When Skyla Colston knows what she wants, she goes for it. Take her FFA start: After growing up following two older sisters to their FFA livestock shows, the North Texas native always knew she wanted to get involved, and in middle school, she did. “I’ve shown everything but chickens and rabbits,” says Colston, who exchanged athletics in high school for FFA. She says she “did a little bit of everything in FFA,” including multiple career and leadership development events, on her way to becoming the 2011-12 FFA chapter president at Northwest High School. She also served as a Texas FFA Area V officer.
Through FFA competitions, she discovered Tarleton State University. “It was the only school I applied to,” she says. “I knew from the start that’s where I wanted to go.” Thanks to an FFA scholarship from San Antonio Stock Show and Rodeo, she did so. She initially enrolled as an agricultural education major, influenced by the advisors who were mentors to her, but concluded that wasn’t the right fit. Instead, the first-generation college student graduated in 2016 with a degree in agricultural services and development with a concentration in ag communication.
Colston admits she didn’t know what she wanted to do as a career until she and her husband moved to Nashville six months later. “I knew Tractor Supply Company (TSC) was headquartered here, and that became my goal company,” she says. Colston joined TSC as a customer relationship management coordinator in December 2017.
After a year, she joined the new store team, which works alongside 4-H and FFA. “That was a nobrainer,” she says. First serving as coordinator then stepping up to specialist, she was promoted in the spring to her current role as associate manager of new store marketing.
FFA is an everyday part of the job too. “Through FFA, I’ve learned some of life’s most valuable lessons, like work ethic and resiliency,” Colston says, noting that raising livestock taught her responsibility, public speaking honed her leadership abilities, chapter conducting helped her learn to work well with others, and interviewing for FFA scholarships prepped her for the real world. Each required her to step outside her comfort zone, which provided some of her best opportunities, she says. “Have faith and trust that you’re equipped with the ability to succeed — and that you can make an impact on those around you,” Colston adds.
Find career opportunities through the FFA Forever Blue Network at ForeverBlueNetwork.org.
