The 2020 Coronavirus pandemic brought 4-H programming to an abrupt halt in March 2020.  Parents, educators, and local communities began learning how to function in a way that no one had experienced before.  One of Extension’s strengths is its flexibility across counties and states to address local needs to achieve locally desired outcomes (Diem, 2016).   This statement could not be any truer than in the current environment of COVID-19 and the impact it has, and continues to have, on both formal and in-formal education, the students and those that administer those learning opportunities.  The Meade County 4-H Youth Development program quickly stepped up to begin developing alternative participation options for current members, while recruiting new members, during a time when families needed additional, outside support for their child’s learning and extra-curricular interests.   The Meade County 4-H Virtual Program series was developed and currently operating programs and or clubs, developed alternate plans to keep youth engaged in project areas and relations with the 4-H Youth Development program. Below is a brief summary of those efforts and the impact made on local youth and their families.

Masks making – Meade County 4-H was approached by Monument Chemical, a local chemical factory, as asked to have sewing members and/or volunteers sew masks for their employees at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic.   The 4-H program provided members and volunteers with fabric and elastic.  Monument Chemical provided the mask pattern needed for their employees.   Through the hard work of the sewing club members and general 4-H volunteers, a total of 187 masks were made and kept at the local level for use by Monument Chemical employees, many who are current 4-H family members and/or 4-H alumni.

Cross Stitch project group – a multi-county program effort between Meade and Breckinridge Counties, a 6-week virtual project group, facilitated through a pre-registration process and lessons presented through Zoom meetings.  The focus was on counted cross stitch on pre-printed fabric project that was eligible as a 4-H project for competition.   A total of 5 youth participated and completed a practice project piece during the 6 week series.  All supplies were provided to participants free of charge and all were given an additional project kit to complete on their own, after the series, to continue to hone their newly acquired skills and to complete a project for submission to their home county’s 4-H project showcase/festival events.  

Art Club – The Meade County 4-H Art Club had been meeting since January 2020 and when the pandemic hit, we were unable to continue our face-to-face meetings.  In an effort to give the 5 project group members and opportunity to continue learning about and creating art, the 4-H Youth Development Agent created a 7-week, at-home program for members to complete on their own.  Project kits were compiled and mailed to members each week and each week focused on a different art concept; including:  “seeing” emotion in artwork, making a color wheel, object breakdown, origami, two-dimensional texture and movement on a page, negative versus positive space in artwork and tessellations, balance and rhythm, and contrast and variation in art.  Weekly, members completed a specific project assignment and in the final week, members designed their own projects that would be eligible to enter as a 4-H project for competition.  

Virtual Projects (a.k.a “Grab & Go Bags”) – Like many other 4-H programs in Kentucky, 4-H “grab & go” bags where offered to community youth and their families in an effort to assist youth in continuing, or starting, their participation in the 4-H Youth Development program.  Through this effort, 2,819 kits were provided for free between March – June 2020; this allowed those youth, and their families, to have a positive exposure to Meade County 4-H program.  All of the kits includes a “Plate it Up” SNAP recipe card encouraging families to purchase local, seasonal produce and cook together.   A variety of topics were covered in the kits, including: health & physical activity, basic introduction to 4-H, home environment (wood finishing and color collage), 4-H Trends projects, arm and needle knitting, abstract art, how to design & write a thank you note, owl pellet dissection, gardening, mixed media, rockets & aerospace, seed experiments, Japanese origami, mindfulness & stress relief, leaf collection project, cow eye dissection, sewing on a button, designing a room floor plan, birdfeeders and butterfly gardens, safe & health food preparation and recipes, robotics, the science behind glow sticks, heritage crafts, and finally, camp crafts.  The 4-H Youth Development Agent recorded many tutorial videos to go along with these topics and posted them to social media outlets, specifically Facebook and YouTube.   Parents were asked to take pictures and email them to the agent showing what their child had accomplished; many of these emails included very positive feedback from the parents.  Comments included: The ‘Science Behind Glow Sticks’ experiment and Facebook live event as well as glow stick dance contest:  “Yay!! It was so much fun! He did a few videos and we narrowed that one down to our favorite one. I just flipped through the radio and he would say ‘stop! This one! Record me!’ and start dancing. The 4-H kits have been a main part of our fun this summer!” another family commented, “Thank you for all you do for us and 4-H!”  A third family shared, “Thank you for putting all of this together. The kids are enjoying making all these fun crafts.”

 FRYSC feeding sites - The Meade County School system provided lunch pick up sites throughout the county for students while studying from home.  The 4-H Youth Development program reached out to the Family Resource Service Center Coordinators of those sites about provided 4-H “Grab & Go” activity bags to supplement the lunches students were receiving; one site (a total of four) per week was provided the kits.  Through this partnership, 1420 kits were given out while allowing those same students and their families to have a positive exposure to Meade County 4-H program.  All of the kits includes a “Plate it Up” SNAP recipe card encouraging families to purchase local, seasonal produce and cook together.  A variety of topics were covered in the kits, including:  mindfulness and stress relief, origami paper folding, taking a nature hike, welcome to 4-H activities, jewelry making, needle knitting, study of animals, sewing on a button, making note cards, gardening and visual arts.  One teacher, who picked up kits for her students stated, “Thank you so much for the fabulous packets.  I delivered them to the kids today.  They were so excited.  I can't express how much I appreciate your help in providing something different for the kids to do.  They are extremely tired of the NTI paper packets.  The packet you provided gave them something different and fun to do.”

As we continue to navigate COVID-19, and assess the needs of local youth and their families, efforts will continue to keep them all engaged with the Meade County 4-H Program in anticipation that the new program year will allow for some, even a slight, return to past educational opportunities and programs.