By Diego Mariscal
One of the pillars in 4-H is Healthy Living. Through various partnerships with school districts, U.S.Soccer, and other community organizations, the 4-H Program successfully piloted various new programs for youth to engage in healthy living through sports.
In addition to working through the fundamentals of soccer and flag football, youth in 4-H sports projects learned about important nutritional education, leadership development, and public speaking, using sports as a way to develop important life skills to be used on and off the field.
These 4-H programs began as simple workshops, but evolved into more immersive programs, such as the 4-H Soccer League, which takes place in the Roseland School District. In the league, volunteers use the “Soccer for Success” curricula provided by U.S. Soccer, and prepare youth to play in the “4-H Clover Soccer League.”
To continue growing and empowering youth and volunteers, 4-H will continue to provide training, sports supplies, and build partnerships with current and new 4-H volunteers to create more projects and make sports more accessible, and affordable, for youth in Sonoma County.
