NEWS A Texas Team Ag Ed Publication
May 2016
Are You Making The Most Of Your Chances? Ray Pieniazek, East Central
This time of year we are in the middle of degree checks, banquets and planning summer activities. I sincerely hope you have taken every chance to encourage your students to participate in every event they could this past spring. However, there is still one more opportunity you can encourage your students to take. Agriscience Fair. For those of us that were around when we were teaching vocational agriculture classes, it was a tough change to convert to agriscience. Now that we are agriscience and technology, we have to encourage our students to be a part of the science world. There are many chapters in our state who are acutely involved in this particular part of our program; you should be too. The Agriscience Fair is something that we should all promote. Our world is ever changing and there are many things that our students could be researching related to our agriscience world. Encourage your students to step out of the norm. They can take their project to four or more science fairs around the state and nation. They have several chances at scholarships; through both the state FFA science fair and the three different science fairs at stock shows throughout the year. Maybe you have the next scientific mind that is going to solve a world agriculture problem.
As your banquets roll around, ask yourself if you have properly honored those exceptional individuals in your community? Sometimes we tend to forget that there are people who have been consistently supporting our endeavors and we need to recognize them. They are the ones who make things happen in our programs and they need recognition for their efforts. Don’t forget to recognize those counselors, secretaries and administrators who are sometimes behind the scenes supporters. I always try to watch the faces of the honoraries as our officers present them with their awards. Last year, it was incredible to watch the reaction of two of our counselors. They continue to demonstrate unlimited support towards our students; especially our seniors. The counselor’s faces were priceless and you could tell they honestly appreciated the recognition. I know all the individuals we have recognized in the past have appreciated the recognition. Have you looked into the coming changes to our CDEs, LDEs and speaking events? Major changes are coming in many of the contests while others are just experiencing minor changes. The comment period will be open for a while longer. Make your comments if you have any so that when your representative goes to vote, your
voice can be heard. These changes have derived from fellow teachers and your voice is important to this process. Visit TexasFFA.org for more information. As I close, I hope you continue taking chances to improve your students as well as yourself. I believe a great teacher’s conference is in the works. I hope you are contributing in some way and hope you take advantage of the opportunities to prepare yourself for the upcoming year. I hope you also take the opportunity to go see your seniors at their graduation. Your presence there will probably mean the world to them. Have a great May and don’t stop taking chances.