4-H and FFA Opportunities for Non-Farm Kids: Livestock Judging

 A key topic in education and youth development is the material taught and the strategy to distribute

Two females evaluating a class of swine.

knowledge. Agriculture-based programs such as 4-H and FFA teach many agricultural related topics, including animal science, plant science, and natural resources, which can sometimes be a stereotype when encouraging youth to become involved. Parents and families may not see the full picture of these programs because of the stereotypes such as "just for the farm kids" or "just for elementary school aged kids." Some may not want their children to be involved in agriculture because it may be "too dangerous of a job" or a job where you "do not get paid as much." While these stereotypes come into vocabulary when deciding which programs to encourage their children to join, they should be taking more time to learn about the benefits of becoming involved, even if a child does not have a background in agriculture. A journal article  discusses livestock programs within 4-H and FFA. Livestock programs including dairy, horses, livestock, and meat judging have been popular since the early 1900's. Participants engage in learning about what makes a good cut of meat or an ideal cow, horse, goat, hog, or sheep. The contests "evaluate contestants' ability to make logical decisions in a fixed amount of time, with a given scenario, and a selected group of animals or cuts of meat." They view a "class" of each and identify qualities in each and rank them from best to worst using a 1-2-3-4 format (Martin, Rusk, 2021). 

As a future agriculture teacher, it is important that I have my school(s) and community know that agriculture involves everyone. Everyone needs to eat three times a day with a few snacks here and there. Students nor parents should be afraid to become involved in 4-H and FFA. Programs such as these offer numerous opportunities and Livestock Judging is one of the many ways that skills are being taught all while teaching a new topic. I plan to make a series of blogs in the future showing the different opportunities that these agriculture-based clubs have for non-farm and non-agricultural families.