The Big E

Over September 13th -15th I traveled with Penn State Teach Ag! to cross more states off my list, Connecticut and Massachusetts. Penn State doesn't take you to states just to cross them off your list though (or I would totally have all 50 covered by now!), we were there to help with FFA Career and Leadership development events (CDEs and LDEs).

This was super beneficial for me because it was the first time that I got to be a part of a CDE or LDE competition the day of the event. Over the summer, I got to help with the background work of the Food Science CDE, but unfortunately I was unable to attend the actual competition. In PA, the ag teachers run the events at the State Level, so having an understanding of what goes into the event is important because I might someday be in charge of one. Regardless if I am in charge of one, I will have students competing, and to be able to coach them well, I first need to understand the event.

Let's take a step back though, What is the Big E and What are CDE/LDEs?

The Big E

The Big E is the Eastern States Exposition and is essentially a large fair that lasts for three weeks, with exhibitors and events rotating which weeks they are held. One cool part of the Big E is that each New England State has their own building to showcase special things from that state. I think one of my favorite parts was the iconic Big E Cream Puff though! It was huge and delicious!

• The Connecticut Building
  (Picture from Amanda Gagne)

• Delicious Cream Puffs!
  (Picture from berkshireeagle.com)

CDE/LDE Competition

Career and Leadership Development Events are focused on specific content areas and are designed to develop "college and career readiness skills". (Find out more about them on the National FFA Website) At the Big E, teams from states in the NorthEastern Region of FFA competed.

So what did I learn?

I learned so much while I was at the Big E! The first event that I helped with was the Vet Science CDE. My specific role was to be a judge for a practicum. Students had to tell me verbally and show me how to properly restrain a rabbit. From this I learned how hard it can sometimes be to really be consistent in my grading for all the members, especially once it was getting to the end of the event and I had heard what should have been the same thing multiple times. I also learned from a coaching stand point how important it is to know the events because I had some teams that all told me very well, and the same way how to restrain the rabbit, unfortunately it did not match the rubric, so I could not give them a good score. Coach knowledge of the event can help avoid these little things that keep students from doing as well in the events as they may have hoped. I also got to grade essays for the Current Issue topic based off of a rubric for this event. I felt more qualified to be able to do this compared to being a practicum judge.

• The second Vet Science Practicum judged (and picture from) Amanda Gange.

The second event I got to help with was the Food Science CDE. I was really excited to help with this one since I had missed being a part of it in June. My background knowledge of what goes into the event before the day of was helpful for me to understand how all the pieces went together, but I was unaware of how much really went into the set up of this event! My main job at this event was to judge the students group work abilities as they figured out safety hazards in food processing plants. Here I also saw the value in previous coaching of how the different segments of the events worked. Some teams were confused on what they were supposed to do in the event and those teams were the ones that also seemed to struggle the most with completing the task.

• The judges for the Food Science Team Event. Mary, Erin, and Amanda
  (Picture from Amanda Gagne)

From both days I really learned how rubrics are beneficial for keeping everything fair across all students because it gives you a guideline that you cannot be as subjective about. It also allows for multiple people to fairly grade the same thing so that work can be done faster. I also learned the importance of well thought through setup, especially thinking through how things are set up so that students don't even have the opportunity to be tempted to cheat or "cheat on accident" because the opportunity was there. I think that both of these lesson translate back into the classroom well too, thinking about assessment design and creation.

• Rubric from an LDE
  (Picture from Luke Kerstetter)

There were many learning moments, some time for fun, and not a whole lot of sleep on this trip, but at the end of the day it was a very beneficial trip.

We even got the bonus lesson of handling when your students leave possessions at places while you are traveling. I don't think that the #PSUAgEd20 cohort will let me soon forget leaving my phone at the Dunkin Donuts on the way home.

• All the Penn State students that helped with the events after the awards banquet.

Kaitlin Liszka

#PSUAgEd20

@KaitlinLiszka