Teaching Like Teri Scholarship

I plan to be an Agriculture Education teacher and FFA advisor for a rural school in the future. Since joining Ag classes and FFA in the seventh grade, this has been my dream career. I have a love and passion for agriculture and I believe that it should be taught in every school across the country. Throughout high school, I had a fairly rough experience in the ag ed department considering I was basically my chapter's advisor, alongside my mother, for two years. We had no ag teacher for this time and a weak FFA chapter on the years that we did have an advisor. We struggled to keep ag teachers for longer than a year and it was difficult to encourage kids to join FFA. We never had more than ten dedicated kids in our chapter who had the determination to stick with it, so I hope to bring a better experience to a high school in the future; one with consistency, strength, and organization. Multiple important experiences have shaped the person I am today. I have been involved in 4-H, FFA, and many other local groups & organizations. The most impactful organization I have been involved in has been FFA. I became a member of the Chester-Joplin-Inverness FFA Chapter as a seventh grader in 2018, and this was just the beginning of a journey that would impact me to great lengths. I have now been an active member for 6 years and am in a new chapter, the Conrad FFA. I have competed in numerous different events and activities, such as livestock & horse judging, parliamentary procedure, extemporaneous speaking, mechanics, agronomy, etc. I have attended state-wide and nationwide events, like Washington Leadership Conference in Washington DC, Alumni Leadership Camp in the Highwood Mountains, the Northern International Livestock Expo in Billings, Montana FFA Ag Expo in Bozeman, among numerous other FFA events. One of my favorite Montana FFA events is Fusion/GOLD Conference, a leadership conference held in January in Helena, MT. We learn about leadership, career goals & preparation, and participate in numerous different rounds of mock interviews. Through FFA, I have learned how to be a good leader with strong values & a positive impact. I am running for a State FFA Office in the beginning of April, and if I am honored enough to attain an office, I plan to share my message with the membership and anyone I come in contact with. These reasons have driven me to become a teacher and share my experiences with young agriculturalists with a passion for agriculture.