Welcome to the New York State 4-H Shooting Sports Website!

SPOTLIGHT ON…

Thank You for Your Support!
CLICK HERE TO VIEW PHOTOS FROM OUR EVENT

New York State 4-H Shooting Sports wishes to extend their sincere appreciation to all who attended and contributed to the 17th Annual Banquet & Auction Event at the Fort William Henry Hotel & Conference Center in Lake George on Saturday, April 23.  Thank you for making our most important fundraiser of the year a huge success, we are extremely grateful for your generosity and support!       

2016 NYS4-HSS Artist of the Year, Molly Pokrzywka (R) with brother, John Pokrzywka (L) at the 17th Annual New York State 4-H Shooting Sports Banquet & Auction Event in Lake George, NY.  Molly’s striking White Tail Deer on Antique Cross-Cut Logging Saw drew heavy bidding in the Live Auction.

Please click here or on the above link to view over 150 photos from our 2016 event!  Photos and listings of many of the fine items that were in this year’s event can also be seen by clicking here.

Preparations are already underway for next year.  The 18th Annual New York State 4-H Shooting Sports Banquet & Auction will be held on Saturday, April 22, 2017, in Tower's Hall, at the Fort William Henry Hotel & Conference Center, please mark your calendars and plan now to attend - we look forward to seeing you there!

4-H Shooting Sports
2016 & 4-H Grows Here!

The New York State 4-H Shooting Sports program is going into its 31st year with a positive cycle of continued growth.  In 2015, we had over 26,000 youth involved in our program throughout the state.  Overall, the National 4-H Shooting Sports Program set a new record of confirmed youth participation at 400,000! That is 30% higher than it was just 10 years earlier. 

The NYS4-HSS program continues to diversify. New curriculum for all major shooting disciplines has now been released in addition to the Hunting and Wildlife curriculum that was updated in 2013.  Coordinator Training, often taken by Cornell Cooperative Extension Educators to assist us in developing and operating the 4-H Shooting Sports Program, has also been expanded to include more comprehensive training on positive youth development components plus the inclusion of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math, as well as an in-depth discussion of risk management and equipment acquisition. 

A new version of the Financial Office Resource Manual (FORM) Code for the New York State 4-H Shooting Sports Program was released in 2015. This new FORM Code outline addresses how the penal law affects each discipline and establishes a minimum age for each discipline based on New York State penal law and the New York State and National 4-H guidelines. The FORM Code also outlines any additional trainings that may be required of 4-H Shooting Sports Program Instructors, in addition to the 4-H Shooting Sports Instructor Training. 

Already this year, NYS4-HSS has hosted the Northeast U.S. 4-H Shooting Sports Winter Instructor Workshop that was held on February 26-28, 2016 at the CCE Saratoga 4-H Training & Education Center and the Kayderosseros Fish & Game Club in Ballston Spa, NY. Over 25 4-H Shooting Sports Instructors provided on-site training for 151 attendees in all seven 4-H Shooting Sports disciplines.  We are currently asking that all Instructors renew their training for 2016 and receive the newly updated National Manuals.  Please see our Instructor Page.  

During the past year, the NYS4-HSS program also fostered its county-campus connections by working with the Wild Harvest Table to promote the use of wild game meat in participant’s diets.  Wild Harvest Table materials are species and harvest method specific and include United States Department of Agriculture nutritional guidelines.  The campus-county effort was further enhanced by the development of an updated Wildlife Notebook currently ongoing at the Cornell University Department of Natural Resources. The Notebook was originally published in 1988 and will now be offered in a series of informational publications about common wildlife species found throughout New York State.

To cap off an incredible year for the New York State 4-H Shooting Sports Program, Sullivan County proudly displayed their 4-H Shooting Sports Program’s largest project - an 8’ deep, 8’ wide and 10’ high working trebuchet at the 2015 New York State Fair.  The trebuchet is an excellent example of our youth using the science and technology that has gone into the historical development of firearms, bows, and shooting implements for hundreds of years.  While they weren’t able to do a working demonstration of their trebuchet at the fair, they were able to show its power through video of this model hurling 4 pound pumpkins up to 300 yards away! 

#4-HGrowsHere!

2016 SHOT Show

Members of the National 4-H Shooting Sports Committee, Dr. Mark Tassin of Louisiana State University (L) and Nicole Pokorney of the University of Minnesota (R) greet New York State 4-H Shooting Sports Teen Ambassador Logan Kimble-Lee (CL) and New York State 4-H Shooting Sports Instructor Colleen Kimble (CR) at the National booth at the 2016 SHOT Show in Las Vegas, NV.

The 2016 SHOT Show opened on Tuesday, January 19th, at the Sands Convention Center in Las Vegas, Nevada.  The National Shooting Sports Foundation’s SHOT Show is the largest Shooting, Hunting, and Outdoor Trade Show and Conference of its kind worldwide. 

The New York State 4-H Shooting Sports Program representatives to the 2016 SHOT Show include NYS State Director Bill Schwerd, NYS Assistant Director John Bowe, Education Specialist Kenyon Simpson, Instructor Colleen Kimble and Teen Ambassador Logan Kimble-Lee.

NYS 4-H Shooting Sports attends this important annual event to connect with the many corporations, foundations, and organizations that support us and provide supplies for our programming.  Throughout the show week, a booth, staffed by the National 4-H Shooting Sports Committee and National Teen Ambassadors, gives industry the opportunity to meet with the leading youth development program in the country.  Our representatives are able to learn about and see new firearms, archery equipment, safety products and other related program items, first hand, before they are released to the public.

Read past NYS 4-H Shooting Sports Spotlight On articles.

The 4-H Name and Emblem are a Federal Mark and are protected under 18 USC 707 and subject to regulations that prohibit the 4-H Name and Emblem to be used in any way that implies endorsement or exclusivity of any firm, product or service.  The inclusion of entities, websites or other sources cited on the New York State 4-H Shooting Sports website, or New York State 4-H Shooting Sports affiliated online or media outlets, is representative of a cooperative partnership with 4-H and does not imply endorsement or exclusivity.

Updated May 19, 2016