PURDUE EXTENSION IMPACT REPORT 2024
We invite you to read our 2024 Annual Impact Report to learn about some of the significant activities that Purdue Extension has led during this past year.
We feature some of our most well-known programs, such as Master Gardener, as well as such up-and-coming ventures as Purdue on the Farm. In every story, what you discover and see in action is Extension’s profound commitment to providing diverse opportunities and ongoing support to all Indiana residents and to contributing to our state’s continued growth and stability.
Purdue’s College of Agriculture is committed to ensuring that Purdue Extension continues to make these crucial, at times even life-changing, contributions by looking to the future with determination and clarity about changes and growth that need to happen. To accomplish this goal, the Future of Extension Task Force met throughout the past year, conducted an expansive survey that garnered almost 3,000 responses, and then submitted a report to College of Agriculture leadership in late August.
Since that time, we have been sharing a summary of the report and consulting with supporters, volunteers, public officials and staff members and leaders throughout the university, conducting an additional review of Extension operations on the West Lafayette campus, and beginning the implementation of several of the report’s recommendations.
Major changes will need to be made to plan for and secure the future of Extension. Our commitment to Indiana, our fellow residents and Extension staff members remains our guiding priority. Thank you for your support of Purdue Extension.
Bernie Engel
Glenn
W.
Sample Dean of Agriculture, Purdue University College of Agriculture
Angela Abbott Interim Director of Purdue Extension, Purdue University College of Agriculture
Purdue University prohibits discrimination against any member of the University community on the basis of race, religion, color, sex, age, national origin or ancestry, genetic information, marital status, parental status, sexual orientation, gender identity and expression, disability, or status as a veteran.
CULTIVATING
LOCAL LEADERS IN
CIVIC SERVICE
“We should all be champions of county services that help with our growth.”
– Stacy Killion, community engagement manager
Stacy Killion credits the training she received from Purdue Extension’s board development program for her positive experience as a volunteer board member. “I want to be an active member in my community,” the Terre Haute resident says. “There’s no better way than service.”
Killion is the community engagement manager for the Terre Haute Children’s Museum. She serves on the Vigo County School Corporation Board of School Trustees and is the Indiana School Boards Association’s Region 7 director. She is also on the boards of the Vigo County Public Library, Vigo County Education Foundation and the former Family Service Association of the Wabash Valley Inc.
Regional and county Extension educators host the threehour, in-person program to better prepare volunteers for serving on local nonprofit and civic boards. “This workshop helps them have the skills to have a productive board and builds capacity for volunteers to be great members wherever they serve,” says Steve Yoder, Purdue Extension community development regional educator.
Yoder is part of a team of educators who teach the session as part of Extension’s Community Leadership program. The session is available as a stand-alone workshop for individual nonprofit boards as well. He also is on a larger team of Extension administrators, educators and curriculum experts who developed a version tailored for Purdue’s County Extension Boards, which launched last year.
During the workshop, participants learn how to recruit other volunteers; engage people once they have been recruited; and retain new board members and celebrate the success of their efforts in the community.
Extension’s goal is that volunteers like Killion leave as more confident leaders with a professional network and the know-how to recruit others, helping to make their boards more effective and strengthening their communities as a whole.
“Extension’s program helps you understand your role as a board member, that you’re there to serve,” Killion says.
PROGRAM IMPACT
Extension educators LEAD VOLUNTEERS THROUGH TRAINING MODULES FOR RECRUITMENT, ENGAGEMENT AND RENEWAL — the three phases of the board development cycle.
PURDUE
ON THE FARM
LINKS GROWERS AND RESEARCHERS
Grower Matthew Tobias and Extension’s Scott Gabbard continue a tradition of partnership between Purdue Extension and the Steinbarger family.
Purdue Extension’s Scott Gabbard had known Mike and Anngie Steinbarger since their daughters Hayley and Michelle — now married with children of their own — were youngsters. He has known Michelle’s husband, Matthew Tobias, since Matthew was in 4-H. Gabbard joined the family and the entire community in grieving the loss of their patriarch, Mike, during planting season this spring.
