EAST ELLIJAY, Ga. – Gilmer Schools has just ended its celebration of National FFA week in the system after a proclamation last Monday from Gilmer Schools Superintendent Dr. Brian Ridley officially designated the celebration in the Board of Education’s monthly meeting.

Though Gilmer has just finished its celebrations, the proclamation and actual National FFA Week began yesterday, going from February 19 to February 26 according to Ridley’s proclamation. The school system celebrated early as this week is a holiday for Gilmer. The National FFA Organization that is celebrating this week has more than 735,000 members in all 50 states, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands.

The week saw events on each day including teacher celebrations and a scavenger hunt and ended on Friday with the hosting of the annual Gilmer County Farm Bureau Livestock Show. This was Gilmer’s students last showing before heading to state this week during the national celebration of FFA Week.

Gilmer High School Agriculture Education teacher Claire Woodard said, “Each year, over 750,000 students throughout the entire United States band together to celebrate National FFA Week… As part of our kickoff, we wanted the board to help us with signing this proclamation.”

At the national level, this weeks celebrations involve Grants for Growing (G4G), a competitive grant program for middle and high school FFA chapters that are developing and improving project-based or experiential learning opportunities for students, sponsored by Tractor Supply Company (TSC) and funded purchases of an FFA paper emblem at TSC stores during checkout. Wednesday is the national Ag Teacher Appreciation Day. Thursday hosts Give FFA Day, a day completely focused on encouraging communities to donate and support, in any way, local students and chapters of FFA. Friday becomes Wear Blue Day as a celebration of pride in the FFA program across the nation. The week also hosts several online and interactive activities like agriculture and education trivia.

So while the schools may be on holiday, Gilmer FFA students are still celebrating both online and in person with activities all week. With support of the school system as a whole and from the national organization, National FFA Week is still underway and will continue into the coming years. In fact, future dates for FFA week have already been set at the National Level for the coming years including February 18-25, 2023, February 17-24, 2024, and February 15-22, 2025.

 

(Photos provided by Gilmer Schools and Gilmer FFA program.)