During the week of April 15th, the Seward Future Farmers of America (FFA) Chapter, dubbed Iron Mountain, traveled to Palmer to compete at the statewide competition. Seward entered this year as a new chapter, but after many impressive wins and awards, they quickly gained respect from their fellow FFA members in the state, “putting Seward on the map.”

Students Tate Barhaug, Lindy Guernsey, Akilena Veach, Cody Bryden, Lincoln Farris, and Teak Barhaug returned home with, quite literally, a stack of prizes.

Cody placed 2nd in Fisheries and 2nd in Marine Tech overall as an individual.

Lindy took 4th in both Prepared Public Speaking and Employability Skills. She was also presented a leadership award.

Tate placed 1st in Agricultural Mechanics, winning a $10,000 Universal Technical Institute (UTI) tuition scholarship.  He also placed 1st in Prepared Speaking, and 2nd in Extemporaneous Speaking.

Iron Mountain, as a whole, shined in the Environmental and Natural Resource (ENR) competition. Tate placed 1st, while Teak took 2nd, and Akilena 3rd. The ENR team, consisting of Tate, Lindy, Akilena, and Lincoln, won first place and the opportunity to advance to nationals in Indianapolis, Indiana, in the fall.

As Tate is only a junior, his hope is to also win additional scholarships towards UTI next year. Luckily, he was already looking into UTI as a choice in schooling, more specifically the  Nascar Technical Institute campus in North Carolina.

Cody was also part of the nomination committee during state FFA, in which he got to grade his fellow officer candidates and choose which people would be best suited for each office.   

The current members of the Iron Mountain FFA Chapter encourage students of all different career interests to join the group. Even though it is called Future Farmers of America, FFA is not only focused on agriculture. They help students improve in all sorts of different fields, ranging from job experiences to leadership opportunities.