We LOVE Agriculture

I'm subbing again this week and I love it. The students and the curriculum are what make me excited for the future. While enjoying the teacher's prep period that our teachers definitely need, I started looking up curriculum ideas. I don't know why but lesson plans make me so excited. I love reading how/when/where these lessons would be implemented and the potential outcomes and objectives of them. I have no idea why. I guess I'm just a #nerd but that's okay! https://www.naae.org/teachag/teachag_lessons.cfm
Anyway, I was browsing the National Association of Agricultural Educators website looking for lessons that would work to reach the content standards in Nevada. Again, not sure why as I am just a sub but again, #nerd. I found this great page about "Teach Ag Lesson Plans, Games and Activities" which has some great resources to celebrate and bring awareness to the career of agricultural education! Towards the bottom of the page, I found some great sample blog prompts and figured- "Hey, I've got a blog and I have a second because I turned in all of my homework early this week (yay for 4:00 AM wake ups these past couple of weeks). So why not?" So here we go:

"What role does agricultural education play in your community? Think of your current ag program, alumni groups, local business, industry supporters, and those who might not even realize the connection."

Wow! What a great topic to get started on. Let me give you my back story. I started 4-H when I was about 9(?) in the horseless horse program in our valley. I then started raising pigs (hated it) and then later moved on to market goats (loved it). Then I became heavily involved in the leadership side of 4-H. So when high school started, I knew I wanted to be involved in AG somehow and someway. Plus those older FFA students that showed in their jackets at the fair, were the coolest in my eyes. Of course I signed up for it. I remember my first day in my high school freshmen ag class. I didn't know hardly anyone. Well, not true. I knew them and their names but didn't hang around them. They were in different circles and well, I wasn't sure if I was ready to expand my social circle yet. I remember the first lesson in Ag with the one and only Mr. Wolfley. He taught us this really cool way to remember the amount of days in the month using our knuckles on our hand. So weird right? You have no idea how many times now as an "adult" I use this same trick. I actually remember getting in trouble in that first class because I was talking to someone. Oops. Oh well. From there I remember watching the older, much cooler, students coming/going and always bringing food or a Pepsi to Mr. Wolfley. Ah, that's the trick in life. Still use that one to this day, when in doubt, bring someone food. Got it.
Anyway, the much cooler ag students started talking to us about trips/contests/events. I had no idea what they were talking about, but hey they were talking to me. So that must be cool. I then get invited to join the FFA Parliamentary Procedures team or at least come and practice with them. I had no idea what I was doing but hey, if it meant that I got to hang out with the cool kids outside of school? Then that's golden to me. We would drive to Moapa to our Ag Advisor's home and his wonderful wife made the most yummy cookies. I was a happy fat kid. During these parli pro practices I was able to learn how to use parliamentary procedure to run a meeting, by myself. As a teenager. I was hooked. I had a voice and now I knew how to use it. I also was asked to be a part of the Horse Judging FFA team. This was so fun. The coach was a teacher at the local elementary school and she was great! She opened up our eyes to looking more at horses and being able to voice our opinions on these classes of horses and why we liked certain horses over others. It was awesome.
After months of practices came the state contest. Here I was able to see the magnitude of FFA in our state and meet even cooler people from across the state. I was hooked. After state, I came home on an ag high. Is that a thing? It's a thing. The current FFA chapter officers put on the end of the year banquet. I was able to help set up, again, I wanted to be around the cooler older kids as much as possible. I was elected chapter secretary. Yes! I had no idea what that meant but if that meant I got to help more and become more involved, sign me up. That summer we attended the Summer Leadership Camp at Lake Tahoe. I had been to the camp itself many times through 4-H. I was lucky that my involvement with 4-H helped me to know many of the FFA members that were at the camp. I socialized and mingled and had so much fun. I was hooked. That summer we had a chapter officer retreat at the Nay Ranch,who would've known I would have married a wonderful man that grew up there many (many) years later. Fate? I'd say so. At this retreat, I was able to get to know my chapter officer team more and we were able to actually plan events for the year. Me. I was able to help make plans. This was huge. Talk about getting to learn independence and follow-thru. I guess you could say I was applying leadership skills. Or something fancy like that 😏 The school year started and we were excited. We held the annual "Harvest Ball" and it went great. Good school support and it was a lot of fun.
The following spring the state contest happened and I was hooked, again. I came home and officer elections were happening. I knew someone needed to be the chapter President and I knew that that could be me. I ran and won the election somehow. It was great. I had a great team to work with and everyone was excited and itching to keep our chapter growing. I knew that if I was going to be a state FFA officer, I needed to be president my junior year so my senior year I could focus on preparing for state. Everything in my plans was coming together. As president I had other plans I wanted to instill, I guess I wanted to leave a legacy #vainmuch? 😅 and I wanted to started an annual "Farm Day" for our community utilizing our school's Ag Farm as the central location. That took a lot of planning and preparation. This was my first event coordinating and I think it came out pretty fun. We got some great publicity from it through the school district, so that was really fun to read afterwards. A dear friend found the article awhile ago, http://www.takeawrite.com/uploads/4/3/8/3/43838279/farm.pdf 
This event taught me a lot about myself and what I enjoy doing. I love doing events. I love the rush and the excitement and the feeling after it was done. I didn't know I loved these feelings until years later but this event definitely had all of these. I am still so thankful for the amazing team that pulled this event off. It was a blast. I also remember helping with various farm tours at the school farm for different organizations. It was so great, I would love to be a tour guide! I do remember the tractor stopping to fast and I completely fell off the tractor, like full on fell off. In front of a large crowd of important people. I remember just having to laugh it off, because what else would a person do in that situation? Good thing, I have a hard head...
So you know that statement from the first day of class? Where I didn't know hardly anyone in the class very well? That changed. 100% changed. These "ag kids" became my very best friends. The ones that I wanted to spend my Friday and Saturday nights with! They understood when we couldn't hang out due to chores or the need to work animals. They got me. These are my people. Senior year came and I knew I wanted to run for FFA State office. I studied so much that year. I had no idea what to study so I read anything I could get my hands on. I ran for state office and won a spot: State FFA Reporter. These people became my family. We laughed together. We cried together. We did some sketchy stuff together. I am forever grateful for these people. If you are reading this, we need to get together. Like for real.
So what does this mean? What is the impact of agriculture on our community? We live in a wonderful beautiful valley and are incredibly lucky to have our very own school farm. This farm symbolizes a lot for southern Nevada agriculture. This symbol means that agriculture is and always will be a strong part of our state's heritage and traditions. This farm is the only school farm in the state of Nevada. At this farm, our youth learn how to cultivate trees, shrubs, and plants. The students learn about animal science with the herd of black Angus cattle, many of which are shown at the Clark County Fair as FFA projects. This farm teaches students how to run equipment, in fact I learned how to drive a tractor on this farm. After I graduated the Ag Program at the school got an amazing hydroponics program going and it's so cool. All of these areas on the farm provide hands-on learning along with a combination of classroom learning. This combination allows for students to get so much out of the program. I was also able to work at the farm, for a summer job. It was amazing and I still laugh about some of the shenanigans that we got into that summer. The poor Ag Farm Manager sure was patient with having three teenage girls working for him, all of whom had no idea what they were doing. 😂

