Educating Tomorrows Leaders Today
By Callie Curry Email
Tony Cook sat in the front of a large auditorium that was dimly lit from the warm Huntsville sun. He proudly watched children from all around Alabama partake in a trial workshop he had been planning for months. Cook was pleased to see his hard work being embraced with such excitement and wonder.
The children sat lined up beside one another, ages 9 to 14, at long wooden tables, waiting patiently and wide-eyed. They were surrounded with large grey kits that were filled with mysterious objects and materials that made noises as loud as a freight train passing by.
Volunteers passed out booklets and told the children to carefully read instructions that were given to them and then let their imagination, creativity and skills take them the rest of the way. Some of the children had never had an opportunity such as the one provided by Alabama’s 4-H that day.
The mission: to build their own working robot, rocket and a lunar machine for a make-believe space trip.
Children from poor and rural communities across Alabama do not get the same opportunities that many other children in the state receive. However, with the help of programs like Alabama’s 4-H, these children are given the chance to experience and participate in these types of educational programs, despite their financial situations.
What is 4-H?
According to Alabama’s 4-H Web site, 4-H is a “learning-by-doing education program” for children in kindergarten through the twelfth grade. “The purpose of 4-H is to foster skill development in younger people by being given the opportunity to select from a variety of programs and projects.” (http://www.aces.edu/fourh/newsite/Volunteers/docs/WhatIs4H.pdf)
Chuck Hill, a 4-H Youth Development Specialist, described Alabama’s 4-H as “One of the leading 4-H programs in the country. It provides opportunities, skills and experiences to young people, which they would not have otherwise had.
“Some of the most important things that we as adults, parents and teachers can provide to young people are experiences. Experiences broaden children’s view of the world and make them aware of the options and opportunities that are available to them,” Hill said.
“Through 4-H,” Hill added, “we make those experiences possible.”
The Benefits of 4-H on Alabama’s Youth:
Hill believes that when done right, “4-H allows young people to lead, by teaching them to become leaders; to have choices and make decisions, by teaching them to become more independent and self-reliant; to develop important skills, which they would not otherwise have developed and lastly to be a part of something larger than themselves.”
Molly Gregg, a 4-H Youth Development Specialist, stressed that there are four essential elements within the program for positive youth development, which are known as belonging, independence, generosity and mastery.
Through each member’s involvement, they have an opportunity to develop a sense of belongingness, the chance to build independence, become more generous and respectful towards others and have success in mastering whatever it is they are learning. “These four elements are advantages to our 4-Hers’ growth that many other children don’t have the chance to learn,” Gregg said.
Once a child has attained these for elements, their self esteem and self-worth is bound to increase. “We hope in the end,” Gregg said, “that children will have a new respect for themselves and a strong value for education and learning.”
Alabama’s 4-H SET For Life
The Newest Face of Alabama’s 4-H:
One might ask, what do robots and rockets have to do with 4-H, which was traditionally known for its focus of educating people about agriculture and livestock?
The answer is that the face of the organization has changed dramatically in the last 100 years.
Cook, the Science and Technology specialist for the Alabama Cooperative Extension System (ACES) of 4-H, is responsible for a good portion of 4-H’s change. He has developed one of Alabama’s newest and most exciting 4-H programs, SET For Life.
SET stands for science, engineering and technology which are the three underlying focal points of this program.
SET For Life focuses on broadening young people’s experiences by giving them the opportunity to work with things that are not normally available to them. The program is made up of three different kinds of workshops: robotics, rocketry and design solutions, which is a set of scenarios given to the children that require some type of engineering structure to solve them.
The program is so new that it is not even being implemented within the Alabama 4-H groups yet. During the first week of March of 2007, the program ran a trial camp, a 24 hour workshop held in Huntsville, Ala., to observe children’s reactions and get feedback about the program.
“Some kids came to this camp with a small interest in science and technology while others came with no interest at all,” Cook said. “But by the time they all got engaged within the activities, you could see the quick change of interests and attitude.
