4-H has new leader

Jay County’s new 4-H educator comes to the job with experience both in the classroom and the real world.

Allison Keen joined the staff of Jay County’s Purdue Extension Office last week, filling the youth educator role that had been the responsibility of Erica Widmer, who died last summer in a traffic accident.

The 34-year-old Portland resident grew up in Fort Recovery and graduated from Fort Recovery High School. She received her bachelor’s degree in education from the Lake Campus of Wright State University and taught in Winchester schools for five years.

It was while she was teaching in Winchester that she saw some kids “falling through the cracks.” One of those students ended up being referred to the Youth Service Bureau in Jay County, bringing Keen in contact with that agency.

When she finished work on her master’s degree in educational psychology at Ball State University in 2014, she joined the staff at the YSB. She worked for about six months in the YSB’s home-based programs, then moved over to the agency’s residential program.

“That brought me here,” she said last week. “My goal has always been to engage youth and their families in the community.”

At YSB, she found herself dealing with high-risk kids in danger of “falling through the cracks.”

“This opportunity offered me more of a community approach,” she said.

Keen grew up in the country, though not on a farm. She was active in 4-H, but her projects didn’t involve livestock. Currently she’s focusing on getting to know the local 4-H Council and the numerous volunteers.

“I’m just trying to get a feel for what’s going on in Jay County,” she said.

She and her husband David, who is emergency shelter supervisor for the YSB, have three children, Raine, 12, David, 10, and Isaac, 3.