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Very little has been published reporting on long-term outcomes experienced by young adults (aged 19 to 34 years old) who participated in 4-H youth development programs. We adopted Gambone et al.'s (2002) framework advancing three long-term outcomes for early adulthood: economic stability, health and well-being, and community involvement. With cross-sectional survey methods, we compared long-term impacts between 693 California 4-H young adult alumni and 373 young adults in a U.S. general population sample who had not participated in 4-H. The results demonstrated that 4-H alumni report more positive long-term outcomes than the U.S. general population sample. The study contributes to the dearth of research around long-term outcomes, may be useful for marketing and funding, and will help better understanding the public value of Extension.

Young people need digital competency and confidence to effectively harness computing power to solve problems and design solutions; a core component is improving young people's computational thinking. Unfortunately, access to computer science education is lacking for all youth, and in particular for youth who live in lower-income households, who are Black or Latino, or live in rural areas. With funding from Google, through the National 4-H Council, California 4-H embarked on a three-year project to build the capacity of 4-H professionals, volunteers, and teenagers to facilitate computer science education with youth. Our programming was effective as assessed with survey methodology. We offer recommendations to Extension professionals in replicating computer science education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Penn State Extension conducted on-farm food safety workshops statewide to train fruit and vegetable growers on Good Agricultural Practices (GAPs). These workshops were evaluated using pre- and post-tests to assess the impact of the training on participating growers. Results indicate overall increases in produce growers' knowledge, attitudes, confidence, and intentions on GAP-related activities. However, few respondents (20%) intended to seek third-party certification (TPC) for their farms. Future evaluations should collect information on the challenges that growers face in implementing GAPs on their farms. Extension should tailor its food safety programs to meet growers' GAPs needs.