​Hello, again!
This is Sophia Hortin checking in with new experiences from the second semester of my senior
year at the University of Illinois. As a student completing an Illinois teaching license alongside
my degree, this semester is untraditional. I am a student teacher at Sycamore High School in
Sycamore, Illinois. Because I am student teaching, I am not on a traditional college campus or
attending traditional college classes. Instead, I am teaching agriculture courses daily, as a career
teacher would, under the guidance of three experienced agricultural educators within Sycamore's
local school district.
The shift in setting that comes with student teaching also challenges me to think of the
grain and feed association industry immersion experience from a different angle. Specifically, I
am reflecting on intersections between agricultural education and the grain industry within
Illinois. Part of this reflection includes a written discussion on how educating about the grain and
feed industry can be integrated into each of the three main components of agricultural education
programs. Agricultural education in Illinois models after three main components: classroom &
laboratory instruction, FFA, and supervised agricultural experiences (SAE). Ideally, these
components will intersect in some activities and events as student involvement in all three areas
creates a holistic agricultural education experience. This model is called the "three-circle model,"
with one circle for each principal component. Throughout my student teaching experience, it is
abundantly clear that there is space to incorporate grain and feed industry education within each
of these circles or components. Doing so is mutually beneficial for both the agricultural
education program and Illinois' grain and feed industry. Through student teaching, I also found
many ways in which I learned about the grain and feed industry or skills applicable to grain and
feed careers, which I will outline more thoroughly towards the end of this discussion.
Classroom & Laboratories
The grain industry touches many different arms of knowledge and skills, which
incorporate into course curriculums in many ways. For example, science-based agriculture
courses can incorporate feed science and grain quality topics from a scientific approach.
Agriculture business classes can include lessons on commodity markets, merchandising, and
origination topics. Technical courses like agriculture mechanics, welding, and physical science
systems, can expose students to the application of skills within the grain industry, such as
operations and technical systems, that they are learning in their coursework.
Critical topics like safety and career exploration are broad enough to be incorporated into
almost any class. For example, safety in agriculture, which includes grain safety topics, is critical
to all people who might encounter grain or a grain handling facility. Therefore, grain safety
topics would be an excellent candidate for incorporation into an introduction to agriculture class,
the foundational agriculture course with the broadest audience.
Lastly, exposing students to career paths, including those in the grain and feed industries,
is integral to a well-rounded high school educational experience. While it is not the role of the
educator is not to recruit students to a specific sector, it is crucial to encompass a variety of
careers in agriculture. Students often think of farmers, veterinarians, agronomists, repair
technicians, and others as being the traditional "careers in agriculture." Yet, industries like the
grain industry house careers in merchandising, origination, operations, safety, and more that
often suit students' interests and skills, even though they may not be a career that the student is
aware of. At Sycamore, I learned a great deal from observing their Agriculture Academy course.
This course is a senior-level class that focuses on career or college readiness and career
exploration. Students in this course visit agricultural businesses in the local area, hear from guest
speakers, and complete job shadow experiences (like those in the GFAI industry immersion
program). I found that even at the senior-level stage, where students choose a career pathway,
they are still searching for what suits them. Exposure to agriculture careers, some of which were
in grain and feed, was critical to developing their decisions about the next steps after high
school.
FFA
From a teaching perspective, FFA is a great space to provide students with stated
interests in agriculture with exposure to grain and feed industries outside the classroom. These
learning opportunities could come in the form of business and industry tours, attendance at
workshops during conferences and conventions, and career development events.
FFA is also a space where students develop leadership and communication skills. Based
on what I experienced during student teaching, teachers must provide context regarding how
those skills translate to applicable settings or careers. Students possess more "buy-in" to learning
these skills and retain them longer when they see purpose in their investment. One way to
provide them with context is through interactions with industries, like grain and feed, where they
see professionals using those skills and have opportunities to practice them during their
interactions.
SAE
Supervised Agricultural Experiences (SAEs) are work-based learning programs for students.
Teachers can create another intersection between agricultural education and the grain and feed
industry by fostering connections for students to complete work-based experiences or projects in
related fields. “Doing to Learn” is a portion of a motto used in describing the work of
agricultural education. The idea is that there is a great deal learned by immersion into the
working environment, which is why SAEs are an integral part of students learning about
agriculture, including the grain and feed industry.
