For the past several years the Fleming County ANR Agent and the Lewis County ANR Agent have teamed up to offer a training for pesticide professionals. This day offered an opportunity to receive CEUs. These CEUs meant that professionals in our area, that held a Commercial Kentucky Pesticide License, could receive training and not have to travel outside the area.  Enough CEU hours were offered each year, so that the professionals could meet their recertification needs by attending this training annually.     

With the onset of the Covid pandemic in 2020 a lot of trainings were cancelled.   This created a much larger need for educational opportunities for professionals to maintain their certification so they could continue to do their job legally. The restrictions that were placed by the Governor of Kentucky in 2020 made it impossible to offer this program the same way as it had been done in the past. Working with UK Entomology and Kentucky Department of Ag Pesticide Division, the Fleming and Lewis County Agents were able to come up with a free solution to meet the needs of professionals, not just in our area but for the whole state of Kentucky.

By utilizing Zoom and Qualtrics programs, Agents and University of Kentucky Specialists were able to offer a program that allowed professionals to receive 3 general and one specific hour or CEU credits for categories: 1A, 2, 3, 10, 12, 18, and 20. By offering the program virtually we were able to meet the needs of over 300 professionals, a 500% increase of folks that were trained from the year prior.  

The program was appreciated by many.  One attendee said, "I wanted to thank you all again for allowing us to participate in last weeks pesticide CEU Program. It was very informational and I know a lot of work and planning goes into this. We look forward to being involved in more of these events in the future."