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Wisconsin part of FFA growth trend

As the National FFA Association tops a million members, Wisconsin is also seeing record numbers.

Wisconsin FFA Executive Director and National FFA Secretary Cheryl Zimmerman tells Brownfield, “We’re over 25,000, well 25,900 plus.”

And, she says more city youth are getting involved in ag education. “Last year, too, Nathan Hale out of Milwaukee, they chartered their FFA chapter so they’re growing and obviously, we’ve got Milwaukee Vincent that’s really been one of our strong programs. We’ve got a couple of others that are inquiring.”

And Zimmerman says La Crosse received its FFA charter recently and is growing rapidly. “We’ve got a former state officer that was hired there as an ag teacher and now this year, they’re actually hiring a second teacher and they’re going into the middle schools more so there’s a strong potential that we’re going to be chartering a La Crosse middle school.”

Zimmerman says she’s seen more newly chartered FFA chapters in the last couple of years than during her first 28 years heading Wisconsin’s FFA program.  She says the challenge is finding enough agriculture educators.  Zimmerman says the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction reported over 60 ag teacher changes in recent years.