Lovell FFA chapter serves the community, school

Some high school organizations are all about fun, many about learning and others about service. The Lovell FFA chapter puts an emphasis on the latter category while learning about agriculture.

Chapter reporter Payton Tillett this week provided information on a recent service project the chapter undertook.

“Our Lovell FFA members wanted to spread some Christmas cheer this year, so they came up with the idea of making Christmas stockings for people in our community,” Tillett said. “Everyone agreed that the stockings should go to the residents of the New Horizons Care Center. Each member helped assemble the stockings, filling them with care.

“On December 2 after school, the group met at the care center to hand-deliver the stockings to the residents. The visit was filled with great conversations and plenty of smiles. The members even made enough stockings for all of the staff to receive one, as well.”

“Going to the senior center for them kind of felt like a big deal, because everybody really does kind of look at kids over Christmas, and sometimes we overlook some of the leaders or people that used to be leaders in our community,” FFA advisor and ag teacher Nick Edelman said. “And so they really wanted to take care of some of those people this year. And they really did. They thought it all out themselves. They set up being there at the care center. They gave me the stuff they wanted to order. I really just tried to stay out of their way.”

Edelman said the stockings were filled with items like candy canes, hot chocolate and adult coloring books with colored pencils. The stocking were delivered December 2.

“They got to go room to room and talk with a lot of the folks in there, which I think was a pretty big deal, too, to get to talk to and see some of those people and just get to hang out for a little bit.”

Other activities

It’s been a busy fall for Lovell FFA members. September was a month for recruiting new members, Edelman said, including an event featuring grilled hamburgers, water balloon dodge ball and more.

Two judging teams attended the Northern International Livestock Exposition in Billings October 13-14 and performed well, Edelman said. The horse judging team of Kate Cooper, Tillett, Daisy Carpenter and Chance Hatch was the second highest performing team from Wyoming. And the livestock judging team of Carpenter, Toree Herman, Ethan Hendershot and John Stuart also performed well. Carpenter scored fourth overall in livestock judging out of all schools in attendance, and Herman was in the top 20, Edelman said.

On Halloween, FFA members went trick-or-treating for cans that were donated to the Lovell Food Pantry at the United Methodist Church. It was “kind of light this year,” Edelman said, but around 800 cans were donated to the pantry.

Edelman said he took 13 members to the Fall Leadership Conference in Casper November 21-22. Younger students were able to get some career exploration, along with leadership training, and students were able to work with and learn from organizations like the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation and the Wyoming Pork Council.

Edelman said there are 28 active members of the LHS FFA, up from last year, and officers are Addisyn Perkins, president; sophomore Kelce Winterholler, vice president; Cooper, a junior, secretary; Tillett, a senior, reporter; Hatch, a junior, treasurer; and sophomore Christy Aagard, sentinel.

“This officer group has been really good about coming up and trying to do different stuff, trying to come up with new stuff,” Edelman said.

For instance, the welding class made Christmas ornaments emblazoned with “2025” that were placed into extra stockings the FFA chapter had and gave them to school teachers and paraprofessionals.

“So they’ve come up with new stuff, and that’s been the fun part,” Edelman said. “They’ve taken a lot of the pressure off of me, really. They’re digging in deep, and they’re doing a lot of the leg work so I don’t have to, which has been awesome.”