FFA week is a national celebration that has been celebrated since 1948. The first day of FFA week is Saturday, February 17, and it will last until Friday, February 23. The theme for Sunday is Supervised Agriculture Experience (SAE) Sunday. FFA members are supposed to show off their own and learn about other members’ SAEs. Monday is reserved for service and advocacy. This day represents the last line of the FFA motto which is “Living to Serve.” Members should gather their friends to plan a service project in their community. Tuesday is Alumni Day. FFA members can connect with FFA alumni using ForeverBlueNetwork.org. Wednesday is Ag Teacher Appreciation Day. Our FFA advisors are the ones who make everything within our chapter possible. Members should post about an advisor who has impacted his/her life, and members should also remember to thank their advisor. Thursday is give FFA day. FFA is a non-profit organization that relies on donations. On Thursday, members should consider asking their family and friends to donate to the FFA. Friday is Wear Blue Day. All members should wear national blue to represent their FFA pride.
Along with the entire nation, the Lewis Cass FFA will be celebrating FFA week. We will be celebrating the entire week with different activities. Our week will start off with going to church with our president. On Sunday, we will also go on our annual ski trip to Timber Ridge Ski Resort. Having the school day off for Presidents Day on Monday, after getting back late from the ski trip, the FFA chapter officers will go on a shopping trip to get all of the supplies we will need throughout the entire week. Most of the supplies will come from Sam’s Club, and after, the officers will spend a couple of hours at the school organizing the supplies. The first school day of the week will start off with Truck Tuesday. FFA members should drive their trucks to school to participate in the truck contest. Categories such as ugliest, dirtiest, nicest, newest, and oldest will be made, and the winners will receive a prizes such as cleaning supplies. Wednesday is one of our members’ favorite days. It starts off with tractor day. Members should show up to school driving their favorite tractor. The FFA also grills our famous pork chops for lunch. Anybody can buy a pork chop at lunch for one dollar. The day wraps up at 6:00 pm with the volleyball tournament being held in the main gym. Teams buy in with six dollars which goes to the FFA benevolent fund. The teams will face off in a double elimination style bracket. This tournament is open to all Lewis Cass students. Thursday is another very early morning. Anyone participating has to be at the school by 6:00 am for the teacher breakfast. The members fix breakfast for all of the teachers and bus drivers in the school. We also have to be in official dress (FFA jacket, black pants, black shoes, white shirt, and FFA tie) the entire day. Friday is our Ag Olympics Day. Competitions will be held throughout the day for prizes. Saturday evening ends our FFA week with our pork chop dinner. The dinner is held at 5:00 pm. There is also an officer worker auction held on Facebook. Anybody can bid on an FFA officer to purchase them for one day of work.
Preparing for FFA week is a strenuous task that requires effort throughout the year. Mr. Appleton said, “Mr. Plank and I are always working on improving our activities. Even during the fair, we are talking about different things we could do, but in reality, it takes every bit of two months to complete preparation for the week.” Mr. Plank has an interesting take on our FFA week. With this being his first year at this school, he brought some interesting ideas from Delphi. At Delphi, they auctioned every member off instead of just the officers. They also had a goat wrestling competition. Maggie Taylor, the chapter president, says her favorite part of FFA week is the teacher breakfast. She likes being able to give back to the teachers. She also enjoys going skiing on Sunday. The FFA is also very thankful for Tyson Foods and all other sponsors during FFA week. Without our sponsors, it would be very hard to do any activities. Everyone should try to participate in FFA week because there are so many activities everyone can get involved in. Even if you are not currently in FFA, there is surely something you can find to participate in.