Learning as a Student Teacher
I would be remiss if I did not also reflect upon how my personal student teaching
experiences impact my relationship with the grain and feed industry. Even though I do not plan
to become a teacher upon graduation in May, the skills I learned during student teaching are still
valuable. For example, teaching high school students about agriculture required me to fine-tune
my ability to break down technical information and present it clearly. This skill will be valuable
in other career fields, including the career fields I experienced during my grain and feed industry
immersion tours and job shadows. Many professionals I encountered during these experiences
expressed how important it is to communicate technical information to their farmer patrons or
colleagues to ensure all parties' well-being and that tasks are performed safely and successfully.
Other skills acquired include collaboration between multiple organizations to achieve a common
purpose, skills to show the value of agriculture in work settings in which many are unfamiliar
and more.
Reflection throughout curriculum development and assisting with the daily facilitation of
an agricultural education program helped solidify connections, concepts, and ideas about the role
of grain and feed in our world. A mentor once told me, “Action without reflection is a waste of
time.” They meant that reflecting upon our past experiences is where we learn to use those them
for further development, action, or to derive opportunities by reconnecting in some way. During
student teaching, I often revisited or reflected upon my experiences as I incorporated them into
lessons, conversations about careers and opportunities with individual students, or in seeking
ways for community professionals to engage with the agricultural education program. Specific
grain and feed experiences I frequently revisited include internships, personal interactions
through my farming background, and the industry immersion scholarship program. Reflecting on
these experiences from a new setting required me to think about them from a new angle,
broadening and deepening my takeaway points as I look back.
Lastly, studies show that an excellent way to learn information is to be in a situation
where you must teach that information or explain it to others. Teachers even use this as a
learning strategy in their classrooms. Challenging students to teach or explain a concept to one
another, an evidence-based strategy to support students in mastering content. I also experienced
this strategy in action personally as I acquired content knowledge and transformed it into lessons
for my students. For example, during a pre-student teaching clinical field experience, I developed
and taught a multi-day lesson about assessing feed quality, which directly intersects with the
grain and feed industry. Before conducting the lesson, I was entirely unfamiliar with assessing
feed quality. Yet, even months later, I still retain what I learned about feed in delivering that
lesson. This feed quality lesson is just one of several examples where teaching strengthened my
knowledge of grain and feed topics as I put together learning content and lessons for students.
Although my industry immersion experience happened through the shoes of an
agricultural educator rather than a local grain professional, I still find many connections as to
how this experience strengthened my knowledge of grain and feed, the skills required to become
an industry professional, and my ability to pass on learning about the grain and feed industry. I
am very grateful for the plethora of investments and experiences throughout the grain and feed
industry immersion scholarship program, which deepened my knowledge of a vital agricultural
industry and sparked an interest in grain and feed careers. Thank you, Grain and Feed
Association of Illinois!

​Hello, again! For a brief reintroduction, my name is Halie Kohl and I reside in Herscher, IL.
Coming from a grain and livestock family, I developed my passion for agriculture quickly. Since
May 2020, I have owned and operated Halie’s Farmstand, a small vegetable production
business. I am currently a college sophomore agribusiness major, dually enrolled at Kankakee
Community College and Illinois State University. Upon college graduation, I aspire to develop
Halie’s Farmstand into a larger farm-to-fork operation with an emphasis on commercial tomato
production and continue raising livestock.
For my spring job-shadowing days, I returned to Rabideau Grain and Lumber. While the
spring-time is busy for farmers in the fields, it can be rather slow at the elevator. I received a
settlement statement from Incobrasa (Gilman, Illinois) for beans which Rabideau Grain hauled
to them via semi. I matched up Rabideau’s outbound weight tickets for the trucks to Incobrasa’s
weight tickets and reconciled the statement in their computer system.
The office manager, Bev Buckley, and office assistant, Lisa Patchett, took this time to explain to
me their grain transportation methods of railcars verse semis, buyers, and end users. In addition
to doing business with Incobrasa, Rabideau Grain ships corn via CN railroad to chicken farmers
in Mississippi and trucks corn to One Earth ethanol plant in Gibson City, Illinois.
