Progress 09/01/23 to 08/31/24
Outputs
Target Audience:*The target audience for this program are members of the Colorado River Indian Tribes (CRIT) beginning from kids who attend Head Start to adults who farms, gardens or interested in cooking and preserving food. The program offers 4-H/youth development, which includes school gardens, animal raising projects, club programs, community service, shooting sports, etc., farming and ranching programs, and gardening, tree and yard (landscaping) educational programs. Program participants who are non-tribal are also welcome to attend. *The 4-H Youth Development Program targets youth from the age of 8 to 18. FRTEP encourages tribal youth in this age group to participate in the 4-H program to help them develop skills in raising different animals, develop self discipline, communication, leadership and other life skills. A sub program of 4-H is the Cloverbuds, which caters to young kids aged 5-7 years old. They engage in different developmentally appropriate activities in a non-competitive environment to explore the kids' interests. The FRTEP Program also serves the CRIT Head Start students which are between the ages of 3-5. They are exposed to vegetable gardening at the school garden. *The Le Pera Elementary School promotes youth development with their school garden program. It caters to students at the local school within the reservation. It is targeted primarily to the 6th, 7th and 8th grades but interested classes in the lower grades are also welcome to participate. Aside from the 6th, 7th and 8th grades, the garden gets participation from the 3rd and 4th grades. The school is open to all students of any race, so our participants include tribal as well as non-tribal students. *The farming sector in the reservation is composed of both tribal farmers and non-tribal farmers who leased lands from the tribe. The tribe also runs its own corporate farm. These farmers operate a total of 70,000 acres of land within the reservation. FRTEP provides workshops, field trials, and consultations on crop, pest, and disease management, and nutrition, in collaboration with the Extension Specialists and Ag Agents of the University of Arizona Cooperative Extension. *Another sector being served is the cattle growers in the reservation, both range type and backyard growers. They will be provided with programs that will help them improve animal care and improving health of their animals. Backyard cattle production is growing, with more of the younger members of the community getting into cattle growing. *The ANR horticulture program is targeted to the rest of the tribal community who are interested in Vegetable Gardening, and food preservation. FRTEP provides gardening and food preservation workshops, demonstration and community gardens to help community members learn and improve gardening techniques. As the reservation is very close to the town of Parker, our FRTEP program also has participants from the town of Parker who are non-tribal and are mostly Caucasians and Hispanics. Changes/Problems:
Nothing Reported
What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?*FRTEP continues to provide annual national professional development conferences that provide professional development opportunities for Tribal Extension Educators. These are an opportunity to share good practices and learn from each other on what works best for tribal communities. The Intertribal Agricultural Council (IAC) as well as the Southwest Indian Agricultural Association (SWIAA) has invited FRTEP agents to participate in their annual conferences. This has provided networking opportunities to learn what is happening in other tribal communities and what programming can be adapted to your own community. *The University of Arizona Cooperative Extension has also included the FRTEP educators in Arizona to participate in their Annual Extension Conference. This provides additional learning in extension programming as well as networking opportunities with Extension Specialists, Agents and professors that can serve as resource persons for various workshops that the tribal community may need. The three other departments of Extension, namely Ag and Natural Resources (ANR), 4-H, and the Family, Consumer and Health Sciences (FCHS), also have their annual in-service retreats. FRTEP educators are invited to participate in these in-service that can provide additional learning opportunities for professional development. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?*Local print media has been instrumental in disseminating information to the public. The article that they wrote about the school garden project has resulted in financial donations for the school garden project. *Social media has continued to convey information on upcoming programs as well as news of recently concluded activities. It has helped improve attendance at workshops and other activities. *Exhibits and posters were displayed during the La Paz County Fair to showcase the services and projects of FRTEP and the County Extension Office. These are updated every year with new information and pictures of activities for the current year. *The Tribal Extension Webpage and the Le Pera School Website has continued to provide information of Tribal Extension programs and activities. What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?*The main thrust of the 4-H program is to get more youth to participate in the program. The AZ 4-H Foundation is offering another competitive mini-grant this year, so we will submit an application to teach traditional arts and crafts to the youth and their parents/guardians. Hopefully this gets funded so we can continue to encourage and increase tribal youth enrollment in 4-H. The application for the WSARE grant last year was funded, so the Drone Technology program will continue for the next three years. We will aim to provide training to farmers on the use of drones for pest control application and monitoring crop health. *The introduction of Hydroponics technology to the school garden project did not materialize last year because the teacher who was supposed to handle it transferred to a different state. We will continue to look for a teacher who is interested to take on this project. *Americorps members were helpful this past year, so we will continue to utilize their help in the garden projects. *FRTEP will collaborate with AZ Health Zone to further improve the CRIT Food Distribution Program Community Garden. This will allow the project to offer raised bed gardening to provide comparison to on-ground gardening and provide another option for community members to implement in their own backyards. *We haven't gotten our commercial kitchen yet this year. We will explore another option to collaborate with CRIT Farms and Local First AZ on the possibility of applying for a grant to construct a commercial kitchen where community members can rent to cook food for sale to the community, and for FRTEP to utilize for training purposes.
Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals?
Priority 1: Tribal Youth: *Tribal youth enrollment in 4-H has increased 35% from 25% in the previous year. Of the total enrolled youth, 57 percent are tribal broken down into 41 CRIT members, 2 members of other tribes, and 14 descendants of tribal members. Total 4-H program enrollment for the county is 164 youths. This includes Caucasian, African American and Hispanic youth. The traditional food demonstration program offered to tribal families with 4-H aged children has really helped in the effort to increase participation of tribal youth in 4-H. *The Tribal council has continued to support the tribal youth 4-H participants by purchasing all their animals at the county fair. The tribe has allocated close to $80,000 for this purpose. This is a big boost to the youth as this ensures they have money to recoup their expenses as well as have seed money for their projects next year, or if they are high school seniors, use the money for their college education. The 4-H youth try to give back to the community by volunteering in tribal events, like serving in the community dinner sponsored by the tribal council during the Fourth of July, Thanksgiving, and other national and tribal holidays. *The school garden continues to provide students with learnings on food production and physical activity. This year, the 6th grade class has participated in the garden in addition to the 7th and 8th graders for a total of 70 students. The garden also accommodates the 3rd and 4th graders, about 30 students, who participate in planting a couple of beds. This serves as there introduction to gardening. The FRTEP educator has negotiated with CRIT Farms to provide help in preparing the soil by plowing it and making furrows. The students took over from there: forming the garden beds, laying out irrigation lines and plastic mulch, planting the seeds, and removing weeds. They maintain the garden until the vegetables mature and they harvest them. They also learn how to take care of perennial crops from the adjacent fruit grove. Both the vegetable garden and the fruit grove have provided the students with valuable knowledge that they could use in their Ag subject in high school, as well as practical knowledge in growing food crops in their backyard. The school is very supportive of the program as this sets them apart from other schools in the district. They have included the project in their website and called it a learning garden. The community has also come to know of the garden because the students sell the produce to the community to raise funds for the PTSO (Parents, Teachers and Student Organization) for their year-end activities. *The drone technology project introduced last year through a grant from the Native American Agriculture Fund (NAAF) will continue this year with funding from Western SARE. FRTEP collaborated with a UofA faculty on a Western SARE grant to provide Drone technology education to students and farmers. Priority 2 - Farmers and Ranchers: The FRTEP Ag and Natural Resources program has continued to provide workshops for farmers in the reservation. Extension specialists and Ag Agents were invited to provide the latest crop updates. FRTEP collaborated with State Extension Specialists and Ag Agents to provide crop updates and field consultations to the farmers in the valley. Topics ranging from pest and disease management, plant nutrition, weed control, weather forecasts were provided by the specialist to help farmers in managing their farms. The workshops also offer Continuing Education Units (CEUs) that farmers, crop advisers and certified pesticide applicators need to maintain or renew their respective certifications. *Collaborated with CRIT Farms to do a field demonstration trial on Liquid Humates to see its benefits to Alfalfa production. The initial results showed promise. However, the product supplier suggested to test a granular formulation and the trial is ongoing as of this writing. Other product trials are also being considered for the fall alfalfa planting season. Priority 3 - Tribal Community: Continued to promote backyard gardening through the community garden project at the CRIT Food Distribution Center and at the CRIT Senior Center. Have also recruited three tribal members to undergo the Master Gardeners Training. The monthly food demonstration and food preservation workshops have a consistent participation that ranges between 15-25 participants per session with the Fry Bread and Tamale-making classes having the most participants. Participation is limited to a maximum of 25 due to space limitation. A Chili Ristra-Making workshop was conducted as a way of preserving produce from the garden. It had 20 participants. All in all, 14 workshops were conducted with a total of 258 participants.
