This was the second year that Gold Country 4-H Club has used a new format for doing community service activities. Instead of electing a community service officer to plan things, as we used to do, we instead replaced that with a Community Service project.
Anyone in the club can join this project, in which we encourage whole families to participate. We meet a few times throughout the 4-H year with the goal of planning two community service activities for most club meetings, as well as a few bigger events as well.
At each club meeting, we try to have ‘bring' and ‘do' community service options, and we generally stick with a common theme for both. For example, in November we asked club members to ‘bring' food for the local food closet and to make (‘do') Thanksgiving placemats for the community Thanksgiving Dinner, while in April we had people ‘bring' towels for the Spay and Neuter Clinic, and make dog treats and toys for the Placer County Animal Shelter.
Also, we try to run a few bigger community service events during the year, such as Salvation Army bell ringing, Placer Nature Center workday, and Stuff-a-Bus for the food closet. We have been able to do a lot of good through these events.
So far, we have had much success doing community service this way, though there are still some things to work out. Most of our club members participate in the activities we plan for the club meetings. Not only do these activities give the members community service opportunities for their record books….as well as being fun to do….but they are much appreciated by the community and truly help make it a better place.