Lisa Lauxman

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Youth residents at LAFB have also participated in a gardening project, made Valentines for veterans at the VA hospital, and planted potted flowers on the base. Lester says he's seen significant changes in the youth participants since the Partnership began there in 2002. "I've noticed that they're a little more about outgoing. Life on a military base gets a little isolated. 4-H offers them the ability to get out, see life outside and interact with people in the community."

By expanding existing military programs for youth, the 4-H Partnership has increased opportunities for the elementary-, middle school-, and high-school-aged young people it serves to meet members of civilian 4-H clubs. Such interactions, Lester says, "let kids on both sides see how the other half lives."

In Cochise County, Tessman says this integration has been one of her primary goals. "The whole idea is not that we do military 4-H clubs, but that we teach non-military kids about military and we teach military kids about the community. I've tried very hard to make the gate to the installation disappear."

Integrating with community 4-H groups enables consistent programming and allows young people to create relationships with caring adults, which has been a benchmark of 4-H program for the last hundred years, Lauxman says.

The Partnership also encourages youth leadership and youth-to-youth mentoring. Recently it sent two youth and one adult each from Fort Huachuca, Davis-Monthan and Osan, Korea to the 4-H national Health Rocks! training in Logan, Utah, where they were trained in health education and substance abuse prevention.

Kathy Sands, the teen coordinator at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base (DMAFB), who has twice taken teens from DMAFB to the training, says the experience benefited not only those who attended the training but younger children who are then taught the material by older kids. "It gives them something to look forward to. They're always asking when we're going to do it again. They get to get out there and show the world what military kids are doing to help their community," Sands says.

And through this Partnership, when young people have to move again, similar programs will be waiting for them on other bases. "They don't have to leave it all behind just because their parents get deployed," Lauxman says. "That's the connection we provide because there are now 4-H military extensions in installations across the globe."

And hopefully, there are as many Oreos to go around.