We are starting to put the dog days of summertime behind us, which means the South Carolina State Fair is right around the corner! We occupy a large exhibit space in the Ellison Building that we populate with as many Extension employees as possible to greet the endless stream of visitors throughout the 12 days of the Fair. This year, each program team has an assigned day for staffing our exhibit (please see the Blog post for the schedule). If you are not signed up to work a shift yet and would like to, please contact Ms. Becca Hedden at rthomp7@clemson.edu as soon as possible. We are especially in need of volunteers for Sunday, October 13 and Thursday, October 17.
In the meantime, the University campus is buzzing again with the start of classes, and we have some exciting events coming up in September that will help highlight the impact of our work in Cooperative Extension. Our first Land-Grant Awareness Week will coincide with the “land-grant day” designation for the September 21 home football game against NC State, and the South Carolina Farm Bureau CAFLS Alumni Tailgate 2024 will be held on September 28. The awareness week campaign will be driving messaging around campus about the history, mission and work of Clemson Cooperative Extension with vibrant displays at the Watt Family Innovation Center. If you would like to contribute photos that feature “Extension at work” to be included in the campaign media, please upload them to the campaign Box folder. We will be sure to capture a gallery of visuals to share with everyone.
Whether you are attending the home Clemson football game against Stanford on September 28 or not, please consider joining us at the CAFLS Tailgate event! Although the game time has not yet been announced, our tailgate space in Fike Recreation Center will open three hours before kickoff. Everyone is welcome. Meal tickets are $12 and should be pre-purchased through the Marketplace Store by September 20. Please email Ms. Taylor Hutchens at tmhayne@clemson.edu if you have additional questions about the tailgate event.
4-H and FFA National WHEP Competition
I am very proud to share that our South Carolina FFA and 4-H WHEP (National Wildlife Habitat Education Program) Teams gave exemplary performances at the National WHEP Competition in Texas last month. WHEP is a youth natural resource program for teaching wildlife and fisheries habitat management to junior- and senior-level (ages 8-19) youth in the United States. Out of 16 teams from across the United States, our FFA WHEP Team once again earned the honor of National Champions, and our 4-H WHEP Team also earned high honors. I would like to recognize Ms. Mallory Maher for her service on the National WHEP Committee, and I am very proud that the success of our WHEP teams has earned us the opportunity to host the 2026 National WHEP Competition. Please read the full story in the Blog post.
SC FFA WHEP Team
SC 4-H WHEP Team
Salesforce
Please be sure to mark your calendars with the dates for the in-person Salesforce trainings for districts:
Pee Dee: Wednesday, September 25, at the Pee Dee REC
Midlands: Friday, September 27, at the Lexington County Extension Office
Savannah Valley: Thursday, November 7, at TEACH Center in Charleston
Our Salesforce leads would also like to continue to emphasize the following points:
Interactions: Please make sure to select the County, the affiliated CUMIS project on the record, and contact hours. You may add an Assisting Agent or Referred Specialist in the Team Member section of the record.
Program Events: Program events must be entered through the approved Eventbrite account for each team. Please be sure to change the owner of your event, select the County, appropriate CUMIS Project, and hours of instruction. You may add Team Members to your Program Events.
The Salesforce Advisory Group continues to host office hours on Mondays from 9:00 a.m. to 10:00 a.m. via the Zoom link.
Conference News
Thanks to support from the USDA Southern Region Sustainable Agriculture, Research and Education Program (Southern SARE), Extension personnel and agriculture specialists at Clemson University and SC State University may access a limited number of travel scholarships for the Carolina Farm Stewardship Association’s 39th Annual Sustainable Agriculture Conference November 2-4 in Durham, North Carolina Please see the Blog post for details. The Call for Proposals for the 2025 SCWAgN Women in Agriculture Conference is open. The conference will be held in Aiken from February 28 to March 1. Please use the Google Forms link to submit your proposal for a presentation.
ADA Digital File Remediation
APEX is the new University vendor contract in place for the remediation of digital files to ensure ADA accessibility. If you are asked to have a file remediated for online posting, please email the file to Ms. Walker Massey (CCIT Document Accessibility Specialist) at emassey@clemson.edu for a quote appraisal from APEX.
New Employees
Please help me welcome the newest member of our Extension family: Olivia Vasquez, 4-H Youth Development Agent for Aiken and Edgefield Counties.
Job Openings
We have new openings to fill with talent. The following positions with their job ID numbers are currently posted on the Clemson Careers website.