Gabbard has built a relationship with the Edinburgh, Indiana, farm family. They grow roughly 2,600 acres across four operations that involve Anngie, a past member of the Indiana Soybean Alliance board; Hayley and Dan Clark (along with their own operation, which includes Dan’s father Bill Clark and brother, Amos Clark); Michelle and Matthew Tobias; and Anngie’s nephew, John Burbrink. In addition to corn, soybeans and hay, the family has a cattle operation, Smooth Stone Cattle Company. Each family member also works off-farm.
“We all control our own ground and own decisions, but we share equipment and share in labor,” Matthew Tobias explains.
Gabbard now heads Purdue on the Farm, which he describes as “the interaction between the farmer, the Extension educators out in the field, and Extension faculty and researchers on campus.” The comprehensive program also involves the Purdue Agricultural Centers (PACs) and Agronomy Center for Research & Education (ACRE) with Conservation Cropping Systems Initiative , the Indiana Soybean Alliance and the Indiana Corn Marketing Council.
Purdue on the Farm connects Extension with growers and partners in four ways: through client surveys; crop scouting,
in which Extension educators assess a corn or soybean field three times a year; demonstrating cropping system products, hybrids, management practices and other factors that producers are curious about; and on-farm research.
After scouting reports are sent to the farmer, they are aggregated and shared statewide. In the College of Agriculture, the scouting results inform prescriptive research trials. For Tobias, who works for a crop insurance company (along with Anngie, Hayley and Michelle), the data is also valuable in his claims work.
Gabbard calls Purdue on the Farm, now in its second full year, “an intentional reset of our relationship with the farmers.”
Instead of researchers generating all the ideas, the crop surveys are prompting conversations between farmers and Extension educators — “What happens if we do x, y or z?” — some of which may continue across growing seasons. “Extension is always about relationships, but this takes a higher level of commitment,” Gabbard says.
As Purdue Extension continues to strengthen its monitoring capacity with the use of evolving technology, some research trials are also getting underway.
“Mike was a big proponent of testing stuff,” Tobias says. “He and Scott got along really well for that. They thought a lot alike.”
Gabbard is working with Tobias and Dan Clark on a Balansa clover trial at the farm in which corn is planted directly into the cover crop. “We’re going to see if there’s any yield drag or not. It would be awesome if there’s actually a yield
increase, because clover is a nitrogen provider,” Gabbard says. “With on-farm research, we have the flexibility to go down a lot of rabbit holes.”
“Scott knows that Mike was a big advocate of cover crops,” Tobias says. “He approached us about trying something different that might help our soils and our crop. We’re excited to see if the clover does provide any benefit for the corn crop growing there, if we can tell anything come harvest time.
“I don’t know if we will or not,” he adds. But either way, Tobias says he will continue to welcome interaction with Extension through Purdue on the Farm. “It’s more seeing what works and more importantly, what doesn’t work for our operation,” he says. “I feel Scott wants to work with us on things we can easily transition into our operation and yearly protocols.”
PROGRAM IMPACT
• Based on scouting reports, 79% OF FARMERS REPORTED THAT THEY ADOPTED A NEW PRACTICE OR TECHNOLOGY after receiving Extension recommendations.
• As a result of the new practice, farmers reported FINANCIAL IMPROVEMENT: INCREASED DOLLAR RETURN PER ACRE (40%), and REDUCED COSTS PER ACRE (40%).
• Farmers said INDEPENDENT RESEARCH ON COVER CROPS (85%), FERTILITY (69%) AND CONSERVATION PRACTICES (54%) would be most impactful to their operations.
Purdue on the Farm is a collaborative effort across many agricultural entities, but relationships are at its core.
Gabbard and Tobias discuss the current crop and how research might impact future yields.
BETTER HEALTH
Vivian Delatorre is part of the first cohort in Purdue Extension’s Food as Medicine program held in the new Healthy Communities Teaching Kitchen at NexusPark in Columbus, Indiana. Delatorre is not only learning healthier food preparation for herself and her husband; as an employee at the VIMCare Clinic in NexusPark, she also is excited to recommend the program to patients, many of whom are underinsured and from low-income households.
