Week 9: Community Relations

This has been a hectic week to say the least. This was also a week that highlighted community relation and how it supports an agriculture program.

This week we were dissecting in my Ag Science II-IV classes so my week started with a trip to Bixler's meats, the local butcher, to pick up some reproductive and digestive tracts. Even though we were learning about poultry in this class, the butcher didn't handle any birds and I wasn't able to have any of my students bring in any birds (live or dead) due to biosecurity reasons, so instead I was able to get tracts from pigs. I picked up both types of tracts this week but we were only focusing on the digestive tracts this week and I actually think that using the pig tracts instead of birds' actually provided a greater learning opportunity.

My students seemed to enjoy the chance to get their hands dirty cutting apart the dissection tract and while some of them were a little grossed out, most seemed to really enjoy it. For me it gave the opportunity to compare and contrast digestive systems across species with the tracts, reviewing some of the material they had learned in past agriculture classes.



This week was also my first of a few FFA banquets I would be attending this spring. In this area, there are several other FFA chapters within an hour's drive of Tri-Valley so each chapter invites their neighboring chapters to send representatives to their banquets and some other social functions. This week was the Upper Dauphin FFA Banquet and I'll admit that at first I thought it was strange to attend another chapter's banquet. This was not something we ever did at home. Then while attending Upper Dauphin I realized how great of an opportunity this was - through the simple gesture of inviting a few extra guests, the chapters were ensuring a friendly community bond was built amongst the chapters.

I had a great time at the Upper Dauphin FFA Banquet. It was a great chance to see how another chapter performed their banquet and allowed Mrs. D and I the chance to compare ideas and think of ways to improve our own Tri-Valley Banquet coming up in May. One of the highlights we both really enjoyed at Upper Dauphin's was that it was the 60th anniversary of the original FFA chapters in that area, and so one of their officers gave a beautiful presentation on the chapter's history. While not everyone would be able to give a presentation like theirs, I do believe that celebrating your chapter's history is another great way to continue to build the community relations within your own local chapter.

Overall, this has been a great week and a great example of the value of community relations to a chapter's success.