Episode 6

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Published on:

19th Feb 2021

February 19 2021 - Re-2 News

Mary McPhee:

It's Mary McPhee, I just wanted to come on and remind you about the free and reduced application. It's that time again, to get it off of the website, print it, bring it into your child's school. Or of course you can mail it to me anytime.

Mary McPhee:

If you have any kind of questions that are regarding that application, you can call the nutrition office and talk to Sherry Edwards, and her number is (970)-665-7604. My number here in my office is (970)-665-7697. So call us any time, and make sure that you print out the application and we can go over it together.

Mary McPhee:

This week's shout out goes to Monica Peyton at Cactus Valley Elementary. She and her staff helped out when Elk Creek needed help. The Elk Creek kitchen staff had to go into quarantine and they came to help us. Monica helped me, Jennifer helped me, and Stephanie of course held down the fort there, and we got through, and Ryan was very happy.

Mary McPhee:

So I just want to give a shout out to the Cactus Valley kitchen crew for helping us make it through. I hope you all have a great weekend, and a good week next week. See you next time.

Theresa Hamilton:

Ryan Hudson, you are the head of the agriculture department at Rifle High School, yes?


Ryan Hudson:

Yes, ma'am.


Theresa Hamilton:

What else do you do?


Ryan Hudson:

So I'm the FFA Advisor. So we have the FFA program, we do all of here with welding, construction, leadership. We work in the greenhouse. We have a lot of different things going on.


Theresa Hamilton:

So we're talking today because next week is national FFA week.


Ryan Hudson:

Yep. It is. It's going to be a great week. We've got a lot of stuff to celebrate. And even with the times that we're dealing with, we're still going to have a good time and have great opportunities to have some fun.


Theresa Hamilton:

Talk to me a little bit about the importance of FFA and, for anybody that doesn't know, FFA is future farmers of America. Why is that an important program to have in our schools?


Ryan Hudson:

Well, I don't know that we have enough time, but I'll give you the highlights. So the technical way to look at it is, is we're inter-curricular, so there's three circles. School, and then we have the SAE component, which is their supervised agricultural experience, and that can range from animals, to working, to all those other things. And then we have the personal side of it that ties in as well with FFA, with our contests and stuff. And so it makes these three circles in it. It makes school relevant. It makes it fun.


Theresa Hamilton:

I know that one week out of a year is not nearly enough to celebrate our nation's farmers. But what are the kinds of things that you have scheduled for next week, at least at rifle high school, to celebrate our future farmers of America?


Ryan Hudson:

Yeah, it's an interesting thing about the [inaudible 00:03:17] we've talked about the [inaudible 00:03:18] and challenges, but we farmed so you don't have to, and it gives everybody the opportunity to do other things. That's kind of a cool quote because about 200,000 people raise all of our food in the United States plus everywhere else in the world.


Ryan Hudson:

It's really an opportunity to highlight some of those things, but we're going to do a lot of things like a spirit day. We have a tacky tourist day. So you, you can imagine where that's going to go. It'll be much have a blue and gold day and official dress day. We're going to have a giant Jenga contest during lunches. We have some chapter meetings to talk about some things that are coming up with our events in our CDE contests and stuff, our career development contest. And we're also going to do Ag. Olympics one day at lunch, and then we're just going to celebrate kids and we're going to celebrate rifle FFA, and just the opportunities we have to be a part of such a cool program.


Theresa Hamilton:

And one of the things that I've always thought was so amazing about FFA is when you hear future farmers of America and, and I'm not going to get the quote, right, but it's not just about raising sow's and cows and plows, right. Did I get that right?


Ryan Hudson:

Plows anymore, you're right. But we don't teach much about sows and plows anymore. We do talk about it because it's important. But the real true component of FFA is career development, personal growth. We do a lot of stuff with public speaking, a lot of stuff with just skills that you're going to need as you get older, whether you're going to be a doctor, a lawyer, a miner, or a farmer, or [inaudible 00:04:55] and we have opportunities every day to make ourselves better and challenge ourselves in every way we can. And we do cool things like weld and build wood projects and sheds and greenhouse stuff. And we're in full swing for getting our bedding plants ready for everybody to come and get those. So it's coming along.


Theresa Hamilton:

And I know that the rifle high school program is a very well-established FFA program. I know that you do an awful lot of work with Coleridge, which is a new program as well. Can you talk a little bit about the partnerships that you have with your sister school?


Ryan Hudson:

Absolutely. Miranda Wilson is the advisor there and she's doing a great job of getting kids involved over there. And we try to do things together a lot. We have had some hiccups this year, but it's not our fault. It's this thing called COVID. But other than that, we've done really well to getting things together. We've traveled together. We try to reduce the amount of opportunities for expenses. So we travel one bus instead of five and those kinds of things, but more importantly, the kids, they collaborate, they get along, they see each other, they do things together.


Ryan Hudson:

And I like the term sister school because we don't have a competition between us. We get along, we do everything together and we make it happen for multiple reasons. And for example, right now she's working on some bee, some honeybee stuff, and I may have done a lot of honeybees back in the past. And so we're working that route and it's a little known secret that Wilson was once one of my students. And so we make sure that we stay in good terms there and she's a little sassier than she used to be, but we get along really, really well.


Theresa Hamilton:

Well, it is definitely an amazing program that we have in both of our schools. And as you said, just so valuable for our kids and our communities. And we're grateful to you guys who are taking the lead on it and supporting our kids. And I'm thankful for you for spending a little bit of time talking about it.


Ryan Hudson:

You bet. I'm glad to. Let me know to come in anytime and I'm happy to show you around.


Theresa Hamilton:

I love that you've got a beautiful blue background there, buddy.


Ryan Hudson:

And I also got the NAPA right there.


Theresa Hamilton:

A little plug for our weekly newsletter spotlight. So, thank you so much for taking some time out of your busy day, as noted by the fact that you are running errands for the ag program and the FFA programs.


Ryan Hudson:

You bet, have a great day.


Theresa Hamilton:

Ryan, you rock.


Ryan Hudson:

Talk to you later. Thank you so much.


Theresa Hamilton:

Yep. Thank you.

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About the Podcast

Re-2 is You
Stories of the people of the Garfield Re-2 School District
School districts are organizations. What makes school districts amazing places to learn, work, and grow are the people. This podcast will showcase the people that make the Garfield Re-2 School District work, and maybe provide some helpful information along the way.

About your host

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Theresa Hamilton

Communication Director for the Garfield Re-2 School District