The Montrose Chapter of Future Farmers of America (FFA) brought National FFA Week to Montrose High School from February 19 to 26 with games and activities for members and students. The week ended with an assembly to gather students and teachers for one last round of games and fun. 

In preparation for FFA Week, members were expected to help with the set up of activities and of the Ag Olympics, with jobs being assigned to members to complete.

“In the beginning, we were all assigned a task, then later on we all just decided to work together,” junior and FFA Reporter Karlee Brach said.

Games and activities throughout the week included the Corn Kennel Contest, a Kiss the Pig Contest, Teacher Appreciation, Ag Olympics, Ag Trivia on Facebook, National Blue Day, a $500 Murdoch’s gift card drawing, and a Cowboy Prom. The winner of the Corn Kernel Contest was Heather Power and the winner of the $500 Murdoch’s gift card was Leona Justus.

“We don’t do things through the school, so getting the school involved was a good time,” junior and FFA member Heather Power said.

On Thursday, February 24th, a school-wide assembly was held for students to participate in games with their peers and with teachers, the first school-wide assembly in two years. Five students from each grade and five teachers volunteered to participate in a series of games. The freshman class finished first, with the seniors coming in second, the teachers in third, the juniors in fourth, and the sophomores in fifth.

“This was the first year we’ve done it like this, we had never done an assembly,” Brach said. “We just try to think of new ideas that would be lots of fun.”

The crowd favorite was Kiss the Pig after the games, wherein teachers with the most money from the Kiss the Pig activity throughout the week had to kiss a pig during the assembly. Teacher participants were Ms. Wagner, Mr. Leonard, and Mr. Voehringer. Ms. Wagner put on a show for the crowd, pulling out her ruby-red lipstick before smearing it on and giving the pig a kiss.

“It was really fun. Mostly the officer team and a few other people were there to help out and help everyone to the best of our abilities,” Power said.

Funds raised by the games played throughout the week will go toward travel and expenses for the Montrose Chapter of FFA.

“We plan to go on many trips with the chapter and compete in different activities,” Mallory Johnson, Montrose High School Agriculture Education instructor and FFA advisor for the Montrose Chapter, said. “The donations and fundraising we have been doing will help immensely with all these activities.”

“We had a great turn out for all events. I hope that the excitement of some new activities will lead to greater participation in the future,” Johnson said.