Penn State Extension Educators Team Up For Youth

As part of the Well Connected Communities (WCC) program, Penn State Extension Educators Lauren Perez, John Byrnes, and Suzanne Weltman are working collaboratively with community leaders to introduce 4-H to the youth of Norris Square, a dynamic, underserved, Latino neighborhood in Lower North Philadelphia.

Together, the team has successfully recruited 15 adult 4-H volunteers and are well on their way towards creating a foundation for 4-H programming in Norris Square.

"Lauren has been a tremendous partner on this project. While Suzanne and I work together to nurture the relationships with these community leaders, Lauren provides us with the proper information, training, and guidance for establishing them as 4-H volunteers)", says John Byrnes, Extension Educator in Philadelphia.

From the perspective of RWJF and 4-H National, WCC is a long term (10 years) effort that involves changing the way Extension views partnerships. The project demands Extension teams work collaboratively as a system. Rather than delivering a program or a curriculum, Extension Educators are asked to develop their approaches holistically, with the community and not for the community. National program leadership places a strong emphasis on the policy systems and environmental change efforts of WCC.

Penn State Extension chose the community of Norris Square, Philadelphia as one of our WCC communities because of our previous nutrition education, horticulture, and integrated pest management programming and relationship building in that neighborhood.  This history provided a foundation for the development of trust in the community and encouraged interest in 4-H as a way to meet expressed needs for community-wide leadership development, programmatic structure and, compelling and well-defined activities for youth.

"Penn State is a wonderful partner. They have created a trusting relationship with the staff at Norris Square Community Alliance. There is plenty of excitement about the potential for 4-H here in Norris Square." says, Eliezer Vila, Intensive Prevention / Youth & Families Services Director with Norris Square Community Alliance.

Penn State Extension was recently awarded funding from RWJF, the nation's largest philanthropy dedicated solely to health, to allow for expanding our staff capacity in each of our three Well Connected Communities. In partnership with National 4-H Council, we are working together with community leaders to empower volunteer leaders to help their neighbors embrace healthy choices at every stage of life.

During the COVID-19 epidemic, Penn State has continued to connect with Norris Square by supplying communities with critical information about emergency food locations, online learning activities for youth, online horticulture training opportunities, and essential resources for struggling community nonprofit organizations.

In the days ahead, Penn State Extension staff will begin to strengthen our connection to Norris Square by providing 4-H "Eight Essential Elements" and "Your Thoughts Matter" professional development training virtually to our new volunteers. With support from the Penn State Center for Economic and Community Development, we will also begin to work with community leaders to create a neighborhood profile of Norris Square to assist with fundraising and needs assessment efforts.  Once the COVID-19 pandemic is behind us, we will apply the WCC funding to new youth community coordinator hire to assist with 4-H Club development.

Well-Connected Communities (WCC), a collaboration between 4-H National and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF), aims to support coalition building in Norris Square, Aliquippa, Beaver County, and Lebanon City in order to help set a direction for positive change around health challenges in each community. These challenges are defined using county health and census track data and conversations with community members and local leaders.