Northern Region PAAE Meeting and Northern Regional Leadership Conference

     This was a unique first-time experience that I got to partake in within the Northern region. Being at the same school as the Northern Region FFA Coordinator, Curt Turner has provided me with an inside scoop into some of the inner workings of regional events. When he thought about doing the leadership conference in conjunction with the PAAE meeting, he asked me what I thought, so I told him that I thought it could be a good chance to reach some teachers who may not normally be involved with PAAE, along with get more kids to the regional leadership conference. The southcentral region started this, so the northern region is now jumping on board with a similar idea, and overall, I thought that it went pretty well. 

    The event was held at Montgomery High School, and the teachers went off into their meeting while the students went through 3, 30-minute workshops with some PSU TeachAg folks, the PA FFA State Officers, and the FFA Foundation staff. My kids said that they enjoyed the workshops and had a great time working with other local chapters during the event. In the PAAE meeting, multiple different topics were discussed, but the primary focus was on keystone degrees being due in the near future. Mr. Turner is involved with receiving all of the applications, and then he sends a few out to each advisor who has students attempting to earn their keystone degree for review. Mr. Truner even offered an opportunity for teachers to meet up in person on an evening somewhere, especially the newer teacher, to go over how to review the keystone degrees to the best of their ability, and what they should be looking for. I currently have 7 seniors at Central Columbia who are wrapping up their applications right now and will have those submitted in the very near future. I am really hoping to get down to the Mid-Winter Convention so I can see them get their degrees because I have seen the hard work that they have put into these applications and of course, their SAE projects. Thomas Gabel and Brian Campbell also addressed the fact that there are scholarships for us as teachers to apply for in order to get some money to help fund professional development opportunities. So this is certainly something I will look into, and they even said that it has been used to help fund teacher's trips to NAAE, as that is most certainly a form of professional development. 

       The coolest part of these meetings is getting to see and catch up with lots of people you have brushed shoulders with over the years. I got to see #psuaged24, and of course Dr. Ewing and Beth Mathie, along with other teachers whom I have had conversations with and worked with on other things in the past. Bouncing ideas off of other teachers and hearing about the cool things that they are doing within their program is also great as well. I had a wonderful time seeing all of these folks, and I am excited to be a part of an organization like PAAE for a long time. 

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