CHARLEMONT — Hawlemont Regional School’s 4-H Club exhibit in A.L. Avery’s General Store window was given a blue ribbon and a perfect score by Pioneer Valley 4-H for its educational value, workmanship and demonstration of the skills children have been learning in the school’s new agricultural-based curriculum.
“Just outstanding. Everything and more that a 4-H Club exhibit should be,” wrote a 4-H Club judge Tom Waskiewicz, who has been a 4-H educator for Pioneer Valley for 33 years. “Beyond excellent!” he wrote.
Waskiewicz said the Window Poster Exhibit week produced 120 posters and 12 exhibits throughout the region, but “that one is the most elaborate I’ve ever seen in my 30 years. I’m going to hold that club up as an example.”
The exhibit shows the work of 24 students in four 4H Clubs: sewing, cooking, photography and goat-raising. “The HAY program (Hawlemont Agriculture and You) has really energized the students,” said Sheila Litchfield of Heath, who co-teaches a program on goat-raising and goat cheese-making at Hawlemont.