2015 LOGAN COUNTY FAIR LINCOLN DAILY NEWS.com August 2-9, 2015 page 187
Though Hartsburg-Emden combined Junior and
Senior High School is just 250 students, the FFA
chapter with around 50 students is somewhat
large. For both small communities surrounded by
farm land, agriculture is the primary industry for
the area.
Now retired teacher, Betsy Pech helped to build
the Hartem Ag program and led the school’s FFA
for many years. Pech, a 2013 recipient of the
Honorary Holbert Award given by the Illinois
State University Department of Agriculture,
was one of the first women to teach high school
agriculture. She is recognized as a role model and
mentor for young women interested in careers
with an agricultural base.
Through her many years at the school, she also
led many award winning FFA teams.
In 2014, as Pech retired 29 years of teaching,
Hartem’s FFA was selected as the top chapter
in Section 14, a Gold Emblem chapter, and a
National Finalist.
2014 graduate and FFA member Natalie
Nowatney participated in the Ag Issues program
for three years. She said that in 2014, “We went to
nationals and got bronze.”
Nowatney says that to prepare for the contests,
“my mom and I read through hundreds of pages
of government documents.” She notes that
the contests gave her a lot of public speaking
experience.
Pech left a great legacy that new Ag teacher and
FFA leader Elizabeth Fanning has begun writing
her place into the schools history.
Fanning gave a review of the past year, her first
year -- “Last year, we did a lot of trap shooting and
livestock judging, which we will be doing again
this year.”
As for future plans, she says, “This year Hartem
FFA will be competing in multiple Career
Development Events (CDE’S) such as Ag Sales,
Livestock Judging, Soils, and many more.”
The Hartem FFA Facebook page shows highlights
from last year’s contests, where the team often
Hartem FFA chapter
built strong and changing
the faces of agriculture
Continued
→
By Angela Reiners
