National FFA Week Events

It was a busy week during National FFA Week. On Thursday morning I was at the Owatonna FFA Appreciation Breakfast. The breakfast was a small way for the Owatonna FFA to say thank you to supporters of the FFA including teachers, administration, parents and business. After the breakfast, I headed over to the Kasson-Matorville High School. A number of years ago, Lori Pagel, the FFA adviser and ag teacher, asked me to talk to one of her classes about careers in agriculture.

Pagel has asked me back for a number of years to talk to her class. I assume that is a complement or she would not invite me back. My message to the students is quite simple, whatever your passion is, we need you in agriculture. Careers in agriculture go far beyond raising crops and livestock. For example, if you like computers, someone has to design the hardware and software for all the computers we use on farms. Someone has to market and sell those computer systems to farmers and educate us on how to use them. If you like chemistry, Monsanto, Syngenta, Dow, BASF all need lots of chemists.