Railcars allow elevators to ship mass amounts of grain in a short period of time. Approximately 4
semis fit in 1 railcar (approximately 4,000 bushel per hopper). Plus, the consignee of the railcars
pays the freight charges. Rabideau Grain plays a smaller role with railroad shipments, handling
only 25 rail cars at a time. At first utilizing railroads seems simple, but I have learned that grain
elevators are truly at the railroad’s mercy. After the rail cars are delivered, CN only allows one
free day and one loading day to get the cars ready for pick-up, regardless if the drop time was
11:59 PM or 12:01 AM. Within this timeframe, Rabideau Grain must have Champaign County
Grain Inspection do a stowage inspection on all cars, have employees load all cars, Champaign
County Grain Inspection returns to take samples and produces a certificate of grain grade, FM,
etc., then the cars are sealed, and submitted for release. If all pieces of the puzzle do not come
together within the allotted CN timeframe, demurrage occurs and each car is docked $200/day.
On a full set of 25 rail cars, Rabideau Grain risks losing $5,000/day due to inclement weather,
breakdowns, etc if they cannot get all cars loaded.
Moving off the rails and back onto the roads, semis also play a large role in the transportation of
grain. Rabideau Grain owns 5 trucks. When trucking grain to Incobrasa or One Earth, each load
is weighed outbound and then when it arrives at its destination. Prior to hauling, a price is
settled on between Rabideau and Incobrasa or One Earth, and the elevator is already price
protected by hedging the grain.

​Hello again everyone! My name is Megan Hagemann, and I will be going into my senior year at the University of Wisconsin-Platteville in the fall. I am currently majoring in animal science with a comprehensive emphasis in nutrition. I have recently completed my spring job shadow at Bocker Ruff Grain in Polo, IL for the GFAI Industry Immersion Scholarship.
I had the opportunity to job shadow at Bocker Ruff Grain in the fall of 2022 and learn the ins and outs of the business. This spring, I was able to have more hands-on experience as part of my job shadow. First, I observed morning paperwork to gain more insight into the flow of Bocker Ruff Grain. I was given the chance to run the outbound scale for the day for all the trucks that had unloaded at the elevator. I then had the opportunity to watch a train being loaded as well. I observed the computer system behind the train and was given more information on how the train sector of the elevator works.
I would like to extend a thank you to Bocker Ruff Grain for allowing me to job shadow at their facility for my fall and spring job shadow. I am extremely thankful for all the opportunities and networking events the Grain and Feed Association of Illinois Industry Immersion Scholarship has provided me the past year, and I look forward to my future in this industry! 

​Hello again! My name is Carli Wright and I am from Bradford, IL. I recently graduated
from Black Hawk College -East Campus with my Associates in Science. My plans for the fall
have remained the same since my last blog post, as I will be attending Iowa State University to
major in Agronomy. While at ISU, I plan on continuing my collegiate Soil Judging career and
become involved within the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences.
Pigeons, chickens, horses, oh my! For the Spring portion of my job shadowing
experience, I was able to tour Rumbold and Kuhn’s Feed Division located in Kewanee, IL.
Throughout this two day job shadowing, I had the opportunity to view the inside operation as
well as the outside operation. As far as the insider operation went, I was able to see “the day in
the office” with Tracy who is the Office/Accounting Manager. I was able to view the process of
ordering inventory, waiting on customers, and so many ins and outs of the operation!!
For the outside operation, I toured the facility and learned more about the operation from
Adam, Brandon, and Austin. I was able to see several recipes of feed get made and then bagged
or loaded onto the truck. I also was able to see a wagon of corn be delivered which was then sent
to storage for it to later on be cracked. Rumbold and Kuhn’s Feed Division sells all different
sorts of animal feed ranging from pigeons, chickens, horses, cattle, goats, and so much more!
I am extremely grateful for Rumbold and Kuhn for allowing me to tour 3/8 locations and
be able to expand my knowledge within the grain industry. Throughout my job shadowing
experience, I have encountered numerous individuals who talked so highly of their profession
and R&K and it goes to show the high levels of respect and gratitude the business holds.
