This week has probably been the busiest week for me as the new educator here in Henry County!

Our Henry County Camp Counselors has their “Overnight Retreat” from Sunday into Monday and wow can those kids stay awake! Our working portion of the meeting had 39 members attend and we had 20 kids stay overnight for food, fellowship and lots of laughs! Gentle reminder to my camp counselors that our Regional Camp Counselor Training at 4-H Camp Palmer will be held Saturday next week March 5th – please fill out your brief survey to indicate attendance (you should have received a link via email to complete)

We held 3 of our Advisor/Volunteer trainings this week; Tuesday’s training was held live & in-person at Crossroads Church. Then on Wednesday & Thursday we held trainings via Zoom. Between our Organizational Advisor Kick-Off and this week we’ve had a total of approximately 95 volunteers complete their annual training requirement! If you are an advisor or a volunteer and did not attend these trainings, please contact me at the office and I will instruct you on how to proceed. If you would like to access the information provided to volunteers, please click here: 2022 Volunteer ppt.

I hope all of your clubs are launching into your first meetings soon. As mentioned in our Volunteer Trainings, I encourage you you evaluate you Club Constitution and By-Laws to align with county standards within our Henry County Handbook.

Reminders: 

If you are a parent or a member interested in participating in the Essay Lamb Contest, please be sure to complete the essay as indicated in this document. Keep in mind the essays are due MARCH 1.

We are excited to be holding our Henry County Scholarship interviews this coming Tuesday, March 1st. We have a total of 16 applicants that have applied for Henry County 4-H Scholarships.

Cloverbud Advisor Training will be held on Thursday March 3rd at 6:00pm at Crossroads Church. We look forward to covering lots of Cloverbud-related resources!

Keep encouraging your parents and members to get enrolled! That enrollment deadline is March 15th! Advisors and Volunteers, please don’t forget to get signed up as well!

Greetings All!

My name is Morgan Parcher, for those of you who may not have heard – Henry County’s beloved Laura Rohlf retired in October of 2021. I was hired on in November of 2021 and have hit the ground running in my first few months of being here!

For a bit of background on me… I was born and raised in Napoleon, Ohio, my family resides just outside of Malinta, Ohio. I was most definitely a product of the Henry County 4-H Program, beginning as a Cloverbud in Grelton Bluebirds & prized Livestock. While I took Horses during my time in 4-H as a member of the Maumee Valley 4-H Club, I took many other Special Interest projects such as Art as Expression, Woodworking, Knots, and Creative Writing. I participated at the Ohio State Fair Jr. Horse show more times than I can count and ended up Grand Champion in the Senior Western Horsemanship in 2009 and Grand Champion in the Senior Western Pleasure in 2010. I was extremely active in my club (Maumee Valley Horse Club), I served in Junior Leadership Club as well as the Junior Fair Board for 4 years. After graduation, I continued as an Adult Volunteer within the Henry County Program, specifically as the Junior Fair Horse Department Advisor.

Upon my graduation from Napoleon High School in 2010, I attended the University of Findlay. I was a 4-year Varsity letterman for our Western Equestrian team in my time there. In 2014, I graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Animal Science. Upon graduation, I was hired as an Equine Veterinary Assistant in Delphos, Ohio. I took a temporary leave from the Veterinary field to pursue an internship in Extension and spent a summer at Ottawa County Extension in Oak Harbor, Ohio. In my time there, I knew 4-H extension was a route I wanted to pursue. I returned to the veterinary field as a Practice Manager and was lucky to be accepted to this position.

While the last few months have consisted of learning the program and catching up with the various councils and boards we have, I’m excited to tackle 2022 and hope we can get back to a relatively normal year in 4-H! Our camp counselors have been selected thanks to a new Group Interview Process we’ve implemented. Our Junior Leadership Club is busy planning new events for outreach and some of our Junior Fair Board members just came back from the Ohio Fair Managers Conference in Columbus, Ohio where they participated in the OFMA Junior Fair Board Conference.

The Henry County Fair theme in 2022 is: “Building Tomorrow’s Future at the Henry County Fair” and the fair will be held August 11-18. I’m also excited to launch into our Livestock Quality Assurance opportunities and Volunteer Trainings for the year. Our Henry County 4-H Calendar is currently posted to our website at: henry.osu.edu under the “4-H Youth Development” tab. We do post many updates from our Henry County 4-H Facebook page – If you do not follow us, please request access to the group at: “Ohio State- Henry County 4-H (Ohio).” Lots of helpful information and reminders will be shared to help aid in your 4-H year. And finally, I have officially launched the new Henry County 4-H News & Notes Blog! If you wish to have regular, weekly program updates, please contact the office on how you can subscribe!

I look forward to meeting all of you and hope to make the best even better in 2022! Happy New Year & let’s get rolling!

For this week’s WNDH News & Notes Update, listen here:

~Morgan A. Parcher

Welcome to the NEW Henry County News & Notes Blog!

In this Blog we will post program updates, reminders, and forms to help our volunteers, advisors, families & exhibitors keep track of all things “Henry County 4-H!”

We are excited to offer up to date information to keep the members of our program well-informed! Please encourage your families to subscribe!