For several years, the national dairy checkoff has sponsored College Aggies Online, and I’m impressed at how smart, creative and driven the participants are to learn and advocate for animal agriculture online.
If you don’t know anything about the College Aggies Online college scholarship program, it’s an initiative from the Animal Agriculture Alliance. As part of the program, students receive nine interactive and educational weeks of instruction and guidance on how to become confident and effective communicators for agriculture with guidance from industry and farmer mentors.
And then they test these skills by communicating and engaging with consumers via social media like TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube.
I’ve been a mentor for the past five years, and this year’s students did a fantastic job of being creative and interesting (to get people’s attention) and then sharing some facts on dairy cows, dairy farming and/or dairy in general. Please check out some of the winning submissions and the hashtags #CAO21 and #undeniablydairy to view all of them on your favorite platform.
Big thanks goes to Becca Hilby at farmingwiththehilbys — my cohort and farmer mentor to the students.
If you are a college student or know someone who would be interested in the College Aggies Online scholarship program, visit the home page here and join in the fun.
To learn more about your national and local dairy checkoffs, visit www.USDairy.com or send a request to join our Dairy Checkoff Facebook Group.