With the return to a semi-normal school year, principals and teachers are allowing more community partners to come back into the classrooms, provided all school Covid-19 guidelines are followed. This has been great news for the Grayson County 4-H program as programming with fourth and fifth grades is an integral part of increasing interest in participation in 4-H programs and activities outside of school as well as 4-H Camp recruitment. The 4-H agent began reaching out to her teacher contacts in July to see about scheduling programs and received positive feedback to all inquiries that were sent. Following schools guidelines, the agent is programming in all four local elementary schools as well as the county middle school.

Working with Lawler Elementary, Wilkey Elementary and Caneyville Elementary schools 4^th grades the agent is providing hands on STEM and Ag Literacy activities such as Enviroscape, Cow Eyeball Dissections, and making butter while learning about Dairy Science. At Lawler and Caneyville Elementary schools, the agent also works with the 5^th grade classes focusing on personal development and leadership activities. An addition to this year is Clarkson 2^nd grade, focusing on STEM lessons supplementing the areas the students are working in. At Grayson County Middle School, the agent works with the Life Skills teacher each nine weeks providing Reality Store lessons to the seventh graders. Some additional one time lessons included “The Living Seed” with Caneyville 3^rd grade classes and a lesson on pumpkins with Lawler Kindergarteners.

The teachers value working with the county 4-H agent knowing the hands-on lessons and activities provided are an opportunity the youth would not receive otherwise. Statement from 4^th grade teacher: “We (the students and myself) love having 4-H back in the classroom. My students love learning real world concepts through hands-on activities and Mrs. Kindra always knocks it out of the park. My students get to experience activities that we would not normally get to do in the classroom, through the 4-H Program, such as dissecting cow eyes and owl pellets, extracting the DNA of a strawberry and even engaging in STEM activities.”

As a result of the continued programming relationship with these contacts, the 4-H agent assisted the county NEP assistant in making new teacher contacts to reach her youth numbers. The NEP assistant in discussion with the 4-H agent expressed her trouble at getting back into the schools after the Covid-19 shutdown and the change in programming by not being able to count LEAP (or preschool aged) numbers; the 4-H agent worked with her by reaching out to teacher contacts and was able to help the NEP assistant get into new classrooms in multiple schools and grades.