4-H is uniquely situated to provide youth with opportunities to learn about citizenship, government, and civic engagement, given its own infrastructural makeup: a federal-state-county partnership. Youth civic engagement is of even greater relevance at present, given the emergent issues seen in society (e.g., aftermath of COVID-19, mental health,…

Poetry spaces provide a place where young people can express themselves and develop skills like critical thinking, empathy, and creativity. They empower young people, particularly those at the margins of society. I organized an extracurricular poetry club, Yo Misma, with Latina adolescents in which we read the work of ten Latin American women…

Cooperative Extension professionals utilize proven qualitative techniques to collect and analyze information to make data-driven decisions that guide program direction and determine impact. While the process may not always look the same, it is indeed essential to ensure findings are credible and reflective of the data. A codebook is a valuable…

As part of developing the University of Arizona Cooperative Extension 4-H Common Measures system, we created resources for communicating results to stakeholders with research-based visual tools. We outline the creation of two tools that may be useful to CE personnel to use evaluation findings to better "tell their story" to a variety of…

The article explores the possibilities for cosmopolitan learning within a site such as the 23rd World Scout Jamboree. The approach is interdisciplinary, combining a theoretical conceptualisation of 'cosmopolitan learning' taken from Intercultural Education with a Cultural Studies focus on the representation of national and global cultures. This…

We introduce a new experience design tool, an experience journey map, to assist youth professionals in planning engagement, immersion, and absorption activities. Experience journey maps are based on customer journey maps, which are widely used in business service design. This new approach highlights strategies for engendering deep structured…

The First-Generation 4-H Youth Member (FG4-HYM) Intervention Framework is an organizational management perspective for preparing 4-H youth programs that supports the welcoming of youth and families that have no previous experience with the organization. Using the Bronfenbrenner ecological model, we explore the multiple layers of 4-H program…

STEM literacy is identified as a necessary skill for participation in the future workforce. 4-H has responded to this need to develop STEM-ready youth by expanding access to project areas like Robotics. It has been acknowledged that recruiting and training STEM competent staff and volunteers is a limitation in expanding these types of programs. At…

Uganda hosts the largest number of refugees of any country in Africa. To protect the rights of refugees in the country, Uganda has designed policies regarding the right to quality education participation and freedom of expression. The authors' non-profit organization, Africa Education & Leadership Initiative (Africa ELI), works with refugee…

We describe a process for construction and use of a "dashboard" for monitoring the quality of in-person nonformal education programs. We followed the process to develop a 4-H special interest (SPIN) club dashboard, but the steps are applicable to any education program that includes instruction over multiple sessions. The dashboard…

4-H, as a research-based positive youth development program, should be affirming and inclusive for all youths, including those who are members of LGBTQ+ communities. This article provides 4-H youth development professionals with a series of checklists for supporting LGBTQ+ participation, focusing on systemic advocacy, guidance and protocols,…

The contemporary Extension 4-H program is focused on positive youth development, providing experiences that increase the likelihood of enhanced wellbeing and optimal development for 4-H participants. Despite the longevity, reach, and success of the 4-H program, however, with few notable exceptions, there has been relatively little attention paid…

This paper describes an original interlinking of a conceptual frame and co-production methodology of a participatory internet radio intervention (RadioActive101) that supports engagement and non-formal learning amongst socially excluded young people. This considers the inclusive learning of socially excluded young people as a social innovation…

This article discusses contested discourses of youth citizenship in Birmingham, UK, in the early twentieth century. It explores how socially committed Quakers and labour and co-operative activists in the city drew on transnational social and political critiques of the urban, and a powerful discourse of nature as facilitator of a morally and…

4-H clubs can build and program underwater robots from raw materials. An annotated resource list for engaging youth in building underwater remotely operated vehicles (ROVs) is provided. This article is a companion piece to the Research in Brief article "Building Teen Futures with Underwater Robotics" in this issue of the "Journal of…