“My job at the front desk is my first job in a medical setting, so the information from the classes will help me there,” she says. “It is a great learning experience about food and health.”
Food as Medicine helps Indiana residents make potentially lifesaving dietary changes. Programs are tailored to community needs but often involve nutrition education, meal kits and innovative partnerships.
In Columbus, data from a health needs survey conducted by Columbus Regional Hospital is the basis for Food as Medicine programs. “Nutrition, obesity and diabetes are always high on our health needs,” says Julie Knight, a registered dietitian with Healthy Communities, the hospital’s public health arm.
Knight, who leads the steering team for the teaching kitchen, invited Stephen Dishinger, Bartholomew County Extension educator, and Katelyn Kutemeier, Purdue Extension Nutrition Education Program community wellness coordinator, to develop and present the Food as Medicine program at the new facility.
During the program, Dishinger provides participants with practical tips on food selection and preparation as
part of meal demonstrations. Kutemeier works with local food producers to fill bags with all the ingredients that participants need to recreate the meals at home.
Knight and her Extension partners are already applying lessons learned from working with the first cohort to a second Food as Medicine program adapted for VIMCare Clinic patients with high blood pressure. “We are looking to make a change in that biomarker,” she says.
PROGRAM IMPACT
• Extension provided 224 LEARNING SESSIONS related to Food as Medicine involving 53 YOUTH AND 2,208 ADULTS (2023-2024).
• Extension professionals TAILORED PROGRAMS TO THEIR AUDIENCES with such topics as heart health, food insecurity, budgeting and meal planning, reading food labels, accessing local foods and physical activity across the lifespan.
• Participants self-reported LEARNING SOMETHING NEW; INCREASED AWARENESS OF OR CONFIDENCE about a topic; NEW SKILLS; AND WILLINGNESS TO “try, adopt, change, apply” what they learned.
Registered dietitian Julie Knight helps Extension’s Stephen Dishinger demonstrate healthy cooking at NexusPark.
LEARNING LAB
PURDUE EXTENSION FACILITATIVE LEADERSHIP WORKSHOP
“This training is so skills-based, you leave feeling confident and able to use these techniques toward your goal.”
– Eric Hessel, vice president of programs
As vice president of programs for the Hendricks County Community Foundation, Eric Hessel has been in his share of meetings. He can spot one that’s well run, and he knows the consequences of one that isn’t.
“When leaving a poorly facilitated meeting,” he says, “you’re thinking, ‘ugh, I never want to come back.’”
So when Hessel led a committee to rebuild his foundation’s scholarship program from scratch, he used tools and techniques that he learned in Purdue Extension’s threeday Facilitative Leadership workshop to draw out ideas, encourage discussion, and guide participants toward inclusive decisions and actionable plans.
Using green, yellow and red dots to “vote” on how to weigh different criteria for the scholarship, Hessel’s group got through its agenda quickly. Over five fast-paced meetings, he didn’t lose a single committee member.
“It was visual and active, and it got us to an end result faster than if we had just sat around a table talking about it. I know some people didn’t agree with some of the things we landed on, but they felt their voice was heard in the process,” he says.
“Those are the kind of things you pick up at the Facilitative Leadership workshop.”
The workshops have drawn more than 400 Indiana participants since 2015, including Extension educators and representatives from local and state governments, education, nonprofits and coalitions, and like Hessel, community foundations.
“As we work on big, complex community issues that have a lot of different stakeholders and challenges, we saw communities needing a more inclusive and robust process to make those decisions,” says Tamara Ogle, a community development regional educator who has led the course more than 20 times.
Like several alumni of the program, Hessel has refreshed his skills as a volunteer trainer at additional Facilitative Leadership workshops.
PROGRAM IMPACT
• 400 PARTICIPANTS in Indiana since 2015.
• In 2023, 96% OF PARTICIPANTS IMPROVED THEIR SKILLS to plan and lead a facilitation.
• At the one-year follow-up evaluation, participants REPORTED USING THEIR NEW SKILLS TO LEAD MEETINGS AND FACILITATE DECISION-MAKING, PLAN AND POLICY DEVELOPMENT, AND PROJECT PLANNING for local communities and organizations.
