Adult Volunteer Leader Development

In 2011, the 4-H Home Economist and 4-H Ag Agent implemented several forms to assist leaders with club management, the club event form and the club fund raiser form. Completion of these forms ensures that clubs are following correct policies and procedures as well as informs the county Agents of club activity.

With the addition of the club event and fund raising forms for organizational leaders, the 4-H Home Economist is better able to gauge the activity level of individual clubs. Of the ten chartered clubs in Santa Fe County, five clubs submitted five event requests including horse events, promotional events and community service events and seven fund raising events including concession stands, project fun days, and product sales. It is the Agents intention that clubs will maintain compliance with the two new reporting forms and a more efficient tracking system will be in place to manage and reward clubs for their work.

Bernalillo County Extension Association
Bernalillo County Extension Association; BCEA is a chapter of the Extension Association of New Mexico which has as its mission to strengthen individuals, families and communities through education, leadership and action. Throughout the year the Home Economist served as the advisor and provided educational programs to the two active BCEA clubs in Albuquerque. The BCEA president, Donna Hannon is also the president of the state association EANM and as her advisor the Home Economist has had many duties. In October 2010 the annual meeting was held in Albuquerque and BCEA was the host of this event. During the annual meeting the Home Economist helped with planning and operations and presented a workshop “ A Complaint Free World”. BCEA held educational trainings and the advisor did several of these trainings including; Keeping the cost down of Home Energy, Home Safety and a Holiday Food program. She also brought in the ACES Health Specialist Dr. Sonja Koukel to do a program on mixing medications and herbs. As the advisor to this group the Home Economist writes a quarterly newsletter for BCEA. Many hours are spent monthly by the Home Economist serving this group of senior women. The Home Economist also serves on the EANM ad hock committee.

14 new adult volunteer leaders completed the screening process and enrolled as leaders in Socorro County. 68 adult volunteer leaders re-enrolled for a total enrollment of 82 leaders in the county.

One thousand six youth and two hundred sixty four adult volunteers have been involved in Socorro County 4-H programming, assisting Extension Agent in reaching new and under served youth audiences. Adult & youth volunteers have assisted agent with instructions and facilitation of programs. After school Programming: During the after school program, volunteers help to maintain order and assist with completion of projects. The youth are broken up into four groups; adult volunteer leaders are in charge of each group. Their duties are to lead their group through each rotation, assist the youth complete their projects, and interact with the youth by playing games with them or helping them with their homework.

The City of Socorro has continued to provide a summer program for the youth of Socorro. The program is offered 5 days of the week from 7:30 am to 5:30 pm. This particular program takes many adult leaders working together to make it successful. As we were gearing up for the summer and preparing to have 150 to 200 youth participating in the Summer program, we felt the need to provide a staff training for the all of the staff hired to work during the summer. We spent several hours talking about the 8 essential elements of youth development and what role the staff played in implementing them. We emphasized the importance of environment and creating opportunities for young people. We then spent the next hour talking about what it means to be a good and bad employee. We went over their job description and talk about key points in the City of Socorro’s policies and procedures manual. The final hour was spent teaching them games and activities that could be used within their group. To follow up, we developed an evaluation instrument to assess the staff progress as we go through the summer. We meet on Monday evenings for a staff meeting to go over any problems that have come up the week before and go over ways to solve those problems.
In the City of Socorro summer program we also utilize elderly women that call themselves “Grandma’s” that volunteer their time to assist young people in the community. The Grandma’s volunteer 4 hours a day and assist us by gathering materials, preparing projects for the day, and helping youth with arts and crafts projects. During the summer program we have 8-10 volunteering daily and during the school year we have roughly 4-5 grandmas’ daily.
School Enrichment: During the school enrichment programs, volunteer teachers assist with maintaining order of their classrooms, preparing snacks during our nutrition courses, and assisting the agent to prepare and clean up before and after the class. Volunteer teachers also assist by delivering curriculum provided to them to their students.

Special Interests Volunteer leaders assist the Extension Agent by helping youth complete projects. They make sure that youth understand the instructions and assist youth with the hands-on activities. Socorro County 4-H’ers also assists with program planning, presentation, and facilitation when called upon.

A new volunteer training was held at the fairgrounds for new adult volunteer leaders, to increase their knowledge and skills related to organizing meetings, project planning, child development, reporting child abuse, 4-H opportunities and training opportunities for leaders. Of the 22 new volunteers 12 attended of those 12 volunteers 75% of new volunteer leaders reported that the training was beneficial and they gained more knowledge of the 4-H program.