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By Carey Reeder | Managing Editor

The Chilton County Chamber of Commerce Foundation and Central Alabama Electric Cooperative subsidiary Central Access made their fourth and final donation towards FFA programs in Chilton County, finishing up at Chilton County High School. Executive Director of the Chilton County Chamber of Commerce Rachel Martin and Assistant Executive Director Brandy Clackley presented CCHS FFA students with the funds at the school earlier in September. The funds will go directly towards benefitting the program’s students who will be traveling to the National FFA Convention & Expo.

“We have unlimited support in our community for our program, and for our FFA (at CCHS),” Marlon Harton, CCHS FFA Advisor, said. “It is going to help our students experience this national convention with some of them not leaving the state before, some of them never having flown before and a lot of them have not been to a convention with 30,000-40,000 other students. It is a great eye opener for a lot of them and seeing what FFA has to offer not only here on a local level, but on a national level as well.”

The 97th annual event in Indianapolis, Indiana from Oct. 23-26 will have students from four high schools in Chilton County represented at the convention. The Chamber and Central Access donated $2,500 to each FFA program to help with the growing costs to attend the convention. The donations began at Thorsby High School on Aug. 29, continued on Aug. 30 with presentations to FFA programs at Isabella and Maplesville High Schools before finishing at CCHS in early September.

The Chilton County schools with FFA programs normally attended the national convention biannually, or every other year. This year fell on a year where they were not going to Indianapolis, but turning their attention to something more local. However, the Chamber’s donation changed that, and the schools were ready to go and made it happen.

Chilton County will have six students representing their school at the national convention — Ava Jones, Chase Lowe, Jocelyn Maza, Will Petty, Maia Tyus and Marynn Vaith.