COLLEGE PARK, MD. - You’d
expect a paid professional worker
to report good things about the
agency which he or she represents.
But when a nonpaid volunteer
worker with wide experience gives
a testimonial on the value of 4-H
youth activities, you know it’s not
self-serving.
Such is the case with Elaine
Shank, a rural, nonfarm
homemaker near Welcome in
southern Maryland’s Charles
County.
A former Cub Scout den mother,
Elaine got acquainted several
years ago with 4-H activities of
fered by the University of
Maryland’s Cooperative Extension
Service for youth in the age range
of 9 to 19.
She became a volunteer adult
helper with the Hawks 4-H club in
her neighborhood and eventually
became its leader. Under her
direction, the club has won the
statewide junior group award for
two consecutive years from the
Maryland Agricultural Safety and
Health Federation.
The club’s most recent honor
was presented March 14 at
Walkersville, MD., during the
safety federation’s twelfth annual
dinner meeting. Mrs. Shank was
present at the Walkersville fire
hall to receive a recognition plaque
on behalf of her club.
She also accepted a plaque on
behalf of her son, Michael, 16, who
was this year’s state winner of the
MASHF award to individual senior
youth. Participation in a high
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school play prevented Michael
from being present to receive the
award in person.
In conversation afterward, Mrs.
Shank noted that the prize-winning
safety education activities of the
club in general and her son in
particular were excellent
illustrations of leadership and
community service instilled in
youth by 4-H programs.
She says she is not surprised by
the results of a nationwide poll
taken last fall of 1,761 persons by
the Texas Agricultural Extension
Service and Agricultural* Ex
periment Station with financial
assistance from the Extension
Service in the U.S. Department of
Agriculture.
That randomly selected sample
of individuals included 710 former
4-H members and 743 adults who
had been members of other youth
organizations. Some persons in the
study had not been members of
any organized groups during their
younger years.
A key finding of the survey was
that former 4-H members today
are more active in community
activites—particularly in
leadership roles-than adults who
had no 4-H experience.
The survey also showed that
persons who did not participate in
any youth groups during their
younger years are currently much
less involved as adults in com
munity activities.
One reason for involvement in
community activities by adults
relates to the type of activities they
A***
award illustrates Hawks 4-H Club's community spirit
V
had as youth, observes Merl E.
Miller, assistant director of the
University of Maryland’s
Cooperative Extension Service
with statewide responsibility for 4-
H programs.
Dr. Miller notes that the
nationwide Texas study showed
former 4-H members giving higher
rankings to personal development,
knowledge; leadership and coping
skills acquired than did former
members of other youth
organizations.
The study also indicated little or
no difference in backgrounds,
educational attainments and in
come levels among the nation’s
youth who were involved in
organizations such as 4-H, Scouts,
Boys and Girls Clubs, YMCA and
YWCA, church organizations, FFA
andFHA.
But the major benefit of 4-H
membership, declares volunteer
leader Elaine Shank, is that its
diversity of project areas allows
young people to be independent
and develop self-reliance. And
almost every project area, she
notes, gives opportunity for growth
in self-confidence through
demonstrations and public
speaking.
Safety, of course, is only one
community service area in which
Michael Shank and the Hawks 4-H
club have participated during
recent years.
Michael, a Lackey high school
sophomore, also has been very
active in 4-H horse and veterinary
science projects. Both he and other
members of the club sponsored,
rabies education clinics for the
public at several locations last
- 1
year.
Seeing her son develop from a
relatively shy person to an
outgoing community leader
through his 4-H activities has made
Elaine Shank’s toil as a volunteer
leader worthwhile, she declared.