Growing the Council FFA
The Council FFA Chapter is growing, and this year they received an award to prove it! 22 students from Council went to the FFA State Leadership Conference this year in Twin Falls where they received several awards, including an award for a growing chapter. “They did really good,” said FFA Advisor Trista Robbins. One student, Yasmin Leon, also received an award for a Scrapbook and the team from Council placed Second in the state for Aquaculture! One of the team members, Ayden Heinemeyer, placed fourth individually in the state for Aquaculture. They brought home a banner that they will be hanging in the classroom.
Taking that many students on a three day trip to Twin Falls doesn’t come cheap, and the Council FFA holds a variety of fundraisers throughout the year to help fund these types of experiences. Recently, Mrs. Robbins decided to take their Fall Apple Cider Fundraiser to a whole new level, and embarked on a true farm to fork style mission to procure apples for the fundraiser. In the past, students have picked apples from along the Weiser River trail for the cider pressing, but the quality was poor, so more recently they have been purchasing apples. Mrs. Robbins thought that was a shame though, when there was an orchard at the school that had over 30 fruit trees, most of them apple. Over the years the orchard had been neglected though, and deer often ate the few apples it produced, not leaving nearly enough for the cider.
Slowly, Robbins is aiming to change that. First she procured a grant to fence in the orchard and keep the deer out. Next she wanted to prune the trees, so she contacted Graham Collings who owns the local tree company Arbor Ops Tree Service, and he agreed to donate most of his time to get all of the fruit trees pruned and chip the branches into mulch for the trees. He gave pruning demonstrations to the Ag students and Robbins hopes that eventually they will be able to get them to a place where they can maintain the orchard so that it can produce all of the apples for the fall fundraiser, and the students can be involved in every aspect of the process from start to finish.
However, the biggest FFA fundraiser of the year, and most anticipated by locals, is the spring FFA Plant Sale. It is just around the corner, scheduled for Friday May 8, from 7:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m. at the high school greenhouse. It draws quite a crowd every year, so this year they are trying out a pre-order option with advanced pickup on May 7. Stay tuned for updates and thank you for supporting our local FFA Students!
