FFA Behind the Emblem: Sparta

160 Members

Sparta, Wisconsin

Monroe County

Tell us about your chapter. Many things make the Sparta area a unique group of students to work with. At one time, this area was very heavy in dairy farming; however, agriculture has evolved here. We have a few larger dairy farms and some small ones, but the beef industry is rather large here. In the Sparta area, you will also find pigs, sheep, goats and other hobby farms.

Sparta is considered a rural school and is very close to Fort McCoy. Most students do not have strong ties to the agricultural industry. However, they maintain a vested interest in learning more about it. Sparta is extremely active at the state and local levels. Our students spend a lot of time volunteering for various causes and prepare themselves for competitions in a variety of ways.

Sparta is a two-advisor program. Madelynn Green is our middle school agricultural teacher and FFA advisor; she has been at Sparta for two years and has been doing an excellent job. Eric Follendorf has been the agriculture teacher for 13 years. He is originally from Sparta, adding a unique knowledge base of information in the Sparta area.

At the local level, our students show at the Monroe County Fair, volunteer with Lights in the Park, raise money for various causes and participate in many more activities. At the state level, students participate in competitions, such as speaking and Career Leadership Development Events, and attend leadership conferences and conventions.

How does your chapter volunteer in the community throughout the year? Some of the volunteer activities our students are actively involved in include Lights in the Park, ice cream sales during a week for a charitable group, milk distribution at Butterfest, the annual community fair in Sparta and FFA card parties.

Each year, Sparta FFA gives out over 5,000 cartons of milk to people who attend the Sparta Butterfest parade. This is one way we support the dairy industry while also making our presence known in the community. We often solicit donations from businesses and, in return, give the milk to the community.

During FFA Week, we choose a charitable organization to donate money to. This year, our FFA members chose to give their money to the Stark family, who recently experienced a house fire that left them with only the clothes on their back. The Stark siblings were active in the FFA while in high school. Often, the FFA members support families who have a tie to the FFA and are going through hardship. However, it is not a requirement that they were active in the organization but rather that they have some sort of tie to the Sparta community.

Perhaps one of the more unique events put on by the FFA members here is the card parties. We host card parties to help reduce the winter blues for our elderly population and local farmers. We host four card parties, starting in January and ending in April. The number of people who show up for these parties has ranged from 50-100 people; that is a lot of tables. It is not the goal to make a lot of money off of card parties. It truly is a community service activity for the students.

Additionally, our students like to help set up the lights in the park for the community. There’s nothing else that can put a person into the Christmas spirit faster than setting up lights. Whether or not the weather is good, we have a lot of people.

New this year, we started collecting deer heads for chronic wasting disease sampling to help the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources track the spread of this disease. Sparta members collected 88 heads, harvested their lymph nodes and sent them to Madison for testing. It was a great learning experience for our students as well as a community service activity.

Other community service events that the FFA members put on include National Night Out, Ag Day and summer ice cream sales.

What fundraisers does your chapter do throughout the year? Which is the most successful? There are many ways our chapter generates money for our causes. We are always soliciting donations for our group.

Perhaps the most profitable fundraiser for us is our fall fruit sale. We sell only local products along with Florida fruit. People look forward to the sale each year, and the phone is always ringing with people looking for an FFA member to stop by their house.

Other fundraisers include the strawberry fundraiser, greenhouse sales, summer ice cream sales and Sparta FFA Alumni Fun Night. Each event brings in a little more money for our group at times when we need it. We are so thankful we live in a generous community that has always been willing to support us, meaning we need to give back to the community.

What are the biggest events of the year? The biggest event students put on is the Ag Day in May. Students really come together to put on this event, and they do a great job teaching agricultural topics to our elementary students. We have an elementary school population of 800 students, and about 30 FFA members get involved with the teaching component of the event.

With our Ag Day, we teach about a variety of topics, including the dairy industry, plants and soils, Wisconsin potatoes, horses and many other things. It’s always nice to see how excited elementary students get about the day. It’s also even more exciting to see how excited our middle and high school members get about being in the spotlight and sharing what they know about agriculture.

What is unique about your chapter? A lot of chapters in this area do a lot of similar things. However, the more you look around, you notice that it’s actually kind of unique how much we travel. Not every FFA chapter across the United States is capable of traveling with their students, and we’re very thankful to be able to offer these opportunities to our members.

We also feel very fortunate we’re going into a referendum which should allow for greater opportunities for our FFA members as well as the students who take the agriculture classes. One of the things Mr. Follendorf hopes to achieve in the near future is to have some sort of facility that will allow for large animals to be at school so students can work with them in a variety of ways. It would be really cool to do lambing/farrowing, minor veterinary care and nutrition labs with the animals.

We are now in our second year of the affiliation agreement. This means any student who takes an agricultural class is automatically considered a member. They can do any activity they would like without the burden of having to pay dues. We are very fortunate that our alumni have obtained grants to help us continue to do this affiliation.

When was your chapter founded and how has it evolved? The Sparta FFA was founded in 1929, the same year FFA started in the state of Wisconsin. Part of the reason why the Sparta FFA was so quick to form was because, already in 1929, we had an Ag Society Club here at the high school. It was a fairly easy transition for us to charter into FFA. There have been many advisors, and each person brings a little different skill set.