Local Ag Mechanics Students
"Burning the Midnight Oil"
To Complete Projects for Contests

 

by: Bobby McDonald

 

 

In most vocational agriculture programs, winter months are spent in the shop. However, it's "crunch" time for local ag mechanics programs, this time of the year. Students are busy completing their projects for the upcoming San Antonio and Houston Ag Mechanics Contests.

The Sulphur Springs FFA Ag Mechanics class are building two large projects for the upcoming shows. Senior students are building a veterinary surgical suite for large animals. The project is so large that the students have been divided into groups, with each group building a part of the project, and then it will be assembled together, just before the contest. The project consists of a scissor lift table for more straight-forward lifts of animals, and an additional table that allows the veterinarian to maneuver large animals that need to be positioned in a more complex setting, which will tilt in a number of different directions. The suite allows animals to be lifted and the surgical table to be positioned beneath them and then utilized.

 

 

 

"This has been a very educational project for our students," explained Ag Mechanics Instructor, Dan Froneberger. "It has taught the students that their individual contribution to the project is important and that if they don't get their part done by the deadline, it jeopardizes the entire project!"

 

 

These students at Miller Grove High School are busy constructing a number of projects in the shop.

 

Another project being constructed by students in the Sulphur Springs FFA Ag Mechanics, for the upcoming contest, is an "English Wheel." The tool for the shop is described as a "mostly hobby tool," today, but it uses construction techniques that were first used back in the late 1800's and has taught the students some of the basic construction techniques in the shop.

 

 

Other FFA Ag Mechanics teams, across the county are working diligently in the shop to construct projects for contests and for community installations, as they learn the construction techniques that they can use for a lifetime.

 

Ag Mechanics projects teach students construction skills that they can use for the rest of their lives.

 

Best of Luck to Ag Mechanics Students
in the Upcoming Contests!!!

 

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