For the love of corduroy
It’s National FFA Week and every year it comes around, I reflect on the present and whether my life would be the same if I hadn’t put on that corduroy jacket years ago. That article of clothing was the facilitator of my future and being reunited with it is a mixture of emotions.
I walked many miles in that coat—meeting fascinating people while donning the national blue and corn gold, cried tears of happiness and defeat on the lapel and the smell of lanolin from my show lambs is permanently soaked into the fabric.
My involvement in FFA and my agriculture advisor’s mentorship not only developed my communication and leadership skills, it also led me to dedicate myself to my career and pursue it with unquenchable passion. I sometimes wonder what I would be doing today if I hadn’t had Travis Bradshaw as my instructor. Would I be a teacher like my mother, in the health field like my sister or would I have fallen short of my potential and not be proud of who I am today?
I can’t answer the what ifs, but I can be certain I am in this agricultural occupation because I joined an organization that promotes agriculture and its many career possibilities, and I was guided by a teacher who looked for the talents in all of his students and put time and energy into molding their young minds. He held me accountable, nurtured my interests, boosted my confidence and his high expectations drove me to aim higher with every challenge. Years later I am successful because I still demand those standards of myself.
I’m not a parent, but I was a high school freshman at one point in my life and if there is one thing I would tell a parent with a child of that age, it is to enroll his or her child in agriculture education. Your son or daughter could take away some exceptional leadership skills from the involvement, but furthermore, joining FFA could be the catalyst that kickstarts a series of breakthroughs that might have gone unrealized without time in a corduroy jacket.
According to the National FFA website, National FFA Week is Feb. 22 to 29, 2020. To learn more about the National FFA Organization, visit www.ffa.org.
Lacey Newlin can be reached at 580-748-1892 or [email protected].