WORKFORCE DEVELOPMENT
HARNESSING AND HEIGHTENING
SKILL SETS
Growing communities means growing job needs and opportunities. Across its four program areas, Purdue Extension is helping the Hoosier workforce adapt traditional skills and build new ones.
Health and Human Sciences
Whether it’s gravied Swiss steak and mashed potatoes or berry pies served á la mode, food brings people together. Christ Kurtis, the owner and operator of Christos Family Dining in Plymouth, Indiana, takes this role seriously, pointing out conversation starters in black-and-white photos across themed dining rooms of antiques, stained glass and ceiling murals.
Despite his restaurant’s deep-rooted history and oldfashioned, homestyle meals, Kurtis has seen great change in the food industry. To keep up, he has relied on ServSafe Manager Certification offered through Purdue Extension to inform him of current best practices for handling food.
“I enjoyed the last training because they concentrated more on allergies and how things have changed over the last five years,” he says.
In 2022 the Indiana Department of Health (IDOH) began requiring certification for home-based vendors making and selling jams, jellies and baked goods. “When Indiana implemented the legislation, Purdue Extension was identified as a trusted partner to cover it through ServSafe Food Handler training,” says Karen Richey, a health and human sciences Extension educator who has taught ServSafe courses for over 30 years. ServSafe is an educational program developed by the National Restaurant Association.
Purdue Extension also has received IDOH funding to work with Purdue’s Food Engineering and Manufacturing Institute on food safety for home-based vendors’ products.
A recent graduate from Richey’s food handler training is more often found in a sea of purple flowers than a kitchen. Doreen King and her husband, Mike, cultivate and operate Lakeside Lavender and Herbs in La Porte, Indiana.
“I felt like a baker already,” says Doreen King, who makes bath and body products using raw materials with added lavender essential oil. “I wanted ServSafe for my own comfort level.”
Christ Kurtis maintains an old-fashioned atmosphere in his restaurant, but he depends on Purdue Extension to look forward in food safety.
Master Gardeners Jeff Hatcher and Daniel Collar harvest produce at the Chain O’ Lakes Community Re-Entry Center in Noble County.
HOOSIERS’
In a growing business embraced by their community, the Kings saw opportunity to enter the world of food. Lavenderflavored baked goods are rapidly gaining popularity, and two local coffee houses are already buying the Kings’ flowers to make sweet syrups.
With aspirations of lavender cookies and scones, dried teas and charcuterie boards, Doreen King enjoyed the training’s safety advice and navigation through the new laws. “ServSafe is a tool that will help me right now and in the future,” she says. “If we decide to take that next step, it’ll give me the confidence to do it.”
Agriculture and Natural Resources
Lavender farms are also popular spots for educational tours, especially for the plant-loving Purdue Extension Master Gardeners . Noble County’s chapter visited a local farm this year, and Master Gardener Jeff Hatcher was excited to see how “everybody’s way of growing things is different.”
For Hatcher and Daniel Collar, both residents of the Chain O’Lakes Community Re-Entry Center, their experience going from incarceration to Master Gardener graduates has been characterized by learning from and accepting each other’s differences.
While Noble County Master Gardeners have long been educating residents at the re-entry center and helping them keep a garden there, Hatcher, Collar and four other residents decided they wanted to take the classes last spring to become Master Gardeners themselves.
Ann Kline, agriculture and natural resources Extension educator and director, says the aspiring Master Gardeners from the re-entry center fit right in. “Now that they are actively involved in meetings and volunteer activities, the entire group gets to see that they are just normal guys and dedicated gardeners, and they’ve enjoyed interacting with them.”
Although both have full-time work assignments now, Hatcher and Collar still make time to be in the garden and teach a new cohort of residents. Continuing the work is important, Collar says. “I know the fresh produce we grow is going to a good cause at the food bank. And I enjoy doing it, just for relaxation and peace of mind.”
Doreen King says ServSafe training is essential to new opportunities in food for her lavender business.
