New leadership for 4-H and FFA

The top two agricultural youth organizations in the state elected new leadership recently at their annual conventions – 4-H elected new officers at their 4-H Congress and FFA a new slate of state officers at their 90th State FFA Convention.

The 71st annual Tennessee 4-H Congress gave 4-H’ers the opportunity to learn about the day-to-day functioning of state government by assuming the roles of state representatives and senators. Since its beginning in 1948, 4-H Congress has given some 37,000 4-H’ers and volunteer leaders firsthand experience in state government. The newly-elected officers are: Governor, Katherine Ann Thierfelder of Madison County; Chloe’ Ragland, Speaker of the House of Van Buren County; and Claire Brooks, Speaker of the Senate of Warren County.

Approximately 400 high-school-age 4-H’ers from all over the state met to become legislators and form a “junior” state Congress, and had an opportunity to debate and vote on youth-oriented bills in the House and Senate Chambers. In addition to learning about government and their state capitol, delegates competed in public speaking, poster and essay contests. 4-H’ers also competed in leadership and citizenship projects for college scholarship money and trips to National 4-H Congress in Atlanta. The theme for this meeting and for all 4-H programs in 2018 is “Tennessee 4-H: Branching from Our Roots.”
Delegates also collected more than 3,000 items to benefit the Ronald McDonald House Charities in Nashville.
More than 3,300 FFA members attended the 90th Tennessee State FFA Convention, where students competed in career development and leadership development events to determine state winners, attended breakout sessions put on by National FFA officer Piper Merritt and out-of-state officers from four other states and rocked out during sessions where they heard from keynote speakers, industry leaders and learned the results of competitions. Their theme this year is “I Can. We Will.”
Their new slate of state FFA officers to lead the association over the next year are:
President – Luke Love of Riverdale FFA; East TN Vice President – Chloe Ford of David Crockett FFA; Middle TN Vice President – Makenzie Moorehead of Fayetteville City FFA; West TN Vice President – Averi Cole of Covington FFA; Secretary – Nick Carpenter of Cumberland County FFA; Treasurer – Tarrah Ivy of Scotts Hill FFA; Reporter – Anna Grace Brown of South Gibson County FFA and Sentinel – Garrett Franklin of Clay County FFA.