CARBONDALE, Ill. — Carbondale Community High School had not sponsored an FFA chapter for 40 years, but that’s changed thanks to an agriculture science teacher, a university graduate student and FFA’s sustaining traditions.
This fall, CCHS FFA Chapter launches its third year following a benchmark startup. These 40 or so juniors and seniors busily earned their way to a Bronze National Chapter award last year. This year is poised to be just as successful, ag teacher Michelle Buchheit said.
"As a teacher, FFA is a great way for me to work in curriculum with hands-on experience. It’s also a fantastic tool for the students to learn leadership and think about ag-related careers," she said.
More high schools are learning the same lesson. FFA National chapter statistics indicate 7,665 chapters are now active nationwide, reflecting a near 15 percent increase over the past 20 years.
It’s a trend that’s expected to continue at the high school and collegiate levels, National FFA Chief Operating Officer Joshua Bledsoe said. The partnerships between new high school chapters and collegiate chapters appear to bolster this trend, he added.
Here’s how the high school-collegiate chapter relation developed at Carbondale: As a teacher, Buchheit helped the high school build a greenhouse and a school garden as well as teaching two ag classes. The next step was FFA.
"We were already placing value in agriculture and making sure it was an integral part of our curriculum, so adding FFA just made sense," she said.
Buchheit turned to Southern Illinois University’s College of Agricultural Sciences, which hosts a model Collegiate FFA Chapter for its students. From there, she was teamed with John Edgar, an Ava, Ill., student starting his Master’s Degree in agricultural education this fall – and carrying a FFA-rich resume.
Not only is Edgar busy in the SIU Collegiate Chapter, but he also is a former state officer, completed study trips to Washington, D.C., and Argentina and currently mentors the SIU chapter. "For me, this all about ag education, and never has the ag industry offered so many types of career opportunities," he said.
About his mentoring role with the Carbondale high school chapter, Edgar said, "A lot of times you have an officer team that they’ve watched older mentors – they’ve watched older students go through it before. They kind of know what to expect, but these students were fresh. They didn’t know what to expect, which was exciting and challenging all at the same time."
His mentoring also took him with the high school students to contests and to the national convention in Louisville, Ky. Attended by more than 60,000 members, the FFA annual convention is considered the third-largest convention in the United States, ranking only behind the Republican and Democratic conventions.
"To take a new group of students into a sea of blue corduroy, it’s a neat experience," Edgar added.
"It’s changed the focus of what I want to do with a career. I want to continue working within the education aspect, but I think my main focus is mentoring and helping other students in opportunities outside of the classroom, because the education system is great, but a lot of these students need more."
