My Experience so Far

I am now a little over half way through this internship and I have been very fortunate and have gotten to work with 4-H, FCS, and ANR. I’ve really gotten to see several different sides of extension and become more familiar with areas I wasn’t aware even existed. This internship has been an incredible experience and has done nothing but reassure me that extension is where I want to be, it has however made me question which area of extension I want to be a part of. 4-H will always be something I love and enjoy being involved with, but Ag is also incredibly gratifying.  I’ve been working with Marion Counties Ag agent and going to farm visits and field days which have really shown me the impact extension can have on someone. Ag agents can help a struggling farmer to produce better products or increase their income just enough so they can survive when without extension the family farm might have gone under. Extension has real world impact, with 4-H you can help youth develop skills or help their confidence grow, FCS works to improve people’s lives through health, finance, and development of skills, and ANR helps people produce better products and improve practices. It is absolutely amazing all of the things that Cooperative Extension can do for people, but at the same time it’s also impressive how little most people utilize the services that extension provides. The people who do utilize extension are working to improve themselves in some way and the agents who provide their time and expertise want nothing more than for that person to succeed, and that’s why I want to be an extension agent.

The past seven weeks have been some of the most hectic weeks of my life but I have enjoyed every minute of it with the exception of spraining my knee, but other than that it has been absolutely amazing. I can honestly say that I never know what is going to happen the next day even though I have a calendar filled with events and programs that are planned weeks in advance; I just never know what will actually be going on until I walk in the office the next day. In fact last Wednesday my calendar said I would be in the office supervising a craft class, doing early entries for the fair, attending a program council meeting, and doing a program on the radio, in reality I was on the radio and attended the program council meeting, and spent the afternoon visiting dairy farms. It’s a good thing a keep a pair of jeans and work boots in my office because I don’t think my khakis and flip-flops would have cut it. My inability to know just what is happening next might be because I have been working with all of the agents in Marion County, but it seems that with extension there is always something unexpected happening and you have to just go with it. There is always something new and interesting happening, this is not a boring desk job. This job can be challenging and forces you to think and learn, which is another reason I want be an extension agent.