UGA Cooperative Extension

Partnering to Improve Student Achievement

Local Cooperative Extension Offices

Through Cooperative Extension offices in almost every county, the University of Georgia helps Georgians become healthier, financially independent and environmentally responsible.

Valued Partnership

"Graduating students prepared for work or college is job one for Georgia. Quality 4-H programs can be a major lever in ensuring that more of our students graduate with superior skills for the workforce and college. We value this partnership."

- Wanda Barrs, chair, Georgia State Board of Education

Whether you'd like to build a safer environment for your students or protect the environment we all share, teach your students to avoid chronic diseases like diabetes with healthy food or train food handlers in your cafeteria, Extension is the place to start.

Congress established the Cooperative Extension Service in 1914 to deliver information from land-grant colleges and universities to all Americans, particularly those who lacked access to formal education.

Now Extension continues to fulfill its basic mission. And at the top of our list is helping our schools improve student achievement.

4-H Agents

4-H agents bring relevance to the Georgia Performance Standards by giving fifth- through twelfth-grade students chances for hands-on learning through:

• Agriscience and Healthy Lifestyles curriculum
• Garden Earth Naturalist training
• Public speaking and language arts mastery
• Citizenship and service-learning opportunities

Ag and Natural Resource Agents

These agents bring real-world information to students by serving as resource speakers in the classroom on topics such as Georgia soils, water, entomology, careers in agriculture and food production. They help improve student achievement through:

• Pest management
• Athletic field management
• Outdoor classrooms

Family and Consumer Science Agents

Family and consumer science agents serve as providers of basic life education. For example, they offer lessons incorporating the USDA's My Pyramid or hand washing sessions to help students prevent spreading diseases. They can:

• provide health education
• teach financial planning
• offer staff development and PLUs to teachers on financial literacy
• teach lessons in nutrition, health and food safety
• enhance students' life skills

Environmental Education Program

Through Georgia's Environmental Education program, more than 34,000 students get their hands and hearts immersed in the science of their surroundings at five 4-H centers across the state each year.

• Burton 4-H Center offers beach and marsh ecology, plus marine animals and hydrology studies.
• Jekyll Island 4-H Center focuses on maritime forest and salt marsh ecology.
• Wahsega 4-H Center spotlights forest ecology, geology and soils, stream ecology and wildlife.
• Fortson 4-H Center centers on pond, forest and wetland ecology classes.
• Rock Eagle 4-H Center offers day classes in ecology, living history and team building.

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