March 2009 Articles

Archives by Months

Spiritual Corner

As I’m about to start my senior year of college and begin my graduate classes as well, I realize that I am getting closer and closer to starting my future career. With my goal of achieving a bachelor’s degree in animal science and a master’s degree in education, my plan is to hopefully work with young people through being a teacher or 4-H agent, or through some other mentor role. Naturally as I get closer and closer to reaching this goal and starting this plan, I have begun to think more about what kind of role model, educator, and leader I want to be to the youth I work with. I know that we all have those few adults in our lives who were leaders or teachers or something similar to us who positively impacted us and who helped get us to where we are today. We look back at these mentors and are thankful for their care and devotion to seeing us succeed, for their pushing us to our limits. We look back, and we realize that we can only hope to be like them and affect youth in the same positive way that they affected us. We all have those people in our lives, right? I know I do at least. I have so many educators and mentors and leaders that have taught, coached, and led me to be the person I am today. I have so many people I am thankful for and grateful to, and so many people I have learned from and am honored just to know. However, as I grow closer to becoming an educator or leader to youth in the near future, there is one person who stands out in my mind that I owe so much to, and who I feel is the type of leader I want to be to my future youth or students one day. That person is Mr. Jason Holmes. Mr. Jason was my 4-H agent for several years of my 4-H career. He mentored me through livestock showing, 4-H University Ag demonstration projects, 4-H camp counseling, 4-H young leaders, 4-H shooting sports and hunters education, and through countless other activities. Mr. Jason has always been the epitome of a role model to me, for he has constantly showed how hard-working he is, and how truly dedicated he is to his 4-H youth. As a future educator, I hope that the parents and youth I am involved with can see the devotion I have for my job, and that my students can see as easily as I the devotion Mr. Jason has for his 4-H youth. Mr. Jason is also a person who demands respect from those around him. I don’t know how he does it, but every 4-Her he has been involved with has had nothing but the utmost respect for him. I have always respected him, and I knew never to cross him or make him mad; however, I wasn’t afraid to talk to him and ask him for help if I needed it, and I was able to joke around with him. That’s how he is with all his youth. As a 4-Her, you respect Mr. Jason, you know not to make him mad, but you still enjoy being around him and he becomes your favorite leader. That is what I think marks a truly good mentor. When you can discipline youth, yet they still love you and want to listen to you. That is the kind of educator I want to be. I remember specifically how much Mr. Jason worked with my cousin, Andrea Deason, and I when we were competing at 4-H University in the team Ag demonstration project. We were constantly over at the 4-H extension office, doing our project for him over and over until he was satisfied with our performance. He would give us critique after critique on our speech and our demonstration and our notes. He would take us to the veterinarian’s office, poultry houses, and the Homer research center, and to cattle farms, and just all over to whatever place we needed to go to get practice for our demonstration and to talk to the people we needed to for our project. We competed every year of high school and each year we continued to place a little higher. We placed 6th our freshmen year, 4th our sophomore year, 3rd our junior year, and we finally won our senior year. I can remember Andrea and I’s attitude throughout those 4 years. We wanted to win so badly, but the main reason we wanted to win was because we wanted to see the look on Mr. Jason’s face when we did; we wanted to make him proud more than anything. So, as you can see from this article, Mr. Jason is a mentor and leader like no other. He puts his whole self into his work and into helping his 4-H youth. He demands respect from his youth, and disciplines them to where they know what is right and wrong and wouldn’t dare cross him. He has the personality, however, to where the kids still love him and enjoy him being their leader. And his leadership causes his youth to want to make him proud more than anything. Mr. Jason has been a positive influence in my life from the time he entered it. I have enjoyed him being my 4-H agent and have always been able to go to him if I ever needed anything, and I know that I still can. Spending time with him and with Andrea working on our Ag demonstration project is what made me decide for sure that I wanted to study agriculture in college. Mr. Jason is a special person, and I seriously hope that one day I will be able to be the kind of leader and mentor to my students or youth that he has been to me. I know I probably have never shown you enough how much I appreciate you, so I just wanted to say thank you, Mr. Jason. By Dana Bennett