St. Joseph, Perry, Vigo and other Indiana counties are bolstering their communities by including incarcerated individuals in their local Master Gardener programs.
Hatcher plans to stay in Noble County after he graduates from the center. He’s looking forward to continuing teaching residents “how to grow things properly and reap the benefits of it in their community,” he says. “I’d never be where I’m at today without the Purdue class and Extension educators, so I feel obligated to give back because they reached out to us and gave me a whole different way of life.”
Community Development
Collar, Hatcher and many others have grown into their green thumbs with the Master Gardeners, but Purdue Extension also provides resources for those looking to become more technologically inclined. Daniel Walker, community development regional Extension educator in West Lafayette, Indiana, says that Purdue Extension’s Digital Ready Business introduces people to the tools they need to expand their businesses’ online and social media presence.
The program helped him ready the family commercial and residential roofing company for the next generation, says Beau Curless, a Purdue Agriculture alumnus and owner of R.A. Curless Construction Inc. in Martinsville, Indiana.
“I took the course because the business has been word of mouth for the last 40 years, and it’s now my job to bring it online.”
Curless, both the man and the company, aren’t alone in seeing the impact of joining the virtual bandwagon. “In past sessions, we’ve seen more than 90% of participants report that the training increased their knowledge and recommended the series to others,” Walker says.
“Applying strategies learned, they reported increased customer engagement, customer base and sales.”
4-H Youth Development
To meet 21st century demands, Purdue Extension efforts open doors for the tech-savvy workforce much earlier. Through the Indiana 4-H Invention Convention program and 4-H Robotics , grade-schoolers test their creative problem-solving skills.
WORKFORCE DEVELOPMENT IMPACT ACROSS AUDIENCES
SERVSAFE MANAGERIAL AND FOOD HANDLER CERTIFICATION
• 438 participants passed ServSafe exams demonstrating proficiency in knowledge of safe food handling practices: 363, Manager certification; and 75, the Food Handler exam.
• Extension delivered 141 ServSafe sessions in 37 counties (2023-2024).
MASTER GARDENERS’ PARTNERSHIPS WITH RE-ENTRY FACILITIES
• Noble County cohort of six residents passed Master Gardener training last spring, the first of several counties starting similar partnerships.
• By volunteering at local food banks and donating fresh produce from facility gardens, re-entry facility residents reconnect with their community.
Purdue Extension is helping owner Beau Curless bring his construction company online to boost sales and customer engagement.
Abby Magner teaches elementary school science in Brown County Schools in Nashville, Indiana. Two years ago she asked her older students to choose a real-world problem and use tools around them to solve it.
Magner was able to connect her students to the Indiana 4-H Invention Convention program, where they presented their projects to judges along with students from across the state. Three of her students advanced to the national convention and are considering pursuing patents for their work.
“I’m a big advocate for STEM education for any kid, and it was especially great to see two girls from my group picked to go to nationals,” Magner says. “The younger students feel like they can do the same. One of my third-graders has already come to me with ideas for their future project.”
Corey Sharp, 4-H youth development Extension educator, partnered with the Elkhart Area Career Center to run a twoweek Invention Convention summer camp in which high school juniors and seniors collaborated on teams to solve real-world, local industrial problems. They worked with NIBCO, whose Goshen plant is a global plumbing supplier. After learning about the company’s current obstacles, the high school teams used 3D printers and robots in the career center to build prototypes to improve production.
The students not only gain useful skills, Sharp says, but their age makes this program a great gateway to the workplace, as they network and showcase their critical thinking skills to an area employer.
4-H also has a separate robotics competition in which students put technology into action. Rachel Haselby, 4-H youth development science Extension specialist, says robotics are the perfect way to interest kids in coding.
INVENTION CONVENTION AND ROBOTICS
• A $4 billion microchip company planned for West Lafayette reflects the importance of science, technology, engineering and mathematics skills for the 21st century workforce.
• Partnerships between Extension educators and local industries offer networking and internship opportunities for young adults.
Students compete by building robots of their own with kits or affordable items. The robots are put to the test in an agriculture-themed arena, where they must follow lines, overcome terrain, and grab and move objects.
