This year the FFA state competition is being held in multiple locations like Tarleton State University in Stephenville, Texas Tech University in Lubbock and Texas A&M University in College Station, Huntsville. Six out of seven teams made it to state this year for FFA which has four students on each team with a total of 24 students.

“I’m pretty excited this is my senior year and it’s going to be my last time going so I plan to have a blast,” Senior Davin Hill said.

The National FFA organization involves floral design, vet med, small animal management, welding and advanced animal science which all fall into agriculture. Contests and showing animals that students do are all apart of becoming a future farmer of America.

“FFA used to stand for future farmers of America but since we’re such a diverse organization they changed it so now it stands for The National FFA organization.” FFA teacher Jennifer Kiggins said.

The competition is different for each team competing, for instance, floral and nursery have to identify up to 60 plants, judge flower arrangements or hanging baskets and determine which is better than the other along with a test over problem-solving. Vet is similar whereas instead of identifying plants they identify insects, pests, organs, breeds of animals and go through the process of giving an animal an injection. Vet also identifies plants on a ranch a cow may graze on.

“It’s a whole big part, they each have different little things for them, but it’s a pretty big deal because there’s so many different components and you have to do have to do really well on all of them to make it to state,” Kiggins said.

To prepare for the competitions, the teachers give students practice tests, they take the students to the nurseries to review over the type of plants, they also review over organs, breeds, and practice injections on stuffed animals.

“We have a lot of consistent practice so we can kind of make sure we’re at the top of our game for it,” Kiggins said.

The students are very excited about the competition and seem confident in themselves and their teammates since almost every team has made it to state every year. Most of the students recommend that more people should join FFA because of the opportunities and fun experiences they could have.

“It’s a great place to have friends and have like a school family and a community to be with and also a good place to compete,” Hill said.