Three FFA students from Octorara Area High School - Alaina Davis, Kelsey Cunningham and Jason Mazepink - were recently presented with the Keystone Degree, the highest FFA award that students in Pennsylvania can receive.
Alaina is the FFA president at Octorara, Kelsey is the vice president and Jason holds the office of sentinel. They were presented with their awards in January at the Pennsylvania Farm Show in Harrisburg.
To qualify for the Keystone Degree in Pennsylvania, students, who must be at least juniors in high school, are required to complete two years of agriculture courses and 25 hours of community service.
They also have to complete more than 300 hours in a paid or unpaid Supervised Agricultural Experience (SAE) or productively invest $1,000 - or a combination of both.
"SAE is a student-led, instructor-supervised project that can be experiential-, service- and/or work-based learning. These projects are unique to the student and help foster career-ready skills," explained Octorara FFA adviser Helena Martin, animal and plant science instructor. "All three of these students kept very detailed records of their projects over the course of several years. They raised the funds required for the degree by either working, showing or selling project animals, depending on their project."
Jason's project was sheep breeding, showing and marketing, while Alaina's project was breeding and showing dairy heifers and working as a lifeguard. Kelsey's project was raising and showing Holstein dairy heifers and working at local dairy farms milking cows.
Keystone Degree candidates are also required to demonstrate leadership abilities and participate in a variety of FFA activities within and outside of the chapter. "FFA chapter activities are events that the chapter does together as a group. Octorara's FFA chapter members will go bowling and ice skating, participate in local parades and volunteer together," Martin explained. "Regional FFA activities are typically contests or events that encompass several local chapters, and state events include chapters from around the state."
Martin noted that the Octorara chapter meets monthly to discuss new business pertaining to upcoming contests, regional and state leadership conferences and volunteer opportunities in the community.
"FFA is an extracurricular student organization. It is one of the three components of agriculture education. The other two components are classroom/laboratory instruction and the SAE," Martin reported. "In order to be a part of this program, you must be enrolled in an agricultural class. Students who are interested in joining Octorara's FFA chapter have the opportunity to enroll in one of two in-house career technical education programs - mechanical systems technology or animal and plant science technologies - or enroll in a year-round FFA leadership course."
She added that the organization was formerly known as Future Farmers of America. "The name was changed (to FFA) in 1988 to reflect the diversity in agriculture. Agriculture goes beyond the farm," Martin stated. "The majority of Octorara FFA members do not live on a farm or have (not) even been on a farm until high school. They have an interest in the agriculture industry, whether that is working with animals, plant production, wildlife, biotechnology or business."
For more information about Octorara FFA, readers may visit http://www.octorara.k12.pa.us, select Octorara Junior-Senior High School under Select a School, click on Clubs and choose FFA.
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