Here is a great clip about the Ag Farm https://youtu.be/D-_piaedaxo

Without agriculture, our valley wouldn't be the wonderful community that it is. I know I talked about the school and the FFA program in depth. But what about the rest of our agriculture world in the valley? Did you know that Moapa Valley is home to a wonderful area that can grow pomegranates? Those beautiful juicy fruit that comes to the stores in the fall time and is sold for like $3 a pop? Yeah those things? They grow so well here! This niche market of produce is grown in our area very well and has an entire festival dedicated to it. Isn't that just "wonderful"? Wonderful is the variety of pomegranates that are grows very well in our soil. Soil- another huge aspect of the things I learned about in my agriculture classes in high school. https://www.reviewjournal.com/life/cerca-moapa-valley-celebrates-pomegranates/ <-- this is a great article that quotes the amazing Carol Bishop and Cheryl Rawson about this delicious fruit.
What else? What other agriculture lies in our valley? I know of some amazing beekeepers that have done very well and I admire them a lot! Our southern Nevada warm winters serve as a great spot for these bees to spend their winter days. Cattle. Pigs. Chickens.  These small-farm operations have been a backbone to our community and are instrumental in our community. These people are the ones who in times of need, step up and always help our young people. I know many of those that raise pigs or cattle have donated meat to many community events to help out, especially when those events are in support of people that may be struggling at the time. These people support the local economy by purchasing supplies from local businesses, and also provides locals to healthy local food. I am so proud of these people.

These are my people.