4-H Blast

Join us on every Thursday during February for Wendy's Night! It's easy to support 4-H: Thursday evenings, from 5-8 pm, stop by Wendy's, order food (drive through or in store), and a portion of ALL proceeds will go to the York County 4-H program. Tell all of your family and friends, too!

*Please note the date is February 16th and 17th, not the 9th and 10th as noted in the 4-H calendars sent to members. *

Come use your hands for larger service as we collect food drive items during the York Home and Garden Show. Items collected will be distributed to Blue Valley Food Bank and Living Water Rescue Mission.

This would be a great opportunity for a community service project for a 4-H club, community service hours for National Honors Society, or a great opportunity to work together as a family. Your task is simple: as people come in and have donated food items, help collect them and add them to our table or food collection bins.

Please sign up to take one, or more, shifts on the Sign-Up Genius linked here or to the image above. Shifts are listed in one-hour increments.

4-H Kick-Off Night is taking place on Sunday, February 25th from 5-7 pm a the York Community Center. This event is open to EVERYONE, so invite your friends to join us! We will have access to the entire building - Fun City, the swimming pool, basketball courts, and even a black light room for GLOW BINGO! We will have fun activities throughout the night for a chance to win some 4-H Swag.

Additionally, we will have computers available for families to enroll for the 2024 4-H year if you have not done so already. We will have pizza available for those who join us; to help us get an accurate count, please fill out the attached interest form. We look forward to seeing everyone and helping to answer any 4-H question you may have.

York County 4-H Council Scholarship - February 15th

Open to youth who have completed their Junior or Senior year of high school AND have been active in the York County 4-H Program for at least 5 years.

Dorothy & Howard May Trust - February 15th

Open to graduating seniors who are current York County 4-H member and has been active in 4-H programs and enrolled in a 4-H plant science area project for at least 5 years.

The Nebraska Extension Special Agronomy Project gives 4-H members an opportunity to experience a crop that is grown, was grown, or has the potential to be grown in Nebraska. Youth participate by receiving seed and resources to grow the crop, research traits of the crop, and determine the viability of that crop in the part of the state they live. The project allows 4-H members interested in agronomy to grow something fun, new, and different. This year, we honor a crop grown in the panhandle!

In the fourth year of special agronomy project, youth will explore sugar beets! Sugar beets are a major contributor to the U.S. sweetener industry and occur in a vast range of different food products. Be eligible to enter an exhibit at both the County and/or State Fair in the agronomy project area.

Enroll for the 2024 Special Agronomy Project through 4-H Online by enrolling in the Agronomy project. The Extension Office will order and distribute the seeds to members. Be on the look out for the pick-up notification soon!

The Farrowed and Owned Cohort is a Breeding and Market Swine division for youth interested in learning more about the swine industry. This opportunity will be available at the Nebraska State Fair in 2024! The goal of this program is to help the next generation of leaders in the swine industry by providing opportunities focusing on swine production. Youth must be 4-H age 10-18 as of January 1st to participate.

Youth will:

• Network with 4-H members across the state who are also participating in the cohort experience.
• Participate in learning opportunities hosted by Extension Swine Specialist Benny Mote about nutrition, feeding, genetics, and more.
• Gain knowledge related to their project and the swine industry as a whole.
• Maintain records related to swine management and basic care.
• Exhibit their Farrowed and Owned project animals at the 2024 Nebraska State Fair with the opportunity for special recognition as a result of participating in the cohort.

Registration closes February 1st! For more information, visit https://4h.unl.edu/farrowed-owned.

What you do makes a difference! We are excited to share that our state will be participating in the 4-H Volunteer Impact Study of volunteers in the North Central Region.

This survey is being conducted as a part of 12 state effort to document the impact of volunteering.

It will focus on three areas:

• the personal benefits of our volunteer experience;
• the impact you have on the organization by volunteering; and
• how your volunteer efforts contribute to your community in which you live and work.

A random sample of volunteers of 1,000 volunteers from each state will be surveyed. This study will be conducted through an electronic survey. If you are selected you will receive an email to let you know you have been selected to participate.

You may be picked!!! If you are, please respond. We want to hear from you and learn from your volunteer experiences.

Your comments will be used to quantify the personal, organizational, and public impacts of volunteers involved with 4-H Youth Development Programs in our twelve-state region.

Your impact is great and we want to hear from you!!!

4-H enrollment is open for the 2024 Fair Year! Please remember that you must re-enroll every year; when you do, please double check projects, grade level of youth, and T-SHIRT SIZE (we use this info for fair exhibitor shirts!).

Reminder, if you are planning to participate in Shooting Sports, you must select your discipline area from projects to sign consent forms AND make sure you are listing either York Street (BB, Air, and Archery) or Clay Busters (Trap) as either the primary or secondary club.

**New this year** Project areas have condensed! Instead of 200 project options, there are now 50. If you have a question as to an area a project may have moved into, please contact the Extension Office. (Examples: Breeding beef is now "Beef" and Sketchbook Crossroads is now in "Visual Arts")

Jenny Rees - jrees2@unl.edu

Amanda Hackenkamp - amanda.hackenkamp@unl.edu

Macee Parrish - macee.parrish@unl.edu

Laurie Linabery - llinabery2@unl.edu

Email: york-county@unl.edu
Website: https://york.unl.edu
Location: 2345 North Nebraska Avenue, York, NE, USA
Phone: (402) 362-5508
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/unlextensionyork/?ref=bookmarks
Twitter: @yorkneextension