From October 25-29th Steinbrenner participated in FFA nationals in Indianapolis, Indiana, where they qualified for growing leaders with a brain eating amoeba awareness project. “The national FFA convention is a big conference where all the FFA chapters, all over the United States come and do workshops, teacher workshops, and the biggest selling points, competition,” said Devon Morrison, the agribusiness teacher at Steinbrenner.  

     Out of all 65,000 students that participated in the overall event, five students were from Steinbrenner High School. These students were Ava Gelyon (10th), Ian St. John (10th), Jillian Towe (11th), Lilly Mccormack (10th), and Renata Blatt (11th). Although many kids want to attend, Steinbrenner wants the students to have a reason to attend. One reason is because of the price of the trip, which can be expensive.  

     During FFA nationals it is crucial to have responsible students on the trip. “… It’s important our officers stuck to their schedule and had different plans and things they had to do in order for our national chapter application to work or even participate,” said Morrison. 

     For example, Renata Blatt and Ava Gelyon both competed together at the nationals. “We participated in the growing leader’s category of the national chapter competition… We did a presentation together,” said junior, Renata Blatt. In their demonstration, they wanted to keep Brayden’s memory alive while talking about swimming safely. Overall, out of 700 competitors, their presentation won 3rd place. For the reward, they got around $600 and a trophy.  

     On the second day of the convention, Steinbrenner was awarded for being a 3-star chapter. This is the highest ranking a FFA chapter can receive in the star program. To receive the award, Ian St. John and Jillian Towe went on the stage and collected a plaque. Steinbrenner has been awarded this honor for the past three years, so it was very special to receive it again. After all, Steinbrenner did exceptional at the FFA nationals in their chapter presentation and overall chapter.  

Brielle Neylan // Staff Writer