The Johnson County Extension Council and 4-H Youth Development Council identified life skill acquisition, overall wellness, and agriculture program opportunities as priorities for the 2019-20 Plan of Work. To address this need, the 4-H Youth Development Program responded to a request from the Johnson County School System to partner for a 21^st Century Afterschool Grant. The School system was awarded a $150,000 grant with the Johnson County 4-H Youth Development program as Co-applicant. The grant cycle is annually renewable for up to 5 years. As a result of this partnership, the 4-H Youth Development program delivered a total of 36 afterschool sessions on Monday’s and Wednesday’s throughout the school year with an average of 20 youth meeting 2X a week. The program comprised the following learning opportunities for Johnson County youth:

• 3 afterschool sessions on electricity that featured SNAP Circuits kits where youth learned electrical definitions, components of a circuits, constructed circuits by following a wiring diagram and then created circuits of their own design.
• 4 afterschool sessions about gardening and agriculture production with hands on activities where youth  planted herb and tomato seeds, transplanted their seedlings and after several months took home maturing tomato plants.
• 4 afterschool sessions of life skill acquisitions spent building vegetable and flower planters to be used at home.
• 5 afterschool sessions where youth learned about agriculture production, practiced grading and candling eggs and hatched chicks through the poultry incubation project.
• 11 sessions where youth learned about nutrition and Myplate guidelines and followed recipes to practice making food items.
• 5 sessions in Robotics where engineering and technology kills were gained by building and programming EV3 Lego Robots in addition to Brushbot and Wigglebot construction.
• 4 natural resource and agriculture sessions where youth learned about pollinators, built bird feeders and a butterfly migration station and hatched butterflies from caterpillars.

Program survey results indicated that youth:

• felt like they could take the information given to make decisions about future projects, assignments and tasks
• were comfortable talking to others or sharing information about their thoughts or feelings
• felt they had caring adults who were interested in their success or that they did well in their efforts
• thought they could apply the skills learned in 4-H sessions and other activities at home, school or in the community
• were able to set and accomplish goals