It has been a busy year so far, from state fair to fruit sale. The year got started with 15 of our members finding great success at the Minnesota State Fair, including Premier Exhibitor Livestock, Premier Chapter Swine Breeding Stock, and more.
In September four of our six officers attended Fall Leadership Day to start off the year learning leadership skills to bring back to the chapter.
In October, we brought 3 teams to the River Falls Falcon Ag Challenge for the region qualifier for Livestock and Dairy, and invitational for Poultry. Livestock placed 5th out of 26 and are going to State, this team consists of Julia Patterson, Sophia Poquette, Cody Ostertag, and Anna Ostertag. Dairy placed 8th out of 24 and will also be going to state, this team consists of Evelyn Scheffler, Hanna Gudknecht, Matthew Scheffler, and Jay Jacobson. The poultry team got first place at this event however it was not the state qualifier for poultry, this team consisted of Jett Smith, Jay Smith, Knute Ronningen, Lukas Gullickson, and Ryan LaCanne.
At the end of October we filled a school van with 8 members and Ms. Van Lanen headed over to Indianapolis for National FFA Convention. After our 10 hour drive we spent our 3 night 4 day stay attending sessions, visiting booths at expo, attending tours, and bonding at the Airbnb. National Convention gave members inspiration to be active in FFA and realize the scope that FFA reaches.
The annual FFA Fruit Sale Fundraiser ended on November 4th, our members sold over $15,000 worth of fruit! The fruit arrived at the beginning of December and distributed from there. Our top seller were Evie and Matthew Scheffler, Cody Ostertag, and Jay and Jett Smith.
On December 12th we had two region FFA officers visit to teach our members about opportunities in FFA and leadership skills. If your member attended these workshops make sure to ask them how to make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.
After a lot of rescheduling due to snow and cold, our poultry team finally got to compete again on December 19th this time to qualify for state. We once again loaded up a school van with our poultry team and head to Riverland Community College in Austin. There our poultry team placed 4th and qualified for state. The poultry team headed to state includes Lukas Gullickson, Knute Ronningen, Jett Smith, and Jay Smith.
This year has been both busy and rewarding, hopefully the rest of the year will be the same.
