Victoria Herr (@Victoria_Herr) is Living to Serve as National #TeachAg Ambassador!

Victoria Herr, National Teach
Ag Ambassador

A @TeachAGPSU star  has been chosen from nationwide pool of student applicants to serve as a National Teach Ag Ambassador! Our very own Victoria Herr (Victoria_Herr) will be spending the next year as a member of the team of 12 National Teach Ag Ambassadors.

Victoria Herr is a junior at Penn state majoring in Agriculture Education and member of the 2019 Ag Ed cohort (#psuaged19). She served as the 2014-2015 Pennsylvania State FFA (@PA_FFA) Secretary and is very dedicated student who is involved with the Teach Ag! Society, Alpha Tau Alpha and numerous other clubs on campus that are motivated to teach others about the agriculture industry. When asked what drew her to apply to become a Teach Ag Ambassador, Victoria said “One of the main reasons I was drawn to apply is because I love to talk about and advocate for agriculture education. I’m a very talkative and passionate person so when I get to talk about something I love, I always enjoy it! I knew that serving as a National Teach Ag Ambassador would give me lots of opportunities to meet prospective Ag teachers and encourage them on their journeys! I also think it’s always really important to give back; I have always had mentors in Ag Ed and I wanted to do the same for other students!”

Victoria at the Alpha Tau Alpha
inductee ceremony.

A Teach Ag Ambassador, Victoria’s main goal will to be to encourage others to consider a career as an Agriculture Educator. She will do this by sharing her passion and enthusiasm about the industry and profession with others through emails, social media, presentations and other outlets that include the campaign at the National FFA (@NationalFFA) Convention. She will also work with local and state leaders in agriculture education to inspire youth to pursue a major and career in agriculture education. Victoria is most excited about “…the National FFA Convention because I will get to spend the week with the rest of the other National Teach Ag Ambassadors and we will get a lot of time with FFA members! National Convention is always a special time and I’m excited to be spending this upcoming convention in a different role. I have spent several years at National Convention myself as a member and can now spend the week serving the FFA members!”

There is an ongoing shortage of agriculture teachers across the country. There are numerous retirements, new programs opening, current programs expanding and teachers going on to pursue other opportunities every year which lead to this shortage. This is why it is so important for the Teach Ag Ambassadors to promote and help students find their passion to teach! National Teach Ag Campaign Project Director, Ellen Thompson expresses why the ambassadors are imperative to the growth of the profession when she stated,“As the number of agricultural education programs continues to grow, we need more quality and diverse agriculture teachers to fill the roles. The ambassador program gives us an opportunity to deliver the Teach Ag message to a bigger audience, while investing in the next generation of agriculture teachers.”

Ellen Thompson (@ellencthompson),
National Teach Ag Campaign Project Director

As mentioned earlier, Victoria will be spending her year of service with eleven other college students hailing from various institutes across the nations ranging from Oregon State University all the way to Florida A&M University. Each of these new Ambassadors are just as passionate about the Agriculture Industry and Agriculture Education as Victoria is. When asked why it is important to serve as an Ambassador, Victoria said:

“I think it is important for students in our major to consider serving in a position such as National Teach Ag Ambassador because it allows them to gain a lot of experience as well as give back. Opportunities like this give student lots of public speaking experience, facilitating and planning experience, and allows them to make lots of connections. And as I mentioned before, I think it’s really important to give back. When we think about it, most of us have been influenced by past teachers and students, so now it’s our turn to do that. I hope that through my role as an Ambassador, I am able to encourage my peers to take on similar positions!”

Victoria (#psuaged19) along with George Dietrich (@TheGeorge4H), left (#psuaged18),
represented @TeachAgPSU in the 2017 Penn State Homecoming Parade!

Macy Fisher, Student Blogger

Twitter Handle: @macy_fisher

#psuaged18 member

2018 Selinsgrove Student Teacher