Nineteen members of the Algona FFA chapter traveled to Ames for the 96th Iowa FFA Leadership Conference April 15-16. In total there were nearly 7000 members and guests from 247 Iowa FFA chapters at the Iowa FFA Leadership Conference. Highlighting the event for the Algona FFA members were Logan Lentz and Cassidy Bierstedt qualified for the Ag Broadcasting and Greenhand Quiz respectively.
The Algona FFA chapter also had 14 students that competed in Career Development Events. Those who participated in a Career Development Event were:
Farm Business Management team; Reid Louwagie, Ian Fehr, Carson Skow, and Porter Divis. The team finished in 13th place and earned a Gold rating.
Team Ag Sales: Logan Lentz, Ace Studer, Tucker Brunsvold, and Harold Reynolds. They finished in 20th place and earned a Gold rating.
Poultry Evaluation Team: Kara Rotert, Ellie Vaske, Grant Kramer, Walker Eilerts. They finished in 50th place and earned a Silver rating
Freshman Greenhand Quiz: Malea Divis - Gold and Charli Dodds - Gold. There were a total of 253 Freshman Greenhands who took the quiz.
Chapter Display: Reid Louwagie, Logan Lentz, Levi Allen - Bronze
Algona FFA members who received the Iowa Degree: Kayla Buscher, Porter Divis, Logan Lentz, Kara Rotert, Carson Skow, Ellie Vaske, and Paige Vileta
Algona Chapter delegates: Cassidy Bierstedt and Maya Lentz.
The keynote speaker was Nick "Sunshine" Tokman from Discovery Channel's "Deadliest Catch!. State officers from 11 other states were also in attendance presenting various workshops and interacting with FFA members from Iowa. Eight Algona FFA members were engaged in a service project with Meals from the Heartland with a goal of packaging 250,000 meals. Funding for the service project was provided by Cargill. The Algona members volunteered their time by helping package the rice-soy meals Monday afternoon. When the members were not competing they attended chapter development activities, conference workshops, the leadership conference as well as renewing or establishing friendships of FFA members from across the state.
The Iowa FFA State Leadership Conference is presented with support from the Iowa Farm Bureau Federation through the Iowa FFA Foundation. The Iowa FFA State Leadership Conference is one of the largest of its kind in the National FFA Organization.