Oklahoma Farm Bureau hosted nearly 100 FFA members at the organization’s fifth-annual FFA Communications Conference Monday, July 21, at the Hilton Garden Inn in Edmond.
The one-day conference gave FFA members the opportunity to learn from agricultural communications professionals in several segments of communications to ignite students to share their FFA chapter’s story through communications work.
FFA members were split into four breakout sessions, including design, photography, videography and social media.
The design session was taught by Elizabeth Perdue, marketing assistant for Ruth Inman Creative Services. She taught students how to use the design platform Canva to make social media graphics and flyers for their FFA chapters.
Ruth Inman of Ruth Inman Creative Services led the social media session, where she taught students how to post effectively across all social media platforms. She also advised students on what content to post for the most engagement with their audience versus content viewers outside of the agriculture industry would not engage with.
The photography session was taught by Mitchell Alcala, photographer for Oklahoma State University Agriculture. He taught students about photo composition, the why for taking a photo and how a photo can tell a story.
JD Rosman, vice president of communications for the Oklahoma Youth Expo, taught the videography session. Rosman taught students how to create a short reel and gave them the opportunity to create their own reel to show them how they can use videos to engage their audience on their FFA chapters’ social media pages.
During the morning session, FFA members heard from Oklahoma FFA advisor Scott Nemecek about the importance telling the FFA and agriculture story with those who are not directly involved with agriculture. Kylee Deniz, executive director for the Oklahoma Pork Council, spoke to students about how they can build their personal brand.
OKFB’s own Dustin Mielke presented the final session at the FFA Communications Conference, where he shared with FFA members how to combine all the skills they learned into a cohesive messaging strategy to effectively share the FFA story.
