Notes for your March 4-H Club Meeting

Notes for your March 4-H Club Meeting

Quality Assurance Trainings

• Members who plan to sell a market animal at the 2015 Western Montana Fair need to be up-to-date on their QA Training.

• Members need to attend once as a Junior Member (age 8-13 on October 1^st, 2014) and once as a Senior Member (age 14+ on October 1, 2014).

• QA Trainings will occur Friday, March 13^th, 6-8pm at the Extension Office, and Friday, April 10^th, 6-8pm at the Extension Office.  They only need to attend one of these.        

State 4-H event for Teens coming up

• Montana 4-H Rec Lab will be held in Livingston, MT, March 27-29.  It is open to any 4-H teen (13+ on October 1, 2014).  Cost is $80.  Registration deadline is March 16^th.  Information and registration materials are available online.

Montana 4-H Foundation $5.00 per Member Donation

• The Montana 4-H Foundation requests every year that Counties make a $5 per member donation.  In addition to 4-H Scholarships, the Foundation contributes to many statewide 4-H events annually.  In recent years, Missoula 4-H has not been a consistent contributor to this effort.  The Missoula 4-H Council voted recently to turn to the 4-H Clubs to help meet this commitment.  Clubs could decide whether to charge a $5 per member fee, do a special fundraiser to cover the donation, or cover the donation through the fundraisers you already do. 

• The 4-H Ambassadors have been making the rounds speaking to 4-H Clubs about the benefits of contributing to the 4-H Foundation, and about opportunities available to 4-H members statewide.  If you would like the Ambassadors to visit your club, please contact Shana Duffalo.

• Checks should be made to the Montana 4-H Foundation, and sent to Colleen at the Missoula office and we will mail them all to Bozeman.  Contributions made by May 31^st will recognized at Montana 4-H Congress in July.  If you have questions, contact a 4-H Council Board member, or the Missoula Extension Office. 

Montana 4-H Week of Service: April 12-19 

• The Montana 4-H Ambassador Officer Team (2 of whom are Missoula 4-H members) challenge you to participate in the first annual Montana 4-H Week of Service. This is an initiative to encourage Montana 4-H youth to make a positive impact within their communities and share what they are doing.

• During the week of April 12-19, 2015, we encourage each county to join together and illustrate how BIG a difference Montana 4-H can make by participating in community service projects of their choice. These projects can be as simple as volunteering with a local organization or as extravagant as a full scale community-wide project.  More information is online.

  

Horse Project

• May 17^th – It’s been a few years, but we’re bringing back the “Mandatory May Clinic.”  Members who are new to 4-H Horse, older members who have a new project horse, older members who are starting in a new project area (i.e. Ranch Horse, Packing, Western Games), or members who want to skip a level (e.g. Western Horsemanship 2 to 4) should plan to attend.

Drama Festival

• The 69^th Annual 4-H Drama Festival will be held Saturday, April 11^th, starting at 10am at the Potomac-Greenough Community Center in Potomac, MT.  So far, we have 3 clubs confirmed to do plays (Potomac, Mullan Trail and Bear Creek)!

• This is a blast for the kids, it’s a low-stress environment, and the more plays we have, the better it is.

• Please consider doing a play – several volunteers have offered to help coach new clubs through the process. 

4-H Calendar online

• If you don’t have it bookmarked, just Google “Missoula 4-H,” then click the 4-H Calendar of Events link on the bottom left of the 4-H page.

• All of these dates and many more are on the Missoula 4-H calendar online.  Go to this link, and you can click on the event for more information.

County-wide Project meetings

• There are currently county-wide project meetings going on for the following projects.  Anyone enrolled (or interested in) the project can attend these meetings.

•  Dog (11^th and 25^th of Feb)
•  Robotics (March dates not set yet)
• Poultry (3^rd Tuesday)
• Meat Goat (3^rd Wednesday)
• Horse (3^rd Thursday)
• Rabbit (4^th Thursday)

County 4-H Committee meetings

• These committees that plan events and discuss the rules and policies surrounding them meet monthly.  Anyone can attend these meetings.

• 4-H Council Board (1^st Wednesday, 6pm at the Extension Office)
• 4-H Shooting Sports Committee (1^st Thursday, 6pm at the Extension Office)
• 4-H Horse Committee (2^nd Wednesday, 7pm at the Extension Office)
• 4-H Livestock Committee (2^nd Thursday, 7pm at the Extension Office)