To Make the Best Better

The 2025 Bernalillo County 4-H Fair is a wrap. And while the ribbons have been handed out, the livestock hauled away, and the arts, crafts, and baked goods taken home, I want to take a moment to thank some pretty important folks who don’t get ribbons.

Behind every polished showmanship round, every small animal competition, each hoofed showcase, and every blue-ribbon battle, there’s a quiet army of people making sure it all happens. They aren’t doing it for the glory (which is good, because the behind-the-scenes glory at a county fair mostly consists of sweat, dust, heat exhaustion, and the occasional swiftly eaten boxed meal). They’re doing it for the kids.

They’re the volunteers.

The moms and dads who’ve been corralling cloverbuds all year long. The county-wide committee members who somehow find time—between day jobs, actual jobs, farm chores, and life—to keep shooting sports running, plan poultry clinics, and host home ec workshops. The judges who spend hours in the exhibit hall, small animal building, and dairy barn, evaluating banana bread, cross-stitch, market steers, dairy goats, and rabbits with the seriousness of Olympic officials.

They’re the people who refill water buckets, reset obstacle courses, and troubleshoot the PA system for the fifth time that day. The ones who’ve hauled folding tables, swept barns, untangled extension cords, and still managed to smile while answering the same question for the twelfth time in an hour.

This year, as I stood in the small animal building, it hit me: I’ve spent almost every summer of my life there since I was nine. Forty-five years. As a 4-H kid. As a 4-H parent. As a 4-H judge. And what makes each of those years more than just a routine stop on the calendar is the people. The volunteers. The ones who show up year after year. Not because they have to, but because they believe in something bigger than themselves.

Because they believe in passing something on.

And that “something” isn’t just how to set up a stall or groom a goat. It’s how to work hard. How to lose with grace and win with humility. How to be part of a community. How to contribute.

It’s easy to overlook them. They don’t usually take center stage. But they’re the heart of the program. The reason 4-H works. The reason it still works after all these years.

The heart of the program.

Did you know those four Hs in 4-H stand for something? Head, heart, hands, and health.

When you become a member of 4-H, you learn the 4-H pledge:

I pledge my head to clearer thinking,

my heart to greater loyalty,

my hands to larger service, and

my health to better living,

for my club, my community, my country, and my world.

It’s something that stays with you. Just take a look around at the volunteers and you’ll see that they bring head, heart, hands, and health to and for the kids.

Especially that heart.

Along with the pledge is the 4-H motto: To Make the Best Better.

And they do. They take kids who want to be better, to grow, to excel. And they give them that opportunity.

You age out of the 4-H program when you turn 19. But really, you don’t. You’re a 4-H’er for life. Being a volunteer is the best way to make the best better. Always giving of head, heart, hands, and health.

I love our volunteers. The ones who move things. The ones who plan things. The ones who organize things. The ones who work tirelessly as administrators, judges, advisors, photographers, gophers... all of them.

So if you see one of them in the wild (probably wearing dusty jeans, holding a clipboard, and looking like they haven’t sat down since 1998), say thank you. Or at least hand them a doughnut. Trust me, they’ve earned it. And they like doughnuts.

To every volunteer who gives their time, their energy, their weekends, and PTO days to make this program possible: thank you. You’re the reason 4-H has lasted for generations. You’re the reason my daughters know how to work hard, speak up, and show up.