Sell working at extension office

By Bosten Morehart

Staff writer

Ryan Sell is in his second year as a summer intern at the SDSU  4-H extension office in town.

As the summer intern Ryan does a variety of different jobs throughout the summer. Some of those include workshops, general office work, filing annuals.

Ryan has always been doing some sort of community service or project ever since he was young. With his father being the shooting sports coach and his mother always doing community service, 4-H has always been a part of his life.

“I’ve had a long history of 4H, we used to, well my club the Clovervale club still does the Memorial Day auxiliary flags for the American Legion,” said Sell.

He participates in 10 workshops a year whether he is running them or just helping out. Although he is a little more “hands off” than the previous year, he is still around the workshops.

“I still go and take pictures and help if they need me, but I’m a little more hands off unless I’m the one teaching the workshop obviously. I still just show up and help if they need it.”

Some of the types of workshops he does include rockets and marshmallow blasters. The rocket workshops have levels to them, and the kids can go up levels as they do them.

As the summer intern he is required to host at least one workshop and the first one he did was the marshmallow blaster. The Cloverbud workshop is mandatory for summer interns and Ryan will be hosting that in a few weeks.

The marshmallow blaster workshop was quite an experience for him. He says that it has been his favorite so far.

“It was very messy because, it wasn’t smart, but I brought a whole bunch of marshmallows for them to shoot. It was a complete mess because we started inside, but we later moved outside, which it was fine after that, but it was the most fun I’ve had so far.”

Ryan is going to school for Cyber Operations at Dakota State University. He said that if he were to work an office job it would be as the IT person.

Doing these workshops and working with kids has taught him a lot about himself. “I’ve been a babysitter as a job but having a bigger amount of kids around also makes me realize I don’t want to do teaching either,” said Sell.