The students develop computational thinking skills — “helpful for computer programming as well as all of life’s problems,” Haselby says.
STEM programs through Purdue Extension— focusing on science, technology, engineering and math — are giving youth the skills that Indiana employers need in their future workers.
DIGITAL READY BUSINESS
• Family-owned businesses need to compete in a virtual shopping world and build their customer base beyond word of mouth.
• Over 90% of participants would recommend Digital Ready Business training to others.
STUDENTS PRACTICE
ESSENTIAL
COMMUNICATION SKILLS
Erin Harmon piloted Discovery Challenge in her sixth-grade classroom, and the results surprised her.
Last year in a 4-H pilot program called Discovery Challenge, Madison Hardy chose to study Yorkshire pigs. “I’m in 4-H, and every year I showed Yorkshire pigs at the county fair, and I thought it would be a really good topic,” says the seventh grader at Eastern Hancock Middle School.
Discovery Challenge helps elementary schoolers in Indiana gain the mastery and confidence to share topics of interest with their classmates. They also are practicing communication skills needed for future school and workforce success.
Madison learned much more than facts about her show animal. Of the different aspects of her project — selecting the topic, conducting research using reliable sources, writing and rewriting her report, and practicing and presenting her findings — she most liked delivering her presentation.
“Madison did a wonderful job,” says her sixth-grade teacher, Erin Harmon, citing the student’s strong opening and enthusiasm for her topic. Harmon, now an assistant principal at Eastern Hancock Middle-High School, even chose Madison’s work for inclusion in a video presentation to the community.
“At first I was skeptical,” Harmon says. “I thought, ‘Oh gosh, we’re going to ask these kids to write a speech when most of them would rather do anything else than stand up and talk in front of their peers.’”
But her students surprised her. They chose an impressively diverse range of topics to explore, from coding to racehorses to foster care to how to change oil in an RV.
They showed passion and enthusiasm, and, above all, personal growth.
Based on the pilot’s success, Discovery Challenge, led by Bill Decker, Purdue Extension 4-H regional educator, debuted in the third through fifth grades at Eastern Hancock Elementary in Charlottesville, Indiana, and is launching in about 10 other sites statewide.
As Indiana strengthens the standards for skills that future workers will need, such as communications, Purdue Extension responds with programs like Discovery Challenge. The program will “grow” along with each cohort — eventually to 12th grade, with competitions and greater focus on careers.
PROGRAM IMPACT
Aligns with 13 INDIANA ACADEMIC STANDARDS, including:
• 4.CC.6 Create oral presentations that maintain a clear focus, using multimedia to enhance the development of main ideas and themes that engage the audience.
• 5.RC.10 Combine information from several texts or digital sources on the same topic in order to demonstrate knowledge about the subject.
• 3-5.WE.9 Display a variety of skills needed for school, personal, and professional situations.
Indiana’s 18 employability skills standards for youth include integrity, perseverance, adaptability, selfconfidence and problem solving. For over a century, 4-H has combined all 18 standards in a fun and supportive environment.
Through many 4-H programs, camps and projects, 4-H members grow and become leaders in their communities as well as in the business world. Here, former members reflect on how 4-H shaped their character and built their professional confidence.
John Beale, owner and manager, Beale Feeds LLC
4-H is where I learned the skills to start my commercial feed business in high school.
I was a 4-H member for 10 years. I showed animals at the fairs, which was fun, but I loved doing the record sheets. A lot of people think record sheets are silly, but I thought they were the most important part of the project. They helped me to understand the basics of bookkeeping and budgeting, which was useful for my family’s farm and for my business.
4-H also taught me how to build relationships and communicate better. I was a 4-H camp counselor, which
PASSIONS PLANTED IN
4-H YOUTH DEVELOPMENT
GROW WITH CAREERS
was great experience working with youth and adults. I met a lot of individuals. We learned to work together, even if we didn’t see eye to eye all the time.
Now, I help my family with their cow-calf operation and row crops while also running my business, which diversifies our profits. My family uses the feed for their operation, but we also sell it to local customers in and around Carroll County.
