Each year at the National FFA Convention & Expo, four FFA members are honored with American Star Awards for outstanding accomplishments in FFA and agricultural education.
The American Star Awards, including American Star Farmer, American Star in Agribusiness, American Star in Agricultural Placement and American Star in Agriscience, are presented to FFA members who demonstrate outstanding agricultural skills and competencies through completion of supervised agricultural experience (SAE). A required activity in FFA, an SAE allows students to learn by doing, by owning or operating an agricultural business, working or serving an internship at an agriculture-based business, or conducting an agriculture-based scientific experiment and reporting results.
Other requirements to achieve the award include demonstrating top management skills; completing key agricultural education, scholastic and leadership requirements; and earning an American FFA Degree, the organization’s highest level of student accomplishment.
The American Star in Agribusiness is awarded to the FFA member with the top nonproduction agribusiness SAE in the nation. Here are the 2021 finalists for Star in Agribusiness:
Noah Anuez, Florida
They say good fences make good neighbors, but for Noah Anuez, good fences make good money.
For his SAE, he owns Anuez Enterprise, a landscaping business that primarily focuses on fencing, among other services.
“I started when I was about 13 or 14 years old doing a variety of different things,” Anuez, with Fort White FFA in Florida, said. “Mowing yards, doing fencing, tractor work, tree work. When I turned about 16 or so, I started putting my focus more into the fencing.”
His father immigrated from Cuba at a young age, and when Anuez was growing up, two of the most important values in their household were hard work and education. This dual focus made him “bilingual with business” — and not just because he can speak Spanish.
“Since I was raised like that, it’s given me a lot of drive and ambition,” Anuez said. “There’s some serious pride in a job when you’re done, and you look at it and say, ‘Wow, that looks great,’ and the customer’s happy.”
Because of how his father valued education, Anuez has a college welding certification, and he’s also planning to earn an associate’s degree in business. He started his degree in January, but he got laid off from one of the jobs he was using to pay for college. He put getting his degree on hold and began focusing on Anuez Enterprise full time.
However, Anuez said business has never been better. He is mainly living debt-free at just 19 years old despite owning a house and numerous pieces of expensive equipment.
“Everybody’s building fences still, and the economy’s still rolling pretty good, so we’ll take advantage of it,” he said. “March was the busiest I think I’ve ever been…”
Anuez said his FFA advisor Wayne Oelfke was instrumental in teaching him what he needed to know for running a business — bookkeeping, public speaking and many other skills.
“He was like a second father figure,” Anuez said. “He taught me a lot of the basics.”
For other FFA members who’d like to start their own SAE, Anuez said his best advice is to start small and plan.
“Get a well-developed plan, start small and be persistent,” he said.
Tyler Ertzberger, Georgia
While raising crops and livestock has always been the core of agriculture, talented workers with a variety of skills and specialties help ensure the industry’s success.
Tyler Ertzberger, with Franklin County FFA in Georgia, has one of the most unique ag jobs of all: livestock photographer.
“It started on my parents’ farm, doing some of the marketing for their cattle,” he said. “Which then turned into me doing some shows, which then turned into more growth.”
Ertzberger started his SAE while he was in high school. Now, at 21 years old, he works full time running Square One Agri Marketing, his photography and marketing business with 18 part- or full-time employees.
Before becoming a photographer, he exhibited livestock for 13 years and won several events. He said he was inspired to pursue livestock photography because he was never satisfied with the quantity or quality of the photos taken at his shows.
“Livestock [photography] has a very specific angle and direction,” Ertzberger said. “Not everybody has the eye for that.”
As a profession, livestock photography is focused on taking pictures and videos of farm animals for marketing purposes. This is often done by visiting farmers directly, but Ertzberger is also regularly asked to cover livestock shows, auctions and state fairs.
“We’ll cover the pig, cattle, sheep, goats and dairy cattle shows going on,” he said. “We take all the official backdrop pictures; then we take pictures of them in the ring. Then we post them on our website for sale.”
For large events, such as the Georgia National Fair, Ertzberger said his team would take as many as 50,000 photos over a two-week period. They also do video, and they’ve been livestreaming events online during the COVID-19 pandemic so elderly farmers can safely watch along.
Because of the uniqueness of his career, Ertzberger said his ag teachers have been tremendously helpful in keeping him focused on finding the right path forward.
