Student applies for AFA and soars Earns seat on AFA’s highest student board By JOAN KITE One might argue that TSU senior Anarra Williams does not play games, waste time, or entertain daydreams. This young woman is 6-feet of walking proof that she knows how to get the job done. She arrived at TSU as a transfer student from Clark State Community College in Springfield, Ohio, where she earned an Associate of Arts degree in Science. At Clark State, she was on a full athletic scholarship playing for the women’s basketball team, but she needed to find a way to pay for the rest of her education. She applied for the Farm Bill Scholarship, which would help finance her way through TSU, and met Dr. De’Etra Young, associate dean of Academics and Land-grant
22 AgLINK | Spring 2022
“It’s one of the biggest opportunities you can get in the AFA.” Anarra Williams Member Student Advisory Team Agriculture Future of America Programs, over Zoom. She got it. “Dr. Young saw my drive and motivation. I told her I would not let her down,” Williams said. Williams opted to major in Family and Consumer Sciences with a concentration in Food and Nutritional Sciences/Dietetics. She is minoring in English. Because of
her love for athletics she is intent on eventually advising professional athletes while handing them smoothies that she has developed. “In the future, I would like to own a dietetic facility,” Williams said. What Williams didn’t know when she first started at TSU was that Dr. Young, in 2017, had worked on a University Growth Initiative Grant provided by Bayer and Cargill to finance TSU’s involvement with Agriculture Future of America (AFA). Monies were used to enter top student leaders in student leadership development programs for one year. “We funded three TSU students, but more than three students came,” said AFA President and CEO Mark Stewart. TSU quickly formed an ideal relationship with AFA without AFA, Continued on page 52
