Henderson County 4-H restarted their shooting sports program in the spring of 2015 with one coach and just a handful of youth.  Kentucky 4-H is a nationally recognized program that fosters life skill development and positive youth development through healthy competition, service, leadership, and education.  Kentucky 4-H believes that all youth should have opportunities for positive youth development in the four overarching concepts of mastery, belonging, independence, and generosity.  The program fosters mastery by learning firearm safety and marksmanship, belonging by taking part in club and community activities, independence by demonstrating responsible firearm use, and generosity by participating in community service projects.  All of the core competencies of the 4-H shooting sports program are developed under the support of caring adult volunteers which provide the youth with the opportunity to develop life skills, self-worth, and ethics.

The club starts up in April and runs through October. In one season, volunteers contribute more than 40 hours each, a total of 400 hours this year. Through this volunteer-led program more than 20 youth developed self-confidence, personal discipline, responsibility and sportsmanship. The youth and adults also gained leadership skills and enhanced their communication and team work through their involvement in the program. 

This club not only teaches youth safety, it motivates them to give back to their club and communities. This spring we had 5 new youth teen coaches and 3 new adult coaches go through the Kentucky 4-H Shooting Sports Certification Process. The teen youth that went through the training were so excited to come back to the club and pass on their new knowledge and skills to mentor younger youth in the club. All 5 of them are ready to go back to training to further their skills in a new discipline and to continue to give back to their club. Youth in the club also raised over three thousand dollars this year to help with the cost of keeping the club going but to also raise money to cook several meals for the local Ronald McDonald House. This group of youth and coaches really live out the 4-H pledge with their actions along with mastering their archery and trap skills that have helped them place in multiple tournaments across the state this summer!