Page Middle Makes History at State FFA Convention

Published April 4, 2023

For the first time in district history, a middle school team made its debut at the State Future Farmers of America (FFA) Convention.

Page Middle is the first WCS middle school to have an FFA chapter, and they were the only middle school among the 62 teams that attended the convention March 19-22. Alp Kaynar, Jonah Thomas, Vivian Candella and Paili Doyle are the State runner-ups in the Meat Evaluation category, outperforming all but one of the high school teams.

"We were the only middle school chapter there," said Page Middle FFA adviser Tommy Green. "We beat teams of high school students, teams of high school seniors, and we only lost by 16 points. Our students knew what they were doing."

Page Middle also received a plaque for being a new chapter in the Tennessee FFA and another for receiving a bronze rating at the State level for the Passing Literacy OnWard (PLOW) program. PLOW is an organized effort to promote the excitement and improvement of literacy in Tennessee agricultural education programs. To receive a Bronze Award, students in a chapter must complete at least 30 hours of personal reading beyond regular academic requirements and host one reading literacy activity, which could include book drives, book fairs and more.

"We weren't expecting this," said Alp. "We were expecting maybe a top 10 finish, but after receiving our scores, we were just really excited."