“They’ve been my backbone,” he said. “They’ve been the ones that have pushed me and helped me get through stuff when I’ve been defeated.”
Ertzberger’s advice to FFA members looking to start their SAEs is to never take “no” for an answer.
“I can’t tell you how many people have told me that I need to go get a desk job or do a nine-to-five job to be able to make it,” he said. “If it’s your dream and you have the desire to do it, you will make it.”
Wyatt Harlan, Texas
Pheasant hunting is a beloved pastime throughout the United States interior, and Wyatt Harlan is one of the people who help it stay popular.
“With my business, I raise pheasants and guide hunts,” Harlan, a member of Slaton FFA in Texas, said. “I also have diversified into selling pheasant carcasses and providing an outdoor experience for people in the West Texas area.”
His SAE entails running a business called Peacock Circle H Outfitters. He primarily focuses on being a wilderness guide, but raising pheasants also takes up a lot of his time, he said.
“Starting with 300 birds back in 2015, I’ve grown my business to 2,000, which is a lot to manage,” Harlan said.
Peacock Circle H Outfitters is a family business that Harlan inherited from his father and grandfather. He has revamped and expanded it in many ways over the last six years, and he said it’s something he’s passionate about as a 12th-generation ag worker.
“My dad and grandfather had owned it years before, and I just had a lot of great memories outdoors,” Harlan said. “I loved getting to watch my dad’s clients, taking the family out and making those memories, and I wanted to provide that same experience for people once again.”
One of Harlan’s favorite parts of the job is educating people from urban areas on the realities of agriculture and conservation, especially now that the COVID-19 pandemic is encouraging more families to visit the rural outdoors for their leisure. This love for education is why he is majoring in public policy and ag economics at Texas A&M University.
Beyond his family’s coaching, Harlan said his ag classes and FFA advisors also played a pivotal role in helping him learn more about wildlife management, water conservation and the importance of record bookkeeping. He has served as state vice president of Texas FFA, and he loves giving back to the organization that helped make him who he is.
“I know what FFA has done for me, and I think it’s a really interesting and neat opportunity that FFA members have to give that back to the next generation,” Harlan said.
For FFA members starting their SAEs, Harlan’s advice is to do your research early so you don’t regret it later.
“Put in as much research as you can before making your first purchase,” he said.
Matthew Rowlette, Kentucky
The COVID-19 pandemic has been impossible to avoid for the past year-and-a-half, especially for students, but Matt Rowlette has been able to find a silver lining.
As part of Rowlette’s SAE, he runs a lawn care business — and it’s been booming ever since he had to leave Eastern Kentucky University in 2020.
“I had to make the hard choice of dropping out last fall, but being out of school gave me a lot more time in the day,” he said. “And since then, my business actually just grew. It exploded more than I ever dreamed it would.”
Rowlette’s Lawn Care is responsible for mowing up to 87 yards every week, and that number is growing. Rowlette and his two employees also do landscaping, privacy fences, retaining walls and more for their community.
“With people … being at home and noticing how bad the yard looks, that’s given us a lot of opportunity to grow the business,” he said. “My phone rings constantly.”
A member of Madison Southern FFA in Kentucky, Rowlette got his start in this industry by working on his extended family’s lawns and fences when he was 8 years old. As a teenager, he also inherited a 55-acre farm from his great-grandfather, and he gained an appreciation for landscaping equipment and working outdoors.
“I’ve learned to make a little money off the land,” he said. “Take care of it, and it’ll take care of you.”
Rowlette is a hands-on learner — another reason he left college during the pandemic — but he still studied plenty in his ag classes to prepare for “the real world,” he said. He credited his ag teachers and FFA advisors with helping him push forward to find his unique career path.
“It’s really been a big blessing,” he said.
For FFA members who want to start their SAEs, Rowlette’s advice is simple: dream big.
“Always follow your dreams,” he said. “Don’t give up, work as hard as you can, and then give another 110 percent.”
The American Star Awards are sponsored by Case IH, Elanco Animal Health and Syngenta. For more information on the awards, visit FFA.org.
General convention sessions will air live on RFD-TV and The Cowboy Channel. FFA members and supporters can tune in and watch gavel-to-gavel coverage of the event. To learn more, visit Convention.FFA.org.
