End of the Year

 We had a wonderful evening celebrating the year at our Annual Banquet.  This was a special picture with Maxwell and our president sitting on the driver's seat.

 Trinity Lewis from Wyoming came and spoke about her FFA experience being a State Officer and challenged the students to take advantage of the opportunities FFA offers and to seek out mentors who can help you achieve your goals.

We honored two families with honorary degrees for their support of our chapter this year.

Next year's officers are being sworn in and looking forward to continuing the growth of our chapter.

 There was a lot of excavating that went into the swing-set area and this picture shows the footings we put down for the frame.  All in all we took out 12" of sod and soil from a 60'x60' area.

 The A frames with the main beam were brought from Dale's house with a pay loader (over 20 miles) and then we assembled the platform and slide on site.

We ordered a semi-truck load of wood chips to fill in around the structure and we will need to order another load this fall as it settles.

 Here is the near-complete project with some of the first kids who got to play on the set.  There are a few odds and ends that will be completed by this fall, however, the set has already had a lot of use and we hope it will be safely enjoyed for years to come!

State Convention 2

 Here are some more pictures from state convention including some full group shots on the steps leading up to Frost Arena.

 SBA had our first ever State FFA Degree Recipients this year-congratulations Andrew and Cassidy!

 Andrew also won a Build Dakota Scholarship for his 1st place finish in Ag Mechanics.

 Shelby served as our district reporter and presented during the business session on Monday.

You can't go to SDSU without checking out the Dairy Bar.  This year we did something a little different and had a game night with a college ministry called Equip.  It was a fun way to end the day on Monday after taking part of competitions and sitting through long sessions.

State Convention 2017

 We had another great convention this year in Brookings in both the competitions and learning opportunities.  Our Quiz Bowl team won first place and will be competing again at the State Fair over Labor Day weekend.  Andrew and Cassidy also became the first SBA students to receive their state degrees.

 The Ag Mechanics team placed 8th out of 52 teams and Andrew finished 1st individually winning a Build Dakota Scholarship.

The Livestock team placed 14th out of more than 60 teams and finished a very successful year in this popular competition.  

 We also try and have some fun in between the sessions and competitions.  SDSU hosted some tours on campus and some of the students got to see the new cow-calf research area.  We always go and check out the Dairy Bar for quality control purposes.

 My camera ran out of memory space at convention, however, there are more pictures to come as we get pictures off of other cameras.

April Happenings

 We broke ground on the swing-set project this week.  "Maxwell" our tractor has come in very handy!

 Here are some construction pictures from Paulson's, where we are building it the set.

 Our CDE teams did well at Bowdle with Ag Mechanics placing first overall, Livestock placing second overall, Horses placing third overall, and our floriculture student placing in the top ten individually.

CDE Season

 Our Ag Mechanics team finished in first place at the Miller CDE with Andrew finishing first overall.

 Our livestock judging team finished in first place at the Miller CDE with Cassidy finishing in first place overall and Teigan finishing in 3rd place overall.

 Here is a picture of all the participants at the Miller CDE.  This is the most participation we've ever had at an event before.

 The livestock judging team also finished in first place at the Redfield CDE

 Here are some updated photos from our swingset project.

FFA Week 2

 We had the opportunity to attend a CDE school in Winner this year during FFA Week.  They also brought in Dr. Rigsby who has spoken at the National FFA convention a number of times.  He had an inspiring message of the power of a parent/teacher on a student's life.  We were grateful to meet with him after the event.

 We also had our annual animal nursery during FFA week.  A huge thank you to a couple of SBA families who provided us with sheep, goats, cattle and a horse for our event.

 The bottle lambs were very young ranging in age from 1-4 days old.

 The Animal Science students taught the elementary students about the animals.

 

 Day 2 of our swing-set construction was successful as we secured the main beam on top of the swing-set,  We hope to move it on campus in the next month or so.  

The Animal Science class is making digestion murals to help teach the elementary students about digestion.

FFA Week 1

 Another FFA week is in the books and this year's activities lived up to all the hype.  We did a unique fundraiser this year by having students put money in jars to support their favorite teacher wearing a bovine costume for the day.  Here is a picture of our chapter with the winner!

 We hosted an Ag-Olympics theme having an apple-bobbing relay, hay bale throwing competition, potato peeling competition and a pop chugging contest out of calf bottles.  In the background, you can also see our tractor "Maxwell" which pulled in a trailer with the officer team on it.

 We also hosted our yearly art competition centered around the theme of "Transformed" where the artists reclaimed products and gave them a new meaning.  There were several outstanding pieces entered including the ones below: