Annually, the Gadsden County 4-H Program holds an Awards Banquet for the active 4-H
members in our community to recognize their hard work for the year. The banquet invites youth
ages 5-18 who are members of 4-H community clubs, along with their families, 4-H volunteers,
sponsors, and Gadsden County Extension faculty and staff.This event has been happening for
four years now and it is growing each year.
This year’s banquet theme was Western so everyone got to dress up in western attire. We
started off by thanking our sponsors and everyone that was able to attened the banquet. The
4-H program provided hamburgers and hotdogs with all the acutriments. All of the volunteers
and families brought side dishes, desserts and drinks. There was so much food! We had lots of
left overs!
This year we had 12 clubs which included, gardening, livestock, sewing, dog, horse,
leadership, photography, cloverbuds, archery, homeschool, chick chain, and cooking club. We
currently have 74 youth that attend these clubs and 25 volunteers that run these programs.
Without these adult volunteers, we would not be able to facilitate the 12 active clubs that we
have in Gadsden County. I am so thankful for their time and patience and also the effort they
put in creating fun and educational activities to teach youth at each meeting.
We recongnized all of our volunteers and their hard work, followed by the recognition of our
graduating seniors, and 4-H members. We announced all of their achievenments this year
inculding awards and pins earned. Afterwards, we had each club leader come up and talk
about what each club acomplished this year. Then all the members were invited up and took a
club photo.
After the final remarks, we had the Awards Committee come up and do the fundraiser drawing
to raise money for our 4-H program. Each club was asked to donate a basket or item to enter
in the drawing. Guests were allowed to make a donation to the 4-H program and recive tickets
to put toward the item of interest. At the end of the might the awards committee pulled the
winning tickets and deliver it to the winning guest. It was a nice touch that we added this year
and plan to do so next year.
The youth greatly enjoy the banquet because it gives them a chance to be recongnized for
their acommplishments for the year. I am so thankful for our sponsors, volunteers, parents,
youth, and Extension faculty and staff that make the 4-H program and this event posible each
year.
4-H has amazing opportunities for youth in Gadsden County to participate in. Please join us at
our Extension Open House on August 21 from 3-7 p.m. to learn more about the Gadsden
County 4-H program. Additionally, you can contact the UF/IFAS Gadsden County Extension
Office at 850-875-7255 for more information.
Evie Blount is a 4-H agent for UF/IFAS Extension Gadsden County.
