Out of 154 students in the chapter, fewer than ten come from farming families. Nearly everyone in the room — officers, members, advisors — raised their hands when asked who did not grow up on a farm.

"We don't want students to have the mindset that it's only for farm kids," says advisor Sarah McKinnies. "We want to recruit the kids who don't live on a farm. Show them opportunities. Give them experiences they might not realize exist within agriculture."

Advisor Ann Piotrowski, who came to Du Quoin from Olney after teaching in Shawnee, puts it plainly: FFA hasn't stood for Future Farmers of America since 1988. The name changed because the mission outgrew it. "You could be a scientist, a broadcaster — anything," she says. "We're teaching students where their food comes from, how to use it sustainably, how to understand the environment around them."

The chapter was founded in 1950. In that time, it has had seven ag teachers total — fewer, as one observer noted, than the United States has had presidents. Last year, it earned the national three-star chapter award, the highest honor available in FFA. This year, it will produce its 13th American degree recipient — four of them in the last four years, after a gap going back to around 2000.

What it produces, though, isn't just credentials. Its direction.

Mackenzie Eaton walked into her basic ag mechanics class, terrified of welding. "Welding my hand. Blinding yourself because you're doing something wrong." Within the semester, she'd turned the corner entirely. Now she's headed to Kaskaskia College — primarily for athletics, but she'll graduate with her associate's degree, and welding is already on her list. The interviewer called it a hat trick. She didn't disagree.

Beckett File, a junior, wants to major in music education with an extension in history. The reason is personal: "I know there are other people in this school who may not have a great male figure to look up to. I want to be someone students would love to look up to and be like." His own model is close to home — his father, who serves as the school's athletic director and is also a licensed minister.

 

Shelby Pearl grew up on a farm and wants to stay close to that world — specifically as a feedlot manager and advocate for the beef cattle industry. "We sometimes get a bad rap for people thinking we're harming our cattle. I want to advocate for those animals, saying they get the best care there possibly is." She's blunt about what the work involves and unapologetic about why it matters: "We feed America."

Tyden Griffith discovered electricity through a sophomore ag class and hasn't let go. He plans to become an electrician and eventually open his own electrical business. "Electricity runs the United States. It always will have a place." His fellow officer, Blake Asbury, is on the same path — heading into an apprenticeship with connections already in place to Burke Electric, one of the region's largest employers.

Rubey Bell, a junior, wants to go into ag education — specifically because of the impact her own advisors have made. Student teacher Lillie Sherrerd, finishing her degree at SIU Carbondale, has a similar origin story: her high school ag teacher built an FFA chapter from the ground up in Decatur when Lillie was a freshman. She wants to teach in an urban environment, so students in a city can see themselves in her the way she saw herself in that teacher.

And Reese DeHart, a sophomore, just knows she wants to work in agriculture. The specifics are still forming. "Thanks to this program, I know I want to work in ag. I don't know what yet." That's not a weakness — it's the program working as intended.

The chapter runs approximately 120 activities a year, nearly all of them student-planned: career fairs, ag safety days, entrepreneurship showcases. In addition to a tremendous commitment from the school district itself, the community backs Du Quoin’s FFA with deep annual financial support to the state FFA foundation, plus individual donations that cover convention costs for students who couldn't otherwise go. Piotrowski says, “We are incredibly blessed to have such a supportive community and school district.”

"These kids are doing things most students would never think about," she continues. "And the amount of work they put in is phenomenal."