Publications
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Progress 09/01/22 to 08/31/23
Outputs
Target Audience:The target audience for this program are members of the Colorado River Indian Tribes (CRIT) beginning from kids who attend Head Start to adults who farms, gardens or interested in cooking and preserving food, and non-tribal members who wish to attend.The program offers 4-H/youth development, which includes school gardens, animal raising projects, club programs, community service, shooting sports, etc., farming and ranching programs, and gardening, tree and yard (landscaping) educational programs. The 4-H Youth Development Program targets youth from the age of 8 to 18. FRTEP encourages tribal youth in this age group to participate in the 4-H program to help them develop skills in raising different animals, develop self discipline, communication, leadership and other life skills. A sub program of 4-H is the Cloverbuds, which caters to young kids aged 5-7 years old. They engage in different developmentally appropriate activities in a non-competitive environment to explore the kids' interests. The FRTEP Program also serves the CRIT Head Start students which are between the ages of 3-5. They are exposed to vegetable gardening at the school garden. The Le Pera Elementary School promotes youth development with their school garden program. It caters to students at the local school within the reservation. It is targeted primarily to the 6th, 7th and 8th grades but interested classes in the lower grades are also welcome to participate. Aside from the 7th and 8th grades, the garden gets participation from the 3rd, 4th and 5th grades. The school is open to all students of any race, so our participants include tribal students as well as non-tribal students. The farming sector in the reservation is composed of both tribal farmers and non-tribal farmers who leased lands from the tribe. The tribe also runs it own corporate farm. These farmers operate a total of 70,000 acres of land within the reservation. FRTEP provides workshops, field trials and consultations on crop, pest and disease management, nutrition, in collaboration with the Extension Specialists and Ag Agents from the University of Arizona Cooperative Extension. ?Another sector being served are the cattle growers in the reservation, both range type and backyard growers. They will be provided with programs that will help them improve animal care and improving health of their animals. Backyard cattle production is also growing, with more of the younger members of the community getting into cattle growing. The ANR Tribal Community is targeted to the rest of the tribal community who are interested in Vegetable Gardening, and food preservation. FRTEP provides gardening and food preservation workshops, demonstration and community gardens to help community members learn and improve gardening techniques. As the reservation is very close to the town of Parker, our FRTEP program also has participants from the town of Parker who are non-tribal and are mostly Caucasians and Hispanics. Changes/Problems:
Nothing Reported
What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?FRTEP continues to provide annual national professional development conferences that provide professional development opportunities for Tribal Extension Educators. These are an opportunity to share good practices and learn from each other on what works best for tribal communities. The Intertribal Agricultural Council (IAC) as well as the Southwest Indian Agricultural Association (SWIAA) has invited FRTEP agents to participate in their annual conferences. This has provided networking opportunities to learn what is happening in other tribal communities and what programming can be adapted to your own community. The University of Arizona Cooperative Extension has also included the FRTEP educators in Arizona to participate in their Annual Extension Conference. This provides additional learning in extension programming as well as networking opportunities with Extension Specialists, Agents and professors that can serve as resource persons for various workshops that the tribal community may need. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?Local print media has been instrumental in disseminating information to the public. The article that they wrote about the school garden project has resulted to financial donations for the school garden project. Social media has continued to convey information of upcoming programs as well as news of recently concluded activities. It has helped improve attendance to workshops and other activities. Exhibits and posters were displayed during the La Paz County Fair to showcase the services and projects of FRTEP and the County Extension Office. These are updated every year with new information and pictures of activities for the current year. The Tribal Extension Webpage and the Le Pera School Website has continued to provide information of Tribal Extension programs and activities. What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?*The main thrust of the 4-H program is to get more youth to participate in the program. Incorporating culturally relevant activities and workshops proved to be attractive to not only youth participants, but also to parents/guardians. Plans to conduct workshops on traditional cooking for the whole family are in place. Application for grant funding with the 4-H Foundation has also been submitted and awaiting decisions. This will be in addition to the regular recruitment activities like the "Back-to-School Bash" and "Back-to-4-H Bash" at the beginning of the school year. Continuation of the Drone Technology workshop which proved to attract interest from the youth is also planned. In collaboration with the rest of the AZ FRTEP team and University of Arizona professor, there are plans to apply for funding with Western SARE for this purpose. *The school garden project will introduce hydroponics as an additional offering to students. Worm composting will also be introduced to the school to support the existing garden. The school garden project will also be expanded to Blake Elementary School in the town of Parker, which also caters to tribal kids. *Americorps members will be utilized to help in the garden projects. They will help in managing and teaching kids in garden activities and help maintain the gardens. *The CRIT Food Distribution Program Community Garden will continue to provide season-long outdoor classes on vegetable gardening. *Will continue to lobby for the tribal council to provide funding support for the construction or renovation of an existing facility to be utilized into a commercial kitchen to support the cooking demonstration and food preservation project.
Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals?
Priority 1: Tribal Youth: *A couple of Trbal Youth joined the La Paz County 4-H group to attend the Citizenship Washington Focus (CWF) in Washington, DC. The CWF program brings youth to Washington to meet with our Nations Leaders and legislators and learn about the government and how it operates. It also utilizes the different attractions in the capital to learn about our history, and the different personalities that help shape our nation. This experience is aimed at helping our youth become effective change agents. *The Tribal council has continued to support the tribal youth 4-H participants by purchasing all their animals. This is a big boost to the youth as this ensures they have money to recoup their expenses as well as have seed money for their projects next year, or if they are high school seniors, use the money for their college education. *The school garden continues to provide students with learnings on food production and physical activity. Each year new students participate in the garden as they enter the 7th and 8th grades. They learn, hands-on, all gardening activities from soil bed preparation up to harvesting. They get to grow different vegetable crops in both the cool season and warm season planting. They also learn how to take care of perennial crops from the adjacent fruit grove. Both the vegetable garden and the fruit grove have provided the students with valuable knowledge that they could use in their Ag subject in high school, as well as practical knowledge in growing food crops in their backyard. The school is very supportive of the program as this sets them apart from other schools in the district. They have included the project in their website and called it a learning garden. The community has also come to know of the garden because the students sell the produce to the community to raise funds for the PTSO for their year-end activities. Some of the funds were also used to buy tomato cages for the garden. The project is still not self-supporting, but the students are learning that food production is also an income generating activity and could be a good livelihood in the future. *The school garden project at Le Pera has continued to provide gardening knowledge and skills to students. As a result of a feature article in the local newspaper about the school garden, a philanthropic organization has donated funds to the school for the garden. The school used these funds to purchase a shed, tools, irrigation materials, etc. to replace worn out equipment. Produce from the garden were sold to parents and the community. Proceeds were donated to the parent, teachers, and student's organization for year-end activities and to purchase tomato cages. This is a testament that the community recognized the importance of this project, how it impacts the youth which are the future of our community and nation. *A collaboration with the FCHS agent has resulted to an Ag Literacy in the Classroom program at Le Pera. This provides a basic indoor gardening class for younger students. *Another exciting program introduced to our youth was on Drone Technology. Participants learned about the regulations governing the use of drones, as well as how the drones are operated. They also learned the different uses of drones and the potential earning opportunities it provides. They learned that drones are used in agriculture through mapping of farm areas, they are used in spraying pesticides and fertilizers, to estimate the harvest, and also to identify plant health. They learned how drones are used in real estate to create videos and pictures of the houses that are for sale. Then they got the chance to fly the drones themselves, which the students enjoyed a lot. Priority 2 - Farmers and Ranchers: The FRTEP Ag and Natural Resources program has continued to provide workshops for farmers in the reservation. Extension specialists and Ag Agents were invited to provide the latest crop updates. FRTEP collaborated with State Extension Specialists and Ag Agents to provide crop updates and field consultations to the farmers in the valley. Topics ranging from pest and disease management, plant nutrition, weed control, weather forecasts were provided by the specialist to help farmers in managing their farms. The workshops also offer Continuing Education Units (CEUs) that farmers, crop advisers and certified pesticide applicators need to maintain or renew their respective certifications. *Farm visits were also conducted to address specific farmer concerns. Field trials are conducted to generate local data and address pressing pest and weed problems. A weekly AZ Ag newsletter is also forwarded to the farmers to provide additional information. University of California Cooperative Extension Ag Agents were invited to present topics on newly discovered pests in the neighboring farms in Blythe, as these may have the potential of reaching the farm areas in the reservation. *Ranchers and Backyard cattle growers also received Beef Quality Assurance training to help them improve their animal husbandry practices to potentially improve animal health and the quality of the beef they produce resulting in higher prices and better income. Priority 3 - Tribal Community: Both the community gardens at the CRIT Food Distribution and at the Methodist Church, as well as the Demonstration garden at the Extension Office have provided experiential learning for community members. An offshoot of this project is the creation of a permaculture group in the community. The organizer is a volunteer that helped in our community gardens. Through social media, the group has members from the outlying areas of the county and the success of the project has spread beyond the borders of the reservation.
Publications
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