Beyond the blue jacket
FFA influences Campbell’s career path, friendships
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-Submitted photo
Emily Campbell, education and outreach coordinator for NEW Cooperative, always enjoyed the Iowa FFA State Leadership Conference when she was a student at Audubon High School. “My favorite part was catching up with friends from other FFA chapters,” said Campbell.
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Emily Campbell, right, was the state champion in the Chapter Website Leadership Development Event around 2015. In this contest, students design, build and present a website that promotes their FFA chapter. Campbell received this award during the Iowa FFA State Leadership Conference in Ames.

-Submitted photo
Emily Campbell, education and outreach coordinator for NEW Cooperative, always enjoyed the Iowa FFA State Leadership Conference when she was a student at Audubon High School. "My favorite part was catching up with friends from other FFA chapters," said Campbell.
You learn a lot about people when they don’t get what they want. Those who find a way to discipline their disappointment often become even more resilient and productive going forward.
Emily Campbell would learn this through FFA, which became part of her life when she found her dad’s FFA jacket in a closet at home.
“Dad was the president of his FFA chapter his senior year of high school,” said Campbell, 23, an education and outreach coordinator for NEW Cooperative. “I was intrigued by all the pins and awards on his jacket and knew I wanted to participate in FFA, even before I knew exactly what it was.”
Both of Campbell’s parents (Paul and Deb Campbell), as well as her grandpa and many aunts, uncles and cousins, had been involved in FFA during their high school years.
“I literally counted down the years until I was old enough to join FFA, which was eighth grade in our chapter,” recalled Campbell, who grew up on a row-crop farm near Audubon.

-Submitted photo
Emily Campbell, right, was the state champion in the Chapter Website Leadership Development Event around 2015. In this contest, students design, build and present a website that promotes their FFA chapter. Campbell received this award during the Iowa FFA State Leadership Conference in Ames.
During her years at Audubon High School, Campbell considered FFA to be her “sport,” because she was so active in the organization. Along with her chapter officer duties, she competed in agronomy, farm business management, livestock evaluation, meats evaluation, soils evaluation, ag broadcasting, chapter program, chapter website, extemporaneous speaking, creed speaking, greenhand quiz and job interview.
Campbell also served as the Southwest District FFA reporter, performed with the band at the state FFA convention, attended the national FFA convention, and participated in FFA’s Washington Leadership Conference and legislative symposium.
In addition, she managed three Supervised Agricultural Experience (SAE) projects in ag sales, ag communication and diversified crop production.
“I kept myself busy,” said Campbell, who excelled at a wide range of FFA activities.
When Campbell was a senior in high school, the logical next step was to run for a state FFA officer role.
“In Iowa, you don’t necessarily run for specific positions,” Campbell said.
“They elect a president, reporter and secretary, as well as an at-large representative from each FFA district. My first choice was reporter, but I was open to any office.”
Campbell’s zeal for FFA propelled her, along with encouragement from many mentors and peers. This would become one of the most influential moments of Campbell’s FFA experience, but not in the way she’d expected.
“The time before, during and after this process taught me a lot about myself and helped me to grow,” she said.
“I’m glad that’s
the way it worked out”
State FFA officer candidates were required to complete a scored application, panel interviews, a knowledge exam, one-on-one interviews, a writing exercise and an extemporaneous speaking exercise. The process also challenged Campbell to invest a significant amount of time assessing her strengths, weaknesses and natural personality traits. “This required a level of self-reflection I hadn’t experienced as a high school student,” she said.
Out of all the state officer candidates, two were chosen for each officer position on the
ballot. “It took about two weeks before we knew if we were even on the ballot, and it was pretty
stressful,” Campbell said. “Still, I was confident I’d become a state officer, or at a minimum be
placed on the ballot.”
On the first day of the FFA State Leadership Conference, the state officer candidates
anxiously waited to hear who had been nominated. When Campbell’s name wasn’t called, she
was crushed. “I was usually able to accomplish whatever I set my mind to. This was one of the
first times I’d invested my all into something I wanted badly, but I wasn’t successful. That was a
hard pill to swallow.”
Before long, however, the shock of defeat wore off.
“Had I been elected for a state officer position, I would have devoted much of my summer and freshman year of college to FFA,” Campbell said. Hanging up her blue jacket gave her the freedom to explore new activities and interests when she arrived at Iowa State University (ISU).
“As a freshman, I watched state FFA officers sacrifice time with friends, hobbies and
clubs on campus to serve in their officer positions,” she added. “Had I been in their positions, I
may have grown resentful that I was missing out on so much at college.”
Campbell knew the time was right to move on from FFA. “I had a really strong run as a member, made many great friends and had some successes along the way — and it was the right time to step away.”
Making friends for life
Campbell is grateful that FFA helped guide her college major and career path. Her FFA
experiences showed her the variety of career options within the ag industry, from meat science to agricultural policy. These experiences also helped her make some career pivots.
“My initial career path was agronomy sales,” Campbell said. “After trying the FFA agronomy and soils evaluation contests, though, I decided I didn’t want to focus on those things on a daily basis.”
When Campbell entered an essay contest during her sophomore year of high school, she
interviewed the agronomist her family worked with.
“In my conversations with him, I learned about ISU’s agricultural studies degree. I had never heard of it, but it ended up being my major and was a great fit for me.”
By the time Campbell graduated from ISU in 2020, she had also earned a minor in public relations. She became the communications and talent recruitment specialist at MaxYield
Cooperative and held that role until MaxYield merged with NEW Cooperative in 2021.
“Then I transitioned to NEW Cooperative’s human resources team. My FFA experiences in public speaking, workshop facilitation and building relationships helped lead me to the career I have today.”
Campbell encourages parents to let their kids join FFA, or at least try it. Not only does FFA offer excellent opportunities to explore ag career options, but it’s a fun way to make new
connections with peers, Campbell said.
“It has been almost six years since I last wore my FFA jacket, but I’m still connected with people across Iowa who were FFA members at the same time as me. Some of those relationships are business-oriented. Others are great friendships that have stood the test of time through high school, college and beyond.”