OFI 1971: Growing And Preserving Food For The Community | FFA SAE Edition | Katie Dauch | Tri-Valley Central High School FFA

Katie Dauch is her FFA Chapter’s President, a junior in high school, a gardener, a food preserver and a very benevolent high school student.  Starting way back in elementary school, Katie and her mom started growing a raised bed garden at their home in Upstate New York for their own food production and food security.  They used canning methods to preserve food for themselves, and between what they grew and what they purchased they put away food for the winter.

This is what led Katie to take her first agriculture class and ultimately to become involved in the FFA.  She and her mom are still growing vegetables in their raised beds and canning them.  It was the involvement in the FFA that led to Katie’s SAE.  Seeing that the school was producing more vegetables in it’s community garden than was being consumed, Katie decided to preserve those vegetables in the same manner that she did at home.  However, once they were preserved she donated them to food banks around her community.  There are three food banks that are happy to accept the preserved vegetables and soups that Katie and her mom make, and her community is the better for having her!

SUPERVISED AGRICULTURAL EXPERIENCE: Growing & Canning Food

HIGH SCHOOL: Tri-Valley Central High School; Grahamsville, New York

MASCOT: Bears

FFA ADVISOR: Tara Burke

CONTACT INFORMATION FOR KATIE DAUCH:

Click on the picture below to be taken to the Tri-Valley Central High School FFA Department’s website:

Katie’s FFA Advisor’s Email Address: taraberescik@trivalleycsd.org 

Tri-Valley Central High School’s Telephone: (845)-985-2296

FFA LINKS:

National FFA Organization

Supervised Agricultural Experiences (SAE’s)

Support FFA 

Donate to FFA – One way that FFA students are able to start small businesses is through an FFA grant of $1,000.  In 2014, 141 FFA students received these grants.  With your donations, more students can get this head start – pay it forward.

REASONS TO DONATE TO FFA:

• Only 2% of Americans grow and raise most of the food and livestock consumed by the other 98% as well as the rest of the world.  FFA is providing the needed education, training and resources to Americans that will carry that torch forward and insure that America continues to have inexpensive, quality food.
• Rural Communities will rely on entrepreneurship in the future for population growth and job creation.  The FFA is a major catalyst to that entrepreneurial growth.
• Farmers, ranchers and those working in agriculture give the rest of America incredible amounts of freedom because the search for food is as simple as going to the grocery store:

“The future of American agriculture depends on the involvement and investment in America’s youth, In order to prepare for the population of tomorrow, we need to encourage America’s youth today, and show that careers in agriculture are profitable, rewarding, and vital.”.

U.S. Secretary of Agriculture, Sonny Perdue

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