Rural Health Agent, Laurens, 109104
Livestock and Forages Agent, Aiken, 109175
Administrative Assistant, Abbeville, 109174
Forest Management Specialist, 109167
In Closing
Members of your Extension Leadership Team and I spent several days last week at the Southern Region Program Leadership Network (SR-PLN) Cooperative Extension System Joint Meeting in Charlotte. Many of our program team and district Extension directors serve on half a dozen SR-PLN committees that meet throughout the year to work on initiatives that will strengthen Extension educational programming by promoting multi-state engagement. The conference agenda is mainly comprised of committee sessions with set purposes. We realized the culmination of the past year’s committee work through final reporting of decisions and accomplishments, and the committees put forth their next plan of work. It is a working conference that gives a lot back in return, and I appreciate the service of all of our members.
As always, please take good care of yourselves and your families, and thank you for what you do for Clemson Cooperative Extension.
Upcoming Events and Reminders
September 16–21: Land-Grant Awareness Week
September 20: Deadline to pre-purchase CAFLS Tailgate Meal Tickets
September 27: Deadline to apply for the CFSA Travel Scholarship
September 28: South Carolina Farm Bureau CAFLS Alumni Tailgate 2024
October 9–20: South Carolina State Fair (Columbia Fairgrounds)
October 15–17: Sunbelt Ag Expo (Moultrie, GA)
December 2: Deadline to submit Presentation Proposal for 2025 SCWAgN Women in Agriculture Conference
The Carolina Farm Stewardship Association’s 39th Annual Sustainable Agriculture Conference will be held November 2–4 at the Durham Convention Center in Durham, NC. Thanks to support from the USDA Southern Region Sustainable Agriculture, Research and Education Program (Southern SARE), Extension personnel and agricultural specialists at Clemson University and SC State University may access a limited number of travel scholarships for this event.
Scholarship
The scholarship will provide registration for the conference (includes all meals starting Saturday breakfast through Sunday lunch), optional whole or half-day intensives on Monday, November 4, and hotel for up to two nights if needed. Hotels will be provided on a reimbursement basis. Mileage will not be reimbursed unless essential.
About the Conference
The conference boasts a premier event featuring local farmer-mentors as well as experts from various sectors of our agricultural system tackling the challenges of building resilient regional food systems, from the big ideas to the particulars of production.
Over 60 workshops on timely topics
Full and half-day on-farm intensives
Keynote presentation
Exhibit hall highlighting products and services for small farms
Amazing local and organic meals
Regional gatherings and networking opportunities
Policy updates
Advocacy opportunities
Seed exchange
Book signing and much more!
How to Apply
Scholarships will be provided until allotted funding is depleted or the deadline to apply (September 27) has passed. If you wish to apply for a travel scholarship, please complete the Google Form before Friday, September 27th.
Please do not complete the form until you are sure you plan to attend the conference.
For questions, please contact:
Kelly Flynn, SC SARE Program Assistant – kgilker@clemson.edu
Dr. John Andrae, SC SARE Coordinator (CU) – jandrae@clemson.edu
Dr. Joshua Idassi, SC SARE Coordinator (SCSU) – jidassi@scsu.edu
The South Carolina 4-H and FFA Wildlife Habitat Education Program (WHEP) Teams traveled to the National WHEP Competition in Brownwood, Texas, at the end of July.
WHEP is a 4-H and FFA youth natural resource program designed to teach wildlife and fisheries habitat management to junior- and senior-level (ages 8-19) youth in the United States. It also allows participants to test their wildlife knowledge in a friendly competition, as each state supporting WHEP conducts an annual contest, and the winning senior (14-19 years of age) WHEP team from each state earns the right to attend the annual National WHEP Contest.
This year, 16 teams from across the United States competed in the National Contest. Participants had to identify wildlife and write a management plan for the woodlands ecoregion, including species like Northern Bobwhite, white-tailed deer, American widgeons and monarch butterflies.
Our FFA Team from Aynor High School, coached by Mr. Nate Bellamy, clinched a 4th national championship. For the individual portion of the FFA Division, Mason King, Ethan Buffkin, Chase Squires and Levi Dickerson also finished 1st-4th place. Mason King had the highest score of the entire contest (both FFA and 4-H). Our 4-H WHEP Team from Lexington, including Hennelly Gavin, Mya Chapman and Emma McCaffrey, performed exceptionally as well. Hennelly Gavin finished 9th place in the 4-H individual division.
Since 2019, approximately 600 South Carolina youth have participated in WHEP. South Carolina has sent WHEP teams to all the National WHEP Competitions (Kansas, Virtual, Kentucky, Iowa and Texas) and has won a total of 5 National WHEP Championships (four FFA and one 4-H) and two third place finishes (4-H).
Ms. Mallory Maher serves on the National WHEP Committee and helps conduct the annual National Competition. Due to our success on the state and national level, South Carolina will be hosting the National WHEP Competition in 2026. It will be a wonderful opportunity to showcase South Carolina’s natural resources to the rest of the country.