As always, a huge thank you to the Grain and Feed Association of Illinois for assisting
me in my educational plans and for providing me with knowledgeable experiences within the
grain and feed industry. It is an honor to be a recipient of the Grain and Feed Industry Immersion
and all of the opportunities that have been provided throughout. I look forward to what my future
entails within the agricultural industry.

​Hello again everyone! My name is Megan Hagemann, and I will be going into my senior year at the University of Wisconsin-Platteville in the fall. I am currently majoring in animal science with a comprehensive emphasis in nutrition. I have recently completed my spring job shadow at Bocker Ruff Grain in Polo, IL for the GFAI Industry Immersion Scholarship.
I had the opportunity to job shadow at Bocker Ruff Grain in the fall of 2022 and learn the ins and outs of the business. This spring, I was able to have more hands-on experience as part of my job shadow. First, I observed morning paperwork to gain more insight into the flow of Bocker Ruff Grain. I was given the chance to run the outbound scale for the day for all the trucks that had unloaded at the elevator. I then had the opportunity to watch a train being loaded as well. I observed the computer system behind the train and was given more information on how the train sector of the elevator works.
I would like to extend a thank you to Bocker Ruff Grain for allowing me to job shadow at their facility for my fall and spring job shadow. I am extremely thankful for all the opportunities and networking events the Grain and Feed Association of Illinois Industry Immersion Scholarship has provided me the past year, and I look forward to my future in this industry! 

​The Sublette Elevator is a place that values the community and the people who help support them. As an elevator, they continuously buy and sell grain to generate a profit that they can then share with their stockholders and patronage who have bought products from their lumber, feed, fertilizer, ammo, and general store supply. Of all the grain the Sublette Elevator attains, about 90% of the corn is trucked to the ethanol plant, Marquis Energy in Hennepin Illinois which I had the privilege to tour.
              Marquis Energy is the biggest dry ethanol plant in America with production of just about 400 million barrels of ethanol a year. The plant intakes between 500 and 550 trucks a day from surrounding elevators to meet their production goals. It is a 24-hour facility that takes trucks from 6:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. Monday through Saturday. Not only do they make traditional grade ethanol, but they also have two tanks dedicated to pharmaceutical grade alcohol that they use when they are outsourced to make cleaning supplies and sanitizers. In 2016 they doubled in size from making just about 200 million barrels to the 400 million they are capable of today. Ethanol plants use a lot of water in the form of steam in the fermentation process. Marquis Energy implemented a piece of machinery that recycles the steam and evaporates the water out of it before it is released so at least some of the water used can be reused again. The plan operates on the structure of redundancy as well. They are currently building a third scale with a probe so if one of their other two breaks, they still can operate. The facility has little to no storage of the grain they intake because they believe in turning the corn right into production, but even though they don’t have storage on the facility grounds, doesn’t mean they aren’t a part of elevators trying to build more storage. Marquis contracted their grain extremely far out this year because of the drought on the western side of the corn belt. They wanted to ensure they had enough grain to sustain their production. If something was to happen and they did not need grain in one month but wanted the elevator to carry it to the next month, Marquis works to pay the elevator the interest they have on that carry to justify them storing it. The Marquis cousins who pioneered this facility come from a family who used to own a community elevator, so they value and only buy from the community elevators in the area instead of large corporate ones.
The Marquis cousins, Dave and Mark, built their business model on needing two things, quality people and quality location. They lucked out on the quality location piece as they are right off the Illinois river and send most of their ethanol to New Orleans via barge. Next, they value their employees and give them benefits such as lunch every day and company vehicles, so they know they are valued. While Marquis has doubled in size with 11 tanks and 1 beer well, they are expanding their production to biofuels as they are looking to build a bean crush plant in the next two years.
It was truly amazing to see the journey in which corn comes to the elevator, leaves, and what it is made into. As a daughter of a corn producer and the many experiences I have had with the Sublette Elevator, I have enjoyed being able to witness how much the grain industry impacts not only my community, but the world.

​Blog #1
Hello, my name is Coy Crull, and I am from the small Southeastern Illinois town of Grayville. I am currently attending Murray State University in Murray Kentucky, where I am majoring in Agronomy. For the first portion of my job shadow I went to Tosh Farms in Henry Tennessee. While there I visited Wayