California FFA News Spring 2019 | Page 5

have found great success with ten State Championships and a National Championship Milk Quality and Dairy Products, in the past ten years. Students in the program also have a diverse array of SAE projects to choose from including many options for work placement in the areas of vegetable, fruit, viticulture and nursery production, agriscience research projects, and livestock entrepreneurships, all of which are important forms of work in the community. In 2018 the program had more than 50 state degrees which are attributed to the students’ work placement and entrepreneurship projects. Santa Maria FFA has a longstanding tradition of working closely with the community in terms of performing community service hours. While not a requirement, over half of our students have participated in some form of community service while in the agriculture program. The service projects range from working with the Food Bank and Toys-for-Tots to posting flags at Photo Captions (opposite page, upper left, rotating clockwise): 2018 State Degree award recipients from Santa Maria; students help harvest grapes at Allen Hancock College; Sustainable Ag Biology Course students learn to use technology to collect and analyze data; Mr. Guerra helps a student learn about oxy-fuel cutting; in the summer of 2018 students attended the ground breaking for the 25-acre school farm; Santa Maria Agricultural Department instructors Marc DeBernardi, Luis Guerra, Shannon Powell, Sara Araujo, Amanda Rodriguez, Melissa Flory-Guerra, the cemeteries during Memorial Day. Annually, Santa Maria FFA students put in over 1,000 hours of community service with various community organization. To maintain the traditions of the FFA, Santa Maria FFA has found it to be vital to develop outstanding academic courses and pathways, allow students to have a variety of leadership opportunities throughout the FFA and engage students with countless hand-on learning experiences in the field of agriculture. • Clemente Ayon, and Mark Powell; each month floral students make over 50 arrangements for the Flower of the Month Club; a winning group photo of students at the Cal Poly State FFA Finals; community service flag posting on Memorial Day; each summer 34 students show and auction turkeys at the county fair; students learn through hand-on projects in the greenhouse; and a student in the Agriculture Survey Course works on his electrical board. California FFANEWS • PAGE 5 • Spring 2019