Thousands of FFA members in their Blue and Gold will be descending on downtown Tulsa May 7th and 8th for the 98th Convention of the Oklahoma FFA. The Convention officially kicks off Tuesday morning with the Opening General Session at the BOK Center- and many of the events will also be happening at the Cox Convention Center. That includes the 2024 Career Show, with over 125 exhibitors interacting with FFA members from across the state and their Ag Education teachers.
According to Oklahoma FFA Executive Secretary Trevor Lucas, approximately 14,000 members and supporters of the organization will be in downtown Tulsa for event. Sixth Convention Sessions will be held on Tuesday and Wednesday. On the final session Wednesday evening, 713 of the best of the best Seniors in Ag Education and FFA will be awarded the State FFA Degree and those attending that session will have the chance to hear from Life Church Senior Pastor and motivational author Craig Groeschel- and to celebrate with the new State FFA officer team for 2024-2025.
The 2023-24 State Officer team is led by Caleb Horne from the Morrison FFA Chapter. Horne and his team will lead all of the Convention sessions and congratulate several hundred award winners during the Convention. The high point of those awards will come on Wednesday afternoon when the Stars over Oklahoma FFA will spotlight the Star Farmer, Star in Agribusiness, Star in Ag Placement and Star in Agriscience. Those four cream of the crop awardees will collectively receive over $120,000 for their achievements- for the third year, the Carl Anderson Innovator Awards will be given to the four stars- each of them receiving $30,089 for use as a post secondary scholarship or operating capital grant.
You can go to our Blue Green Gazette and see the stories(and listen to our interviews) of all 18 Area Stars in the four categories that are vying for the four State Star awards.
Jacey Fye, the Executive Director of the Oklahoma FFA Foundation, says the Foundation has raised $870,000 for the 2024 convention- for the event itself as well as for cash awards. In addition to the monies raised for the convention itself- the Foundation works with supporters of the Blue and Gold to offer $338,000 in scholarships to those who excel in their competitions and SAE programs. The Foundation raises money for all of the programs through the year related to Oklahoma FFA- but the convention is easily the largest single event that they support.
Ahead of the convention itself, many of the state champions in speech and other contests are being decided in the Interscholastics competition on the campus of Oklahoma State University. Team and Individual results can be reviewed by clicking here. The top winners will be walking across the stage in Tulsa this coming week.
Oklahoma FFA is a top ten state in total membership nationally, with currently 29,672 members who belong to a total of 366 chapters.
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For more information about the 98th Oklahoma State FFA Convention, click here.
