Creating the Future of 4-H and Forestry

Chad Barclay
Forestry Student

I am currently a Forest Science student at Penn State University taking the forest management option. This past summer I worked for the Colorado State Forest service as a seasonal forester. As a seasonal forester in Colorado, I preformed a variety of job duties including: cruising timber sales, assisting with setting up timber sales, removing hazard trees around recreational areas in the forest, creating defensible space around office buildings on the forest from wildfire and doing Mountain Pine Beetle evaluation on the forest.

During my years before college, I was very active in my local 4-H program. I participated in a number of 4-H projects which included: rocketry, shooting sports, cooking, fishing, backpacking, goats and hogs. But some of my favorite times in 4-H would have been when I was working on my wildlife or forestry projects. I remember spending countless hours studying for the state and national forestry competitions. When I attended the National Forestry Invitational in West Virginia, I had the opportunity to meet natural resource personal from around the country and learn a little bit about their ecosystem. Being able to meet these people was a great experience to network and make friends. I still talk to some of the people I met at the Invitational to see how they are doing.

I have been working on giving back to the 4-H program. Once I graduate from Penn State, I plan on helping the 4-H members learn more about our environment and hopefully be able to coach a national 4-H team in the future. I was able to be the assistant coach of the Pennsylvania team at the National Invitational in 2007, which I enjoyed so much. I was able to help out this past year at the PA state forestry competition which was a real treat to give back to the younger members.       

In 2006, I competed in the National 4-H Forestry Invitational with the Pennsylvania team and had a great time. When I attended the national contest, I received the Joe Yeager Leadership award for showing good leadership and support throughout the competition to my team and other teams as well.  While I prepared for the competition, I gained so much knowledge on the forests of the U.S. One of the events at the National competition was tree ID. I learned over 100 trees from around the country, which in turn helped me as I took my forestry classes at Penn State. I knew most of the trees in my Dendrology class before my classmates did which gave me the opportunity to help teach them the trees we were learning in class. This 4-H contest has helped me through all of my coursework at Penn State as well as making me a better employee in my different seasonal forestry positions.