Future farmers provide holiday blessings
- November 25, 2014
- / Reggie Dogan
- / early-learning
Rosemary Smyth found joy in cramming boxes with canned goods, turkeys and fresh vegetables to give to needy families for Thanksgiving dinners.
As a member of Tate High School’s Future Farmers of America, Smyth on Tuesday helped spread some holiday cheer while fulfilling the organization’s motto: “living to serve.”
“This makes me feel wonderful,” said Smyth, Tate High’s FFA chapter committee chairman. “If they don’t remember me, they will remember the blessing.”
This holiday blessing comes as part of the Escambia County schools FFA first Farm to City effort to help get fresh food to families in need while teaching students about where food comes from.
Nealry 30 students from Tate and Northview high schools and Ernest Ward Middle School spent Monday at the University of West Florida Research and Education Center in Jay, harvesting turnips and collard greens.
On Tuesday, about 15 Tate students took a bus to the Waterfront Mission to put the finish touches on the Farm to City project.
They quickly learned the importance of teamwork as they worked an assembly line, wrapping and passing bundles of turnips and collard greens to a truck en route to a washing station.
The vegetables then were packaged in boxes with canned goods, grits, cornmeal and a turkey for delivery to hundreds of area needy families.
The good deed became teaching moments for the students who learned about the cycle that gets goods from a farm to a family’s holiday dinner table in time for Thanksgiving dinner.
“Part of FFA’s motto is ‘living to serve,’” said Melissa Gibbs, Tate High’s FFA adviser. “This is something we start in the classroom. A big aspect of it is to give back to the community.”
Tate High School’s FFA was established in 1929, the year after the national organization was founded in Kansas City to bring together students, teachers and agribusiness in support of agricultural education.
Patra Miller, president of the Tate’s FFA chapter, joined her school’s organization as a seventh-grader.
Miller would like to see more students participate to learn more about one of America’s oldest occupations.
“There are lots of career opportunities in the agricultural field,” Miller said. “It’s more than just being a farmer.”
For Dylan Hammac, a Tate senior who joined FFA three years ago, participating in the Farm to City project was a real lesson of thanksgiving.
“I grew up not having a whole lot, so I know what it means to need help,” Hammac said. “That’s why it feels so good to give back to the community.”
They quickly learned the importance of teamwork as they worked an assembly line, wrapping and passing bundles of turnips and collard greens to a truck en route to a washing station.
The vegetables then were packaged in boxes with canned goods, grits, cornmeal and a turkey for delivery to hundreds of area needy families.
The good deed became teaching moments for the students who learned about the cycle that gets goods from a farm to a family’s holiday dinner table in time for Thanksgiving dinner.
“Part of FFA’s motto is ‘living to serve,’” said Melissa Gibbs, Tate High’s FFA adviser. “This is something we start in the classroom. A big aspect of it is to give back to the community.”
Tate High School’s FFA was established in 1929, the year after the national organization was founded in Kansas City to bring together students, teachers and agribusiness in support of agricultural education.
Patra Miller, president of the Tate’s FFA chapter, joined her school’s organization as a seventh-grader.
Miller would like to see more students participate to learn more about one of America’s oldest occupations.
“There are lots of career opportunities in the agricultural field,” Miller said. “It’s more than just being a farmer.”
For Dylan Hammac, a Tate senior who joined FFA three years ago, participating in the Farm to City project was a real lesson of thanksgiving.
“I grew up not having a whole lot, so I know what it means to need help,” Hammac said. “That’s why it feels so good to give back to the community.”
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