SE teacher named state’s top young ag educator
August 23rd, 2007
Sibley East teacher Jeff Eppen was recently named the Outstanding Young Agricultural Education Teacher of the Year. Eppen has helped the Sibley East FFA chapter grow from about 25 to more than 100 members.
Sibley East’s agriculture education teacher, Jeff Eppen of Belle Plaine, received the Outstanding Young Agricultural Education Teacher award at the annual Minnesota Association of Agricultural Educators’ summer conference. The conference was held July 9-13 in Grand Rapids.
The award is presented to an agricultural educator who has six or less years of teaching experience, and has made great strides, both personally, and in the local agricultural education program. The award is sponsored by the Minnesota Farm Bureau Federation.
“It is a nice honor,” Eppen said. “I don’t think I do anything differently than the others I graduated with.”
Eppen graduated from Goodhue High School in Goodhue, MN in 1996 and earned his degree in agriculture education from the University of Minnesota. He taught one year in Wisconsin, at the Stanley-Boyd School District, prior to starting at Sibley East in 2002.
“Stanley-Boyd was similar to here and had the same class sizes,” he explained. At the time of his employment in Wisconsin, his wife was doing an internship at Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin.
During the years at Sibley East, Eppen has helped Sibley East’s FFA chapter grow from 20-25 students to about 120 students. Sibley East students in Grades 8-12 can belong to FFA.
Eppen admitted that when he started attending college, he was planning to study agriculture engineering. He said the more he learned about the field, he found out the career involved a lot of “sitting in front of the computer” and he didn’t want to do that. As a college sophomore, he changed his major in agriculture education. “I liked FFA and 4-H and I liked working with kids,” he said.
When asked about the accomplishments, Eppen stated that “a lot of credit goes to the community in which I am involved in. Without the support of parents, local businesses, school board members and the school administration, the program would not be as successful as it is today.”
Eppen explained that at Sibley East, all eighth grade students take an agriculture class, and about 50% of those students choose to take an agriculture elective as ninth graders.
He also noted that locally that the 4-H program is strong. “A lot of the kids just need some guidance,” Eppen said. “The ingredients were all there. They just needed some proper ‘cooking.’”
Sibley East FFA will again have among the largest participation at the Minnesota State Fair. 27 Sibley East students are expected to be exhibiting about 115 animals.
At Sibley East, there is a wide variety of agriculture classes offered. These include leadership, plants, wildlife, and shop classes.
Eppen serves as co-advisor of the Sibley East FFA chapter with Tim Uhlenkamp. Eppen’s specialties are in livestock, ag science, and the chapter’s fruit sales, while Uhlenkamp works with metals, wildlife, and the chapter’s corn drive.
Although the personal honor is nice, Eppen said he would rather see the Sibley East FFA Chapter earn awards. It is the goal to be one of the top FFA chapters in the state. When Sibley East graduate Chris Lilienthal of Arlington served as state FFA president several years ago, Eppen said it helped people in the state realize that a solid, strong agriculture program is offered here.
