January Heart of 4-H Volunteer Award: Emalea Dean

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Lancaster County 4-H is proud to announce Emalea Dean of Lincoln as winner of the January “Heart of 4-H Award” in recognition of outstanding volunteer service.

For five years, Emalea has contributed to Lancaster County 4-H. She helps the following 4-H clubs as a parent volunteer:
• Clever Clovers — helping with meetings and 4-H projects, as well as hosting club parties.
• Rabbits R Us — hosting meetings and helping with service projects such as the dunk tank fundraiser.
• 4 On The Floor dog club — she plans to contribute more when meetings resume.

“I like being a 4-H volunteer because I love to watch the 4-H’ers learn and grow with new skills and talents. Many of the skills that kids learn from 4-H are lifetime skills. I think about my three girls learning beginning cooking and sewing skills, and know that they will use those skills for the rest of their lives. As a 4-H volunteer, you encourage 4-H’ers to lead meetings and projects, and in turn, that teaches them the skills of leadership and public speaking. Finally, the best part of being a 4-H volunteer is walking around the fair and seeing the projects on display or watching the 4-H’ers present their project or animal in front of a judge and audience. I have a couple of favorite experiences:
• Working the food booth at the county fair and seeing the kids excited to help others and thanking customers for supporting 4-H.
• Working service projects — Planting flowers at a local nursing home in the springtime so that the residences had beautiful planters to enjoy by summertime.”

Lancaster County 4-H thanks Emalea for donating her time and talents. People like her are indeed the heart of 4-H!