Jason Troendle plans for year as Minnesota FFA President

05/19/2010 |

Published in the Winona Daily News.

The FFA may not just be for farmers anymore, but it's still very much about the future.

Case in point: Jason Troendle, a senior at St. Charles High School and the newly elected Minnesota State FFA President.

"It's more than plows, sows and cows," Troendle said. Most FFA members, he said, "aren't from farms and don't plan on farming."

Troendle, 18, is very much part of the new image of the youth organization known for generations as the "Future Farmers of America" - officially changed to "The National FFA Organization" in 1988.

"(My family) doesn't have a farm," he said, "I don't intend to be a farmer."

Still, Troendle has been involved with FFA since he was an eighth-grader and will continue with the organization at least through his first year of college.

The organization, he said, was founded to promote youth in agriculture, and today agriculture touches on virtually every interest and career - and contemporary FFA programs and activities reflect that.

Troendle points to his own involvement with FFA as an example. As an eighth-grader, he learned that a canoe trip through the Boundary Waters was an activity of the local FFA chapter. "I absolutely love to fish," he said.

Once hooked, he not only pursued interests in fish and wildlife and natural resource management, but saw his interests broaden and deepen.

Read the full article on the Winona Daily News website.

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