Prof. Jennifer Ours Williams: A 30 Year 4-H Career, from West Virginia to Kenya

Jennifer Ours Williams grew up on a family farm in Hardy County, outside Fisher, West Virginia, the daughter of a full-time farmer and a secretary. Her 4-H story began at age eight as a member of the Oakdale Challengers 4-H Club, where she showed cattle and took part in camps and programmes across the state. By her own account, much of who she is belongs to 4-H: it gave a girl from the hills the confidence to speak in public and set her on the path to becoming an Extension agent. That ambition never wavered. Her parents made clear that university was a given, and West Virginia University (WVU) was the natural choice as the state land-grant institution with an agriculture school that matched her interests. She arrived at the Arnold Hall Annex in August 1984.

A dean and a mentor. At the College of Agriculture and Forestry (now the Davis College), Jennifer met the then newly appointed dean, Dr. Robert “Bob” Maxwell. She recalls his outsized presence, wide grin and great laugh, and the way he made a young student feel that she mattered. Maxwell gave her her first leadership opportunity with WVU Extension, and she remained close to him and his wife, Betty, for the rest of his life — a friendship with Betty that continues to this day. Jennifer holds a BSc in Animal Science and an MSc in Agricultural Education.

Falling in love with Kenya. A 2023 family holiday that began in Kenya and continued through four other African countries changed the direction of her career. It was Kenya that stayed with her, and on her return she went straight to Betty Maxwell to share the experience. Betty, in turn, shared her own memories of the Maxwells’ years in Kenya. Jennifer began researching agricultural education and Extension in Kenya and found Miriam Kyule, Chair of Agricultural Education at Egerton University, Njoro. A Zoom call led to a self-funded solo trip in December 2023.

It was at Egerton that the two halves of her story met. During a lunch break, a faculty member asked whether she had heard of a West Virginian named Robert Maxwell, whom they still taught about in their classes. Jennifer’s answer — that he had been her dean, had launched her Extension career, and that she still visited his widow — delighted the Egerton faculty, who photographed her with his portrait and sent the image to Betty in West Virginia. Jennifer describes it as a moment she will never forget.

The Bob Maxwell legacy — 4-H in Kenya. Digging into USAID reports, newsletters and old photographs, Jennifer learned that in 1960 Bob Maxwell had moved his three young sons and heavily pregnant wife to Kenya, where he helped build agricultural education from the ground up through a WVU-USAID partnership supporting what was then Egerton College — writing curriculum by Coleman lantern and securing Cambridge approval before it could be used. That early work laid foundations for Kenya’s agricultural education system, and it is in this period that the seeds of 4-H in Kenya — later adapted as 4-K — were sown. His 1965 writing on the difficulty of cooperation between the Ministries of Education and Agriculture shows how long-standing today’s coordination challenges are. A 1969 project report she uncovered framed WVU’s international work as breaking down the barriers of ignorance and misconception that separate peoples — a statement she says captures everything she believes about the current partnership.

Bringing 30+ years in 4-H and Extension to Africa. Today, Jennifer’s career has touched almost every level of the Extension and 4-H system: County Extension Agent in Upshur County — primarily agriculture, but sharing the county 4-H programme with a colleague and taking an active leadership role in it; Statewide Programme Director, leading 4-H youth agricultural programmes and policy for West Virginia from the Agricultural Sciences Building in Morgantown; Director, Agriculture and Natural Resources — supervising and developing ANR programming statewide while staying hands-on with agricultural youth projects; and Associate Dean and Associate Director, WVU Extension Service (from 2015) — overseeing 4-H Youth Development, Family and Community Development, and ANR. In this role she was closely involved with WVU’s residential camping programme at Jackson’s Mill, the oldest state 4-H camp in the United States, and with the youth-protection policies that residential camping demands.

From connection to collaboration. Jennifer and Miriam Kyule set goals, shared materials and pursued a formal MOU, which WVU Provost Maryanne Reed signed on 10 July 2024. In November 2024 Jennifer led a WVU delegation to Kenya to deliver youth-development training for 4-K Club members, teachers and Egerton students. Programmes since then have included the Seeing Yourself in the Future curriculum, soil profiles, post-harvest preservation and, in July 2026, an agricultural-engineering unit built around The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind. WVU’s US$250 seed grants to ten Egerton-area schools have produced poultry, sheep and garden enterprises; Egerton’s allocation of a demonstration farm (two acres, later expanded to five) drew some 900 children and several hundred farmers to a recent field day.

The second mountain. Having led a large organisation for a decade, Jennifer told her leadership she wanted to step down from administration and devote herself to this partnership. Drawing on David Brooks’s The Second Mountain, she describes it as the passion project that follows a career spent building an individual identity. Her sabbatical began in August 2026, and she intends to spend the early part of 2027 in Kenya working alongside Egerton University, 4-K and 4-H Clubs and the Africa Clover Network. Jennifer credits Kenya with enriching her life beyond what she could ever repay, and believes — as Betty Maxwell has told her — that Dean Maxwell is guiding the journey. As the 4-H Africa team we say, “karibu sana Kenya”, we are all excited to scale this second mountain together!