Ashley Worsham

Ashley Worsham is the volunteer leader of Action Clovers 2.0 in Sarasota 4-H. She started with 4-H as a child in the Midwest. Her passion for 4-H stayed with her and she became reconnected as an adult. Now, she is one of Sarasota County’s best leaders and volunteers.

4-H Involvement

A 4th generation 4-H’er, Ashley was destined to be involved. Her great-grandmother was a club leader, followed by her grandmother who was a member and leader, her mother who was involved as a member. Each generation lived on farms in rural Iowa, before Ashley’s mother changed that trend and moved their family to progressively smaller and smaller towns. Ashley started her 4-H journey in Michigan and participated there for 3 years. Then, she moved to Ohio where she participated for another 10 years, totaling her involvement to 13 years in 4-H!

Why did she do 4-H? Well, the answer is simple, I’ll let Ashley tell it. “4-H gave us the opportunity to explore interests, and our interests could change over time. But there would still be the same formal setting to explore them in.” 4-H allows kids to stay within the same close-knit community while exploring many different projects, skills, and clubs. She appreciated longevity and consistency. Since the towns she moved to were smaller and smaller, the number of extracurricular activities shrunk as well. 4-H was always there for her.

Favorite 4-H memory: simply being able to thrive. She was able to succeed in 4-H since it values a diversity of skills in youth. She loved being recognized for things that she didn’t have an outlet for elsewhere. 4-H offered her family an affordable and diverse amount of programming that Ashley took full advantage of.

Favorite 4-H project(s): cake decorating and teaching sewing

Career Path

Ashley has a very interesting career path. She graduated from college with a Bachelor of Arts, double majoring in graphic design and broadcasting, minoring in web design and the Bible. She spent the first six years of her career working in professional baseball. The first two seasons were with the Dayton Dragons, the low-A affiliate of the Cincinnati Reds, and the remaining seasons she spent with the Tampa Bay Rays and Washington Nationals. She then worked for a software development company and a consumer products goods company. Last January, she started working for Foster the Family. Foster the Family is a non-profit that works to support foster, adoptive and kinship care for families. She helps to oversee the Program Development and Implementation in Pinellas and Pasco Counties.

4-H Club Leader

Once Ashley became local, she got more established in her career and gained a ton of leave to use. She decided to use that leave to outreach to her community and remembered the great time she had in 4-H as a child. She has participated in 4-H Sarasota ever since.

Life Skills

Ashley identified life skills she felt she developed while in 4-H as a child. She still feels she is learning these skills as a leader, but on a deeper level. Now, she not only understands it, but knows how to teach it. She absolutely thinks these skills aided her career path. She identified the following:

The Future

Sarasota 4-H is incredibly accessible, she says. In Florida, programming is strong while still allowing students of all levels to join.

If you’re interested in joining a local club, Ashley offers the following advice:

“Get involved! Say, we are going to do it for this school year and get involved. I’ve had a few families that enter through my club, and then they move onto Moo Crew, or the other clubs where they have a desire to do agriculture that I don’t have the resources to help them with. And for me that’s still a win. Even if you’re not still in my club, you’re still with 4-H! So, just say hey we’re going to try it for a year. And join the Action Clovers 2.0!”

For more information about Sarasota 4-H and clubs – https://sfyl.ifas.ufl.edu/sarasota/4-h-youth-development/4-h-youth-development/4-h-clubs/

Contact 4h@scgov.net to find out more.

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