SD Agricultural Education and FFA History

Participation in Contests and Career Development Events.

By Clark W. Hanson
Professor Emeritus, Agricultural Education, SDSU

Competitive agricultural activities have been a part of rural America’s landscape since Colonial times. Early on agricultural fairs and similar events were frequently sponsored to promote the production of quality livestock and crops. At some point, competition among producers was created where farmers would critically analyze agricultural products and complete an assessment of their observations.

During the early 1900’s, there was considerable interest in providing instruction in agriculture to rural America’s youth. In addition to classes provided by local schools, student organizations emerged known as corn, poultry, school agricultural clubs, farmers’ institutes, and 4-H (Cooperative Extension Service).  An outgrowth of club work resulted in competitive events between individual members and clubs. School administrators and club leaders determined that skills acquired via competition was of value for the members and also parents. Hillison, Tenney, and Uricchio found:

              For members, competition improved work ethic, cultivated
              agricultural interests, increased school and work attendance,
              and fostered a desire to continue education at the university level.

During that time period, students were encouraged to conduct corn yield test plots with parents’ known to adopt practices resulting in higher yields.

Stimson and Lathrup report the agricultural component of the National Society for Vocational Education appointed a committee to prepare a dairy judging contest for a vocational contest in addition to the boys’ and girls’ club contest which had been conducted for several years at the National Dairy Show.

A National Dairy Judging Contest was held at Indianapolis, Indiana in 1925. Apparently, the event was deemed a success and the Federal Board for Vocational Education requested that a similar event be conducted for general livestock. In 1926, the American Royal Livestock Show, Kansas City Chamber of Commerce and agribusiness firms agreed to provide a national vocational agriculture program including a General Livestock Judging Contest for vocational students. Over 900 vocational agriculture high school students and 400 4-H club members attended.  Later, the National Dairy Judging Contest was moved to Waterloo, Iowa and hosted by the National Dairy Congress.

A summary of vocational agriculture events, as reported by Stimson and Lathrop, states that South Dakota vocational agriculture judging contests had been conducted at South Dakota State University prior to 1929.

During World Was II, FFA activities were reduced in numbers including not conducting national judging contests during 1941 to 1946.

Many readers will readily recall the system of assessing individual and team activities when they participated in conests or Career Development Events  (CDE).  Remember the Hormel Slide Rule Calculator, a devise with all combinations of 1-2-3-4, cuts between individual pairs, and points earned for a given class or activity?  A hand held slide rule device that incorporated the official placing of a class (obtained from the official judge), placing cuts (deduction top pair, deduction middle pair, deduction bottom pair determined by the official judge) and generates a value for all possible placement combinations. The George Hormel Company, Austin, Minnesota developed the original Hormel scoring card.

Over the years, a variety of devices and approaches to scoring events have been attempted. Initially contests were hand graded and calculated.

Rather than using the hand held calculator, one only needs to go to the computer and search for Livestock Judging Score Calculator. Program calculators require the final placing, cuts between the three pairs, click calculate and the score for all placing combinations are immediately displayed.  Improvements in test reading equipment and the advancement of computers have eased the complicated task of evaluating each student’s level of performance in a wide range of Career Development Events. The current means of collecting an FFA members CDE “answers” is via scantron sheets available from the National FFA Organization.

The Annual State FFA Convention Tuesday A.M. scheduled CDE results still energizes students. The author is guessing that Mr. Phil Plumart’s personal reward for his devoted efforts to score 4-H and FFA Judging Contests was the opportunity to announce results. Mr. Plumart had the technique (ability) to excite students who were captivated with wonderment. As top “place” individual and teams were announced, Mr. Plumart’s voice would become louder and higher pitched. The most memorable were the multiple times Mr. Plumart would shout into the microphone,  “And in first place - T-U-L-A-R-E.” at which point the FFA members would wildly express their endorsement.

Terry Reickman, McCook Central (Salem) agriculture instructor, recalls a conversation with an out of state teacher. The conversation had drifted to competitive events sponsored by the State FFA and SDSU. Terry’s friend made the comment that South Dakota certainly offers a wide array of competitive events for a relatively small State FFA organization. This was an interesting statement. The South Dakota Agricultural Education profession should take pride in what has been provided for the state’s youth for a long time.

In a conversation with Lyle Anderson, former member of the DeSmet FFA Chapter, this author asked the question as to the relationship of an FFA members’ participation in a CDE and one’s career path. Lyle indicated that his involvement with the Milk Quality CDE as a definite factor in his selecting the dairy industry as his chosen line of employment.

Changes and updates to South Dakota’s CDE content are considered at Teacher In-service sessions and annual teacher conferences.

The current National FFA web site contains the following description for Career (CDE) and Leadership (LDE) Development Events:

                        FFA members focus on skill development and career
                        preparation through participation in Career Development
                        Events and Leadership Development Events. These
                        competitive events develop individual responsibility,
                        foster teamwork and promote communication while
                        recognizing the value of ethical competition and individual
                        achievement. Successful members expand their knowledge
                        base by interacting with peers, teachers, as well as business
                        and community leaders to gain a complete and comprehensive
                        knowledge about specific career and leadership areas.

State Career Development Events conducted in the Fall of each year (now called Leadership Development Events at the national level) feature district elimination with finals in Pierre, include; Agricultural Broadcasting, Agricultural Issues, Agricultural Communications, Agricultural Sales, Creed Speaking, Extemporaneous Speaking, Employment Skills, Chapter Conduct of Meetings, Marketing Plan, Parliamentary Procedure and Prepared Public Speaking.

Career Development Events in the spring of each year, open to all, without district elimination, conducted at South Dakota State University, during the annual State FFA Convention feature: Agriculture Business Management, Agricultural Mechanics, Agronomy, Dairy Cattle Judging, Floriculture, Food Science & Technology, Horse Evaluation, Livestock Evaluation, Meats Evaluation & Technology, Milk Quality & Products, Natural Resources, Nursery/Landscape, Range Plant I.D, Veterinarian Science and Biotechnology

The FFA has a program for recognizing the top teams and individuals in CDE competition. The current practice is to recognize the top 40% of the teams and individuals in an event. The 40% level is constructed with 10% of the individuals and teams recognized with Gold awards, the next 15% is categorized as Silver and an additional 15% identified as Bronze. When and where did this practice start is open for discussion

Lundry, Ramsey, Edwards and Robinson conducted a Delphi study in an attempt to determine the value of participation in FFA Career Development Events formerly known as contests. The results of the Delphi study identified the following CDE skills acquired with 89% agreement include; team work, competition, setting and achieving goals, time management, self-motivation, work ethic, confidence, leadership, dedication, critical thinking, decision makings, reasoning, evaluation, and analysis

The annual Soils Judging Contest, Range Management Contest and Judging Land for Home Sites Contest are events that are not official FFA CDE but provide an quality educational opportunity for a large segment of secondary agricultural education students. The soils and range management events have existed for years and years. The evaluation of a site for a house is a recent development.

The unique feature, in the three mentioned contests, no limit exists on number of participants. What an opportunity for freshman and sophomores students to participate in a very structured educational offering. Of the group attending the events from a given school, the agricultural instructor selects twelve – fifteen (varies by regional events) students to have their assessments scored with the four highest scores comprising the team score. The remaining students have their assessments scored at their home school.

A future article will review the support that exists for agricultural education competitive events.