Illinois Agricultural Education

Happy Friday - only 2 more weeks until Christmas break! 

As we roll into next semester, I wanted to send an email with updates, resources, and upcoming dates that might be helpful. 

Before I get too far into things, I wanted to say congrats to all of you that were nominated for the Golden Owl Award! There were a ton of nominations from D2! If you weren’t nominated this year, know that in my book you are all “golden” owls and deserve all the awards for the things you do in your schools and communities. 

Updates: 

• First, update wise, we are inching closer to being fully funded for the Three Circles grant for this school year! Admin can watch for emails/blasts in IWAS in the new year with more information. On the note of Three Circles, don’t forget to be tracking your hours in AET. Remember that 80% of the hours should be FFA/SAE related and 20% Curricular/PD. If you have questions regarding what counts, check out this document. 

• There are a ton of NEW PD options available for 2026! You can check them out at this link. Make sure to register in PD+. If you have a PD topic that you are interested in that isn’t currently available, let me know! 

• If you haven’t had an opportunity to update your teacher profile (history, demographics, etc.) in AET, please pop in there and do so. This is where we will be collecting all the data that we share with legislators, use to complete the annual report, etc. On a similar note, if you don’t see a picture of yourself in this directory, please send one my way! 

• Interested in helping your students earn the College and Career Pathway Endorsement in AFNR on their diplomas? Learn about the process here. 

Resources: 

Still haven’t had time to learn where everything is on the new website? Here is the link to the Educator Resource page, where a ton of useful information is located. 

Struggling with finding links that you need for all Ag teacher/FFA things? Check out this all-in-one link document: Commonly Used Links by Ag Teachers

Cool Lessons/Classroom Resources: 

National Ag in the Classroom: Herbs and Spices of the World 

Can Do Struggle Meal Challenge 

Candy-themed Activities

FREE Parli Pro unit from Open Educational Resources

pH Poinsettias from Illinois Ag in the Classroom 

Upcoming Dates: 

12/16 - D2 New-ish Teacher Holiday Chat, 3:30pm

1/15 - American Degree Applications Due

1/23-1/24 - Illinois FFA Alumni & Supporters Annual Meeting

2/2-2/3 - Ground Zero Dates @ JJC

2/20 - Illinois Valley Community College Middle School Mania - Invitational CDE Competition

See all the upcoming things at this link. 

Hope the rest of the first semester is smooth for you! Let me know if you need anything!

Good luck to those competing at State Dairy Foods and Agronomy this weekend!!