Monday, January 05, 2009

by Kent Dinnebier

FFA is not just for farmers any more.

That is the message Brokaw FFA Chapter Advisor Andy Johnson has been sharing with students at Clarinda High School since he joined the Clarinda Community School District in 2000 as the FFA Advisor and Agricultural Education Instructor.

“It goes beyond cows, plows and sows,” Johnson said.

In 1988 Future Farmers of America changed its name to National FFA Organization to appeal to students interested in areas of agriculture beyond farming.

“We started to see a lot of new agricultural areas develop. They wanted to keep FFA because it was so well known, but they didn’t want to make it exclusively for those students going into farming,” Johnson explained.

Therefore, as the Agricultural Education Instructor at Clarinda High School, Johnson has always focused on offering as diverse a curriculum as possible to appeal to the greatest number of Clarinda students.

 “The whole agricultural industry today has changed. There are so many different careers that a young person can go into in agriculture and I don’t think some kids know that at this level,” Johnson said.

Examples of the non-traditional courses Clarinda offers are landscape design, horticulture, animal science and agricultural communications along with the standard courses in marketing and management.

Meanwhile, Johnson also tries to utilize the latest technology and equipment to simulate the actual work performed in those respective careers.

“But, I still continue to teach the production type things in Ag I and Ag II when they are younger because if we didn’t have the production we wouldn’t have any of the other areas in agriculture. People have to eat,” Johnson said.

The strategy has paid off in Clarinda as Johnson sees between 100 and 115 different students enrolled in his classes over the course of a year.

Those same trends have also carried over to the state and national organizations as Iowa surpassed 12,000 members last year and has been steadily increasing in recent years.

Overall, there are 7,248 chapters with 451,997 members in all 50 states, Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, Guam, Rota and Saipan (Commonwealth of Northern Marianas Islands, Majuro (Marshall Islands), Kosrae and Yap (Federated States of Micronesia).

“I think the word is getting out that there are opportunities for kids when they get out of college in agriculture and that is helping numbers of ag ed programs and FFA programs tremendously,” Johnson said.
A native of Creston, Johnson was actively involved in FFA as a student.

Under the direction of Galen Zumbach, the Creston FFA Chapter is regarded as one of the premier chapters in Iowa in terms of its membership, community involvement and performance at competitions.

Johnson earned his State FFA Degree, attended state and national conventions and was involved in many of the contest his students now compete in.

“I grew up on a farm. Each FFA member is supposed to have a Supervised Agricultural Experience (SAE) project. We raised pigs and I had a job at a nursery as well. So those were my SAE projects,” Johnson said.
Initially, Johnson intended to pursue a career in agricultural business and holds an undergraduate degree from Iowa State University in that field.

However, a change of heart prompted him to change his focus to education.

“I had thought about teaching early on and I decided it was something that I wanted pursue while I was in college. My mother was a teacher and she kind of helped with that decision as well. I liked agriculture and the whole aspect of FFA and teaching leadership to kids, so I wanted to go in that direction,” Johnson explained.

Therefore, Johnson went on to earn his Masters in Agricultural Education with his teacher’s certification from Iowa State.

Since his experience with FFA was so positive when he was in high school and serving as a student teacher at Orient-Macksburg under the direction of Ed Hansen, Johnson said his primary objective now is to duplicate those experiences for his members.

“I feel what I learned in FFA was very beneficial to whom I am today and I think most people that are my age and older, if they were in FFA, would say the same thing. They learned skills in leadership, teamwork and presentation skills. Those are the things I want my FFA members to develop and have when they graduate so they can look back on their years in FFA and think that it helped,” Johnson said.

During his first year as FFA Advisor, Johnson had 28 members in the Brokaw FFA Chapter. Over the past eight years that involvement has grown to between 45 and 50 students a year.

Under Johnson’s direction, the Brokaw FFA Chapter received a Gold Rating in the Supreme National Chapter Award program in 2007.

In 2003, the chapter received the Governor’s Award for Environmental Excellence in recognition of its work with Clarinda’s curbside recycling program.

In addition, Johnson has had 19 students earn their State FFA Degrees and six Leadership Contest entrants have advanced to the state level. Those included the Program of Activities team that placed second in 2005 and third in 2007, while Sarah Beaver placed third in public speaking in 2006.
The Clarinda Soil Judging Team placed fourth in the state competition in 2003 to qualify for the national contest. This year the Soil Judging Team placed second at the state level and will compete in the national contest at Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, in May.

“We have also had one American Degree. That is the highest award you can get at the national level and that was won by Sarah Beaver in 2007,” Johnson said.

Johnson said the most rewarding aspect of serving as the FFA advisor is seeing his students develop as individuals.

“Each year I usually get a really good group of kids in FFA. I’ve enjoyed seeing a lot of the FFA members be successful in the contests and competition we do. I’ve enjoyed kids watching kids develop into the type of people and the leaders we want them to develop into,” Johnson concluded.