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Show LEADERSHIP ROLE IN 4-H APPEALS TO TEENAGERS TEEN-AGERS With so much competition today for the leisure time of teen-agers, it is interesting to note that membership in 4-H Clubs often lasts up to 10 years, reports the National 4-H Service Ser-vice Committee. "For example, in the national na-tional 4-H Leadership program last year, the average membership member-ship tenure of 12 national award winners was nearly 9 years, " said a committee spokesman. Long continuous membership member-ship may be partly due to the flexibility of the informal, educational 4-H program, ob-I ob-I serve adults working with the youth who are between 9 and 19 years old. There are available avail-able today, about 40 different projects or activities. The national 4-H Leadership Leader-ship program is one. It is sponsored by the Sears-Roebuck Foundation and supervised by the Cooperative Extension Service. Its purpose is to develop character, self-confidence and anrtunderstanding of people and the importance of responsible citizenship. "Nobody is a born leader, " said Charles Freeman, program leader for a 4-H citizenship education and leadership development de-velopment group which met recently in Washington, D. C. "It (leadership) has to be learned, and it can be learned.". He mentioned "skills" and "understanding" as prime requisites. The starting place can be anywhere in the club. Sometimes Some-times it is with office.holding. Needed is recognized ability in sewing, cooking, electrical electri-cal or mechanical endeavors, and in other areas such as health and safety. Adult volunteer 4-H leaders guide and encourage the young people to be active in school and the community as well as in the club. Participation Par-ticipation in the leadership program is entirely voluntary. Boys and girls "enroll, " and at the end of the club year their contributions are evaluated eval-uated by themselves, by the adult leader and by the county extension staff. Awards are offered on a competitive basis at three levels: county, state and national. Each year six boys and six girls are chosen from 50 states as winners of $500 scholarships. The highest ranking boy or girl in the state will be named a delegate dele-gate to the National 4-H Club Congress at Chicago with all expenses paid. Gold-filled Gold-filled leadership medals will be presented to the four top members in the county. Right now there are more than 150, 000 junior leaders helping younger members with their projects. All have been trained in the leadership leader-ship program. More are needed, says the Extension Service. |