Salute to Agriculture
Caliche FFA off and running as new school year gets underway Chapter busy with a variety of projects By Todd Thomas Caliche FFA Advisor
The school year has started and we are off and running. The officer team had their retreat during the summer and set some amazing goals for the chapter as well as themselves. The team is busy working on the Program of Activities and making sure our committees are set up for success. The officer/leadership team consists of: President – Asa Bogie, Vice President – Nevada Mitchell, Secretary – Haylee Marick, Treasurer – Brandyn Hill, Sentinel – Howard Dedrickson, Reporter – Brayden Wasson, and Executive Committee – Trista Hernandez. We started the year off with a student teacher. Her name is Lena Haun and she comes from Grover, Colo. She is finishing her ag-ed degree at Colorado State University. The Ag-Ed I class has been busy setting up their AET (Agricultural Experience Tracker) online record books and studying Parliamentary Procedure. The Ag-Ed I class also attended the BIG (Becoming
Courtesy photo
Caliche High School agriculture-education students watch a demonstration at Graham Electric (planters) in Sterling during the recent Manufacturing Day tours.
Involved as a Greenhand) Conference at Northeastern Junior College. This conference is held each year and run by the State FFA Officer team to show case the many opportunities that are available to members of the FFA. As tradition is an important part of the Caliche FFA the Ag-Ed I class also hosted the Annual Cali-
36 • OCTOBER 30, 2019 • SALUTE TO AGRICULTURE
che Homecoming Mini-Float Parade which was held during the pep assembly on the Friday of Homecoming Week. The Food Products and Processing class has been working on different ways to preserve food and what goes into the different processes. We’ve made beef jerky through dehydration as well as
dehydrated various fruits, canned raspberry preserves, and made cheese and butter. The Ag Mechanics and Technical Systems class started the semester with balancing records and catching things up from the summer break. We have 11 students enrolled in the class. Our first class project was on how to connect trailers and back them up successfully. We really want to thank MW Equipment, who loaned us a new goose neck flatbed trailer to practice on. We’ve taken our safety tests and have completed a plumbing unit where students worked with various types of pipe; copper, galvanized and PVC and were able to show how we could connect them all together so as to possibly solve a real life problem. To make it more applicable and hands on the students built some sprinklers utilizing those different types of pipe and fittings. We are on to building an 8-foot by 12-foot shed as carpentry project. Our goal is to auction it off this spring at our annual Oyster Fry and Labor Auction. Progress photos to come in the future. The Ag-Ed II class has been working on a range and pasture management unit. They have gone out and identified decreaser, See CALICHE, pg. 37