What grade are you in?
“I’m a senior.”
What interested you in joining FFA?
“I’ve been in FFA since 7th grade, when we first established one for Logansport. The sense of community is moreso why I joined because I didn’t really know who I was as a person. And when I joined FFA, it’s a lot of leadership-based things, so I found my role in what I would say is my little community.”
How many years have you been in FFA? What motivated you to join?
“This is my sixth year in FFA. What motivated me to join the most was to improve on my public speaking skills. I wasn’t really good at public speaking. When I first joined, I was afraid to talk to anyone one-on-one.”
What does FFA mean to you?
“FFA to me means home away from home, pretty much because we have national conventions and stuff. And every time I go to a national convention, I get to meet people from all over the United States, and it’s like we all have our own little reasons for joining FFA, but at the same time, it’s like we’re all doing it because we want to belong somewhere.”
What classes can you take to better understand FFA?
“You can take the intro class at any point. The intro class basically goes over every career pathway you have and goes over food science, plant science, field work, landscaping, all of that. If you’re interested in agriculture, I think [Ms. Fishburn] has five other classes, two of them lead into horticulture and landscaping. And the other ones lead into crop management, landscaping, turf management and greenhouse production.”
What competitions does FFA participate in? How do they go?
“A lot of the competitions we participate in are like speech competitions. Right now, we are doing leadership. So, it is like 20 different categories of speech-related activities, and you just go in and present or give a speech, something [agriculture] related. Most of the time, it’s teaching-based. For right now, I’m doing two different demos. I’m talking about the importance of insects and what you can do with them, and the same with pine trees. We also have other competitions. Logansport competes in forestry and entomology, that’s during the winter. Forestry is when you go judge trees and the insects and pests that live on them. Entomology is insect judging; you just go in and identify different insects and their family. There’s normally a short quiz about facts about them. Logansport also participates in soil judging. Which is in the very beginning of the year. We go out in a field, and we go in a six-foot pit, and we judge the soil to tell if it’s okay for a farmland or a home. There are tons and tons of other competitions, but we just don’t have a big enough FFA chapter for that.”
What is the Kiss the Pig event? What do you do as the president to plan for it?
“The Kiss the Pig event is an event we do to celebrate National FFA Week. Kiss the Pig is just something to get students more involved with us and make them realize we are here. And although our numbers are small for Logansport, FFA is a really big national organization. It’s really important because, at the end of the day, everything leads back to agriculture. Kiss the Pig specifically helps us with donations for FFA, and that’s what we do to run the contests. As president, I usually plan the scripts. So, I’m writing the script for the entire event. I help plan the games we do during lunchtime and the dress-up days.”
Who has helped you along the way?
“I would definitely say Fishburn is my biggest advocate when it comes to motivation. She’s basically my mom, even though she’s not that old; she’s like ten years older than me, she’s basically like my mom. And she’s helped me get through a lot, not just FFA and school stuff, but a lot in my personal life. She’s made me realize that I have potential in the future.”
What other clubs/extracurricular activities are you involved in?
“Right now, I’m only in tennis. I’m varsity for tennis right now, I have been since sophomore year, I believe. That’s the only other thing I do because it aligns with FFA so well. Cause everything in FFA stops competition-wise once tennis starts.”
What are your plans after high school?
“After high school, I’m going into the Air Force.”
What’s a fun fact about you that people may not know about?
“I’m a really nice person. I love helping people, and I love helping people through tough times. That’s one of my biggest motivators to be in FFA because I’ve been able to help a lot of people get through hard stuff.”
