FFA Behind the Emblem: Brodhead

175 members
Brodhead, Wisconsin
Green and Rock Counties

Tell us about your chapter. Brodhead FFA gives members the chance to explore and be active in their own way. Our student-run organization focuses on premier leadership, personal growth and career success and is available for students in grades 7-12. Students are given the opportunity to attend leadership conferences, participate in Leadership Development Event and Career Development Event contests, apply for state and national awards, show at the Rock or Green County fairs, participate in community events and attend fun monthly field trips and meetings.

 How does your chapter volunteer in the community throughout the year? The Brodhead FFA has an outstanding Brodhead FFA Alumni that supports the program and agriculture department. Every summer, we volunteer at the FFA alumni’s two food stands at one of our popular community events, Concerts in the Park. The FFA chapter plans and helps with both of those events. We also organize and host a kid’s pedal tractor pull contest for ages 3 and up during another popular community event, Covered Bridge Days. Our chapter gets a sponsorship from Speich Oil Inc. for this event and we can purchase trophies for our top three pullers in each age group.  With this donation, we are also able to award drawstring goodie bags filled with snacks and small agriculture-themed items for each participant. We host a collection drive annually to collect items either for a food pantry or another organization the members are passionate about. The last two years, we have collected needed items for the Green County Humane Society. We have also volunteered at events in the area to help out other organizations. This past year, we helped serve cream puffs and ice cream at the Cheese Days Festival in Monroe. We are always looking for more community service opportunities.

What fundraisers does your chapter do throughout the year? Which is the most successful? We do three fundraisers throughout the year. Our first fundraiser is our snack and milk vending machine. The machine is available for students and staff to purchase milk products and healthy snacks throughout the year. The second fundraiser is our annual plant sale. This takes place in our greenhouse, which is attached to our classroom. We sell annual bedding plants, hanging baskets and pots, vegetable plants and a few houseplants. This fundraiser is our most successful. We have many repeat customers who compliment us on how beautiful and healthy our flowers and plants are. The students enjoy seeing the results of their hard work as they make others happy. Our third fundraiser is our FFA Banquet Dessert and Basket Auction. During our annual FFA banquet, we have 10 gift baskets and 10 desserts that we auction off throughout the night. The auction is quite successful ($500 for a peach pie) and brings in money for our chapter to use for the following year’s events.

What are the biggest events of the year? Our biggest event is our Food for America program. We put this event together with Parkview FFA in the fall at Spring Grove Dairy in Brodhead. The Food for America event is to educate fourth-grade students on where their food comes from along with giving students a chance to see the farm. In addition to Brodhead fourth graders, we also invite students from 10 different elementary schools, adding up to 450 fourth graders. We have local businesses and other local FFA chapters help lead a station topic along with other businesses donating items to support the program. This year, we were fortunate to have Grande Cheese make pizzas for all the students and volunteers for lunch. Another event that we host is ag day. Held on one day in May, we host a petting zoo at our high school for the Brodhead Elementary students to come and learn about each animal and be able to pet them. We just started this two years ago and have had great success and positive feedback with the event.

What is unique about your chapter? We are the only Green County FFA Chapter that hosts a Food for America Program. We invite most of the fourth-grade students from the majority of the Green County elementary schools to the event, adding up to 450 students. We appreciate the support and being able to incorporate the other FFA chapters to run a station and be involved in the program.

When was your chapter founded and how has it evolved? The Brodhead FFA Chapter was founded April 26, 1949. As with any agriculture program and FFA organization, over the course of 75 years, there have been changes in teachers, involvement from students and support from administration. In Brodhead, we have so much support from the community, alumni and local agriculture businesses that our program continues to grow and be strong. The Brodhead FFA Chapter has seen national and state proficiency winners, multiple American and State FFA Degrees, state FFA officers, LDE and CDE State competitors along with giving students the opportunity to grow and be successful in their future career choices.