A Team Effort: Drive Your Tractor to School Day at Skyline High School

Ecstatic is the word Grace Bucklen used to describe how she felt on Wednesday, February 21, at 8:30 a.m. in the Skyline High School parking lot after a group of tractors, driven by SHS students with a police escort, pulled in from Skyline Vista Drive, having started at Virginia Livestock, LLC on Route 619. It was “Drive Your Tractor to School Day” at SHS.

Organized by Skyline’s Future Farmers of America (FFA) chapter, composed of student members who are interested in agriculture, the event was inspired by what students saw other chapters across America doing and posting about on social media, Bucklen, Agriculture Teacher, and FFA Advisor for SHS, said in an interview the night prior to the event. “Our members wanted to host an event that not only was fun and unique for them to participate in,” Bucklen explained, “but they also wanted to raise awareness for the agriculture community and hopefully increase interest for other Skyline students to join our chapter.” Participation was not limited to Skyline’s FFA chapter; through a general interest meeting used for students who wanted to participate, any student was welcome to trailer his or her tractor to Virginia Livestock and proceed from there to Skyline in the police convoy.

Skyline High School’s Future Farmers of America progress along Skyline Vista Drive. Below: FFA students pose for pictures. Royal Examiner Photo Credits: Brenden McHugh.

“Our members range from 9-12^th grades and come from a variety of backgrounds, rural and town,” Bucklen said. “We are quite fortunate to be a part of the organization,” she said of the FFA, which has local, state, and national components. “This was my first job out of college, and I was the school’s first agriculture teacher and FFA advisor; I’ve been able to watch the program grow from the ground up since the 2016-2017 school year.” Bucklen has seen the program make great strides since then. “My first few years teaching, I was only serving about ninety students per year and now I serve an average of about one hundred fifty students per year. My classes currently have a waiting list, and we could support having another full-time agriculture teacher in the building. For the past three semesters, I’ve taken on extra class periods to teach and reach more students. Our FFA chapter started with five active members, and now we’re exceeding thirty.”

Skyline High School student Cayden Morris sits on his tractor.

Speaking in broad terms after the successful arrival in the Skyline parking lot, Bucklen shared her vision for the program. “We’re trying to get away from the traditional sense of agriculture – ‘it’s just for farmers’ – we’re trying to reach a broader group of students who maybe don’t want to go into production agriculture but want to pursue other things like science and technology in the agriculture fields, but there is still a demand for that traditional agriculture as well, so we like to have a healthy mix of both.” In a conversation with Principal Danelle Sperling, as the tractors were en route, Sperling underlined some significant aspects of the event. “This is the first time that we have done the ‘Drive Your Tractor to School Day’,” Sperling explained. “This is all part of National FFA Week, which brings attention to agriculture in our community and as post-secondary options for students.” Speaking of Bucklen, Sperling called her “one of our very treasured teachers” in a subject matter that has such a high demand that the school is hoping to hire additional teachers for the agriculture subject that still may have a waiting list even after the additional hiring.