Cayla Walker, owner, Daisy’s
Designs
Through being a 4-H volunteer and 10-year member, I found my niche and created a job I love that gives back to my community.
After doing aquatic science projects with 4-H, I got involved at the state level. I spent almost every weekend in middle and high school doing some sort of 4-H camp. I never wanted to leave 4-H.
Cayla Walker (left) was part of a 4-H chorus in 2007.
After going to college to be an Extension educator, I found I didn’t enjoy teaching. That’s when I started my embroidery and screen printing business. It was tough at first, and I was working five or six part-time jobs while I got my business started.
4-H taught me the persistence I needed to get through that time. As a kid, you don’t realize what you take away from those late nights. I only realized when I got older how valuable those experiences were.
Now, my business has a storefront and services 4-H groups, locally and nationally, and other organizations. It’s exciting to see my hard work and that of my employees paying off and to make a difference in the community.
Matthew Skiba, assistant director of bands, McCutcheon High School
4-H showed me how I can bring passion into my job as a high school band director. There’s a lot I do now that I’ve either already had experience doing or that I’ve been a part of myself.
I worked on a variety of 4-H projects, including aerospace, woodworking and photography, and participated in the State 4-H Junior Leadership Conference. I also got involved with the State 4-H Band for two years in high school. These experiences taught me how to manage time, communicate and find passion in my work.
Those things were valuable to me in college and now in my career. Some days I’m exhausted or less motivated than normal, but I don’t dread work. 4-H helped me to find a job that works well for me. I found passion through putting work into projects I genuinely enjoyed.
I didn’t always recognize what 4-H did for me, but as I grew into a teacher and realized where some of those skills developed, I refound an enthusiasm for 4-H and how it lets students explore their passions.
Kyle Mohler, founder and CEO, Insignum AgTech
When I presented my 4-H projects at the fair, I had one chance to get it right. Since I’ve founded my biotech company, Insignum AgTech, I’ve encountered similar high-pressure situations.
In 4-H, I did projects on everything from swine to soil and water conservation to wheat. Through trial and error, I made the projects the best possible. Sometimes they turned out great, and sometimes they turned out ugly.
We’re trying to blaze a new trail with Insignum AgTech, and there’s a lot of trial and error. Sometimes we succeed, but sometimes we fall flat on our faces.
4-H taught me that in those times you need to be confident that you can fix things and figure them out.
My company is working to create genes that help farmers detect fungal infections in corn.
I’m excited to bring a new tool to farmers, and I love seeing their excitement over the new technology. I hope my company makes farming crops easier for people like my dad, who grows corn and soybeans.
Kyle Mohler has carried his farm upbringing, 4-H experience and studies in biotechnology into Insignium AgTech, which he founded in 2018 to help farmers better detect stress signals in crops.
Cayla Walker’s business has both a storefront and an online catalog for custom embroidered products.
FUTURE
DIRECTIONS
Purdue Extension continues to look ahead to assess the needs of Indiana communities and to support their planning and decisionmaking with research-based information. In 2025 and beyond, our efforts will include:
• 4-H youth development programs that focus on CAREER READINESS, equipping youth to be healthy, productive and engaged members of society — Beyond Ready to contribute and fill the jobs needed by the state’s employers.
• Continuing to strengthen Indiana’s capacity to build RESILIENT, INCLUSIVE AND SUSTAINABLE COMMUNITIES using new research-based resources and processes related to child care, housing, clean energy, workforce development and civic engagement.
• Minimizing INVASIVE SPECIES’ threats to human health, the environment and the economy through effective management and prompt reporting. A team of experts from varied disciplines conducts research and outreach to help stakeholders assess strategies to reduce risks and mitigate or eliminate the effects of invasive species.
• Promoting HEALTHY AGING THROUGH FALL PREVENTION in an evidence-based program, A Matter of Balance, developed for the many older adults who restrict their activity due to concerns about falling.
• Improving REGIONAL QUALITY OF LIFE AND PLACE by focusing on two key social determinants of health in the seven-county Wabash Heartland region — transportation and child care — as part of a five-year Lilly Endowment grant awarded to Purdue University.
