Our Impact
Making A Difference in Our County
University of Georgia Cooperative Extension is working hard for its constituents. The following are examples of Extension’s impact in the county over the past year.
4-H Youth Development
Approximately 675 4th and 5th grade youth participated in our 4-H STEM inspired lessons at Upson-Lee Elementary School and Skipstone Academy in 2022. Lessons were taught face-to-face working with the Elementary STEM teacher and grade level lead teacher. Another 54 middle school students were seen at both Upson-Lee and Skipstone where 4-H lessons focused on life skills.
Aside from our in-school club meetings, we also host a wide range of other meetings, activities and camps. In 2022 we held our monthly homeschool club whose lessons were focused on agriculture education. We hosted numerous county contests including: peanutrition, milkmake, and pumpkin decorating contest. We also participated in many state contests including: BB Gun, Shotgun, Poultry Judging, Project Achievement, and Cotton Bowl and Consumer Judging. Throughout the year we host numerous afterschool programs including: Cloverleaf Club, Cloverbud Club, Adulting 101, Craft Days, Garden Club, STEM Challenge, Holiday Parties and many more!
This summer we ran a Summer Day Camp at the Civic Center for grades K-5th. It was an eight week camp, Monday-Friday, where youth went on fields trips, did crafts, learned games/sports, went swimming, did STEM activities, and just had fun. We also had a summer program where students were able to go on educational and fun field trips throughout the summer, for grades 4th-12th. .
Our office offers a wide range of activities all throughout the year for the youth in our community.
Agriculture and Natural Resources
Upson County covers a wide range of agricultural commodities. The top four commodities include Poultry, Hay/Forages, Cattle, and Timber.
The extension office has many educational and agricultural resources for all types of commodities and other individuals in the community. We offer testing for water, soil, forage, and poultry litter. We identify insects, insect damage, different vegetation, plant diseases, plant damage, pasture and turf weeds.
In 2022 Upson County Cooperative Extension hosted several producer-oriented workshops for the surrounding counties, allowing participants to earn credit hours for their private and commercial pesticide licenses and gain knowledge needed to identify problems and implement solutions on their farms. We also hosted monthly Lunch N Learns for adults in the community to learn about a range of different homeowner agriculture topics.
With the need to focus on technology-based learning and resources, the Upson County Extension website gained many new resources. Under the Agriculture and Natural Resources tab, we now have many pages with educational videos, pictures, and write-ups focused on different agricultural topics. Each page is a focused resource, so the individual does not have to jump around to other places. There new pages include: Toxic Weed Identification, Pastures and Forages Educational Resources, Livestock Management Educational Resources, Local Agricultural Videos, Georgia Forages Videos, and UGA Beef Team Videos.
The subpage titled "Toxic Weed Identification" is a page where the 22 most common toxic weeds in the southeast are listed. For each weed; there is a picture, description, list of animals affected, signs of ingestions, and how and where the toxicity is.
The Subpage titled "Local Agricultural Videos" is a page with videos created by the ANR Agent. These videos may be recording of educational programs, teaching basic testing techniques, or showcasing "A Day in the Life on an ANR Agent."
As usual, the Southeastern Hay Contest was a success. More than 60 samples from Upson and Lamar counties were entered, with three producers placing top three in their respective categories. Our counties are continuing to be recognized for our pride in producing high quality forages.
Employee Spotlight/Awards
In 2021 our Extension Administrative Assistant won the Larry B. Willingham Secretary Award for outstanding young secretary in Georgia and in 2022 she won the Larry B. Willingham Secretary Award for outstanding secretary in Georgia with over 5 years of service.
In 2021 our Extension Agriculture and Natural Resources Agent won the Cattlewoman of the Year award from the Georgia Cattlewomen’s Association and the Top Georgia Agent for the Southeastern Hay Contest. In 2022 she won the Top Georgia Agent for the Southeastern Hay Contest, again.