“That’s our approach to what we are doing here in Alabama. We are here to change children’s ideas about education and hard work. The point is, kids who work together, can do amazing things,” Cook explained.
He described his amazement in watching children, who knew nothing about rocketry and robotics prior to this workshop use their imaginations, knowledge, abilities and skills to transform these kits into a working, creative and technical product.
Cook hopes to have SET For Life ready for use in state 4-H groups by the end of the year. Counties are applying for the kits now, and once the applications are reviewed, training sessions for the lead volunteers will begin.
“We have designed these kits to where the volunteer leaders can easily become educated on how these programs work and then be able to turn around and easily run the activities themselves,” Cook said.
Alabama’s 4-H organization is continuing to flourish with specialists developing new programs, like SET For Life, to help educate Alabama’s youth. It is imperative to focus on the growth and development of young people because they are the future of tomorrow.
Four-H does just that. Specialists, such as Cook and Hill, believe it provides opportunities, skills and experiences to young people all over the nation that they would not normally have had the opportunity to experience.
4-H Depends on Volunteers
Four-H depends heavily on volunteerism in order for many of their programs to work and be successful. For example, the SET For Life workshop would not have been successful had it not been for the volunteers helping the children with the development of their kits.
According to the 4-H Volunteers Web site, the program looks for “a dynamic group of volunteers and parents working hard to ‘Make the Best Better’!” It allows volunteer leaders to get “educational training, exchange ideas and broaden communication to better serve youth, and to assist with the recruitment and utilization of volunteer leaders in the 4-H program.”
Adults of all ages spend their time by helping the 4-Hers’ development through sharing their own knowledge, skills and talents with the youngsters. Volunteers get to enjoy working with Alabama’s youth and have the satisfaction of watching a child blossom into an independent, motivated and responsible young adult.
Those who spend time volunteering within the program are the reason why 4-H has so much success today.
Four-H simply could not work without the aid of Alabama citizens reaching out and giving their time and knowledge to the youth of their communities.
It is a really easy process to become a 4-H volunteer leader, and the outcome is beneficial to you and Alabama’s youth. To access more information on how to volunteer your time to 4-H, go to 4-H’s volunteering at http://www.aces.edu/fourh/newsite/Volunteers/.
Poverty within Alabama
Many of Alabama’s citizens and families live in harsh conditions. Perhaps one of the most difficult issues related to the poverty level is the growing percentage of underprivileged children who live in the state.
The following information, from the Alabama Poverty Project’s Web site (http://www.alabamapoverty.org) paints a sad picture.
- According to the 1990 U.S. Census, approximately one-quarter of Alabama’s citizens 25 years of age or older did not graduate from high school.
- At the end of the twentieth century, Alabama ranked 47th in care for children. The National Kids Count report revealed that only three states were worse than Alabama in the conditions for children.
- In 1990, Alabama had the second highest rate of child poverty in America.
- During 1993, more Alabama children lived in poverty than the amount of students who attended college in the state (288,000 to 193,000).
- Alabama had 450,000 functionally illiterate adults in 1995, and along with that number an amazing 92,000 adults had only completed the fourth grade or less.
- In 2005, more than half the 730,000 children in Alabama public schools were eligible for free and reduced meals because of family poverty.
- Poverty rates by county in Alabama: Lowest in the state was Shelby County with the only single digit poverty rate of 6.5 percent. Black Belt counties (Perry, Wilcox and Bullock) led the state with poverty rates above thirty percent.
These numbers show that a great percentage of Alabama’s families and children are living in poverty today. It is shown in the statistics above that people who not receive a good education are much more likely to fall into poverty. As adults, if there is a way that we can help change the future of children who are stuck in poverty by educating them to become independent and leaders, we should do so.
According to the National Center for Children in Poverty, 24 percent of Alabama’s children live in poor families in 2007. http://www.nccp.org/state_detail_AL.html
There is no excuse to allow children to go on living in these types of situations when they are things that can be done to help. The first thing we can do as Alabama residents is look into ways of volunteering your time to help the state’s youth, and Alabama’s 4-H programs are a good place to start.
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Last updated May 03, 2007