. Multiple youth attended more than one activity resulting in 147 connections throughout the summer. Ben Hill County 4-H collaborated with Irwin and Wilcox County 4-H programs for the Farm to Fork blueberry field day, and with Irwin County 4-H on all multicounty activities. Youth learned healthy living skills, agricultural knowledge, life skills, and teamwork. They made new friends, formed positive relationships with adult leaders, teen leaders, and camp counselors. When asked about the impact summer 2024 programming had on one family, a 4-H parent explain that her 4-H’er asks to return for programs because: “he wants to do 4-H until he graduates and wants to be a teen leader and camp counselor one day, they teach him so many new things and he likes learning the things they teach because it’s fun, he enjoys getting to travel to new places and see new things.” The parent also stated that she encourages her son to stay involved in 4-H because “it keeps him active and off of games and television, and he makes lots of new friends from all around us.” Through purposeful summer programming, Ben Hill County 4-H was able to provide positive alternatives for youth thereby reducing the opportunity and desire to engage in risky behaviors such as violence.