Davie County 4-H and Cognition Davie to Offer Life Skills Workshop Series

We’ve all been there. We wish that we had a better hold of our finances. We wish we knew how to change the oil in our car. We wish we knew how to meal plan for the week and stick with it. Let’s face it, adulting is hard, especially for young people just starting out. 

“Many of the young adults in our community are lacking the knowledge of basic life skills,” said Danny Lough, Davie County 4-H extension agent, as he shared the following statistics. According to a study by FINRA Investor Education Foundation, 60% of adults in the US do not have a strict budget and/or have some type of credit card debt. Indeed, the online job search engine, Indeed, found that 25% of adults didn’t know what to include on a resume. A study done in 2018 by Tufts University found that 28% of adults didn’t know how to cook.

“These are skills that adults need for long term success ,” says Lough. “However, skills like financial literacy, basic auto maintenance, and interview skills are not being taught to most of our youth through the school system and are often left to be taught at home by parents that may or may not be knowledgeable themselves.”

To gauge the need and interest in a life skills series, Davie County 4-H and Cognition Davie created a community survey last spring that reached over 3,000 residents. The survey found that 88% of participants believed youth needed to be taught critical life skills. The survey also highlighted the top six life skills needed by Davie young people: college applications & financial aid, resume & interview skills, financial literacy, basic auto mechanics, basic home repair, and cooking & meal planning. These six life skills will be the main focus of the “Adulting 101: Life Skills workshop series. Through this series, youth will learn from experts in the field about these skills and how best to apply them. 

“This isn’t going to be a two-hour lecture about how you should save money or how you should present yourself during an interview. That’s not what 4-H and Cognition are about and that’s not how teenagers learn. Each workshop will have some lecture, an interactive activity, and then a discussion,” explains Lough.

 “Youth are going to learn these skills from someone experienced in the field that uses these skills every day. They’re going to learn how to change a tire from a mechanic. They are going to create a budget with a banker. They are going to learn interview skills from real business owners here in Davie County.”

Cognition Site Coordinator Jessica Huyett, who is two years out of college, agrees that these life skills are essential and wishes that she’d had the opportunity to take these types of classes during her teens. “Even though I’ve been ‘adulting’ for a few years now, there are plenty of these things that I am looking forward to learning through this series. This is a great FREE opportunity that I hope plenty of high school students will take advantage of.”

Her message to high schoolers? “Adulthood will hit you sooner than you realize. When it does,  you won’t have your parents there to rely on, and you will wish that you had these skills.”  

The Adulting 101: Life Skills workshops are FREE and open to all Davie County youth ages 14-18. Each workshop will be presented by an expert(s) in the field and will have a presentation, activity, and discussion portion. All workshops will be held at Cognition’s Makerspace from 6-8 p.m. unless otherwise specified. 

Adulting 101: Life Skills Workshop Schedule 

• September 7th: College Applications & Student Loans-Ignite Davie College Promise and Davidson-Davie Community College
• September 14th: Interview Skills and Resume Writing-Davie County Chamber of Commerce and United Way of Davie County
• September 28th: Financial Literacy-Bank OZK
• October 14th: Basic Home Repair-INENCO Inc.
• October 26th: Basic Auto Mechanics- Mocksville Tire and Automotive
• November 9th: Cooking and Meal Prep- NC Cooperative Extension

Register Now! 

Registration is REQUIRED as space is limited to ensure social distancing and to allow for an interactive program. Registration can be found HERE. 

Want More Information? 

If you have any questions about the workshop, please reach out to Davie County 4-H Extension Agent, Danny Lough, at danny_lough@ncsu.edu or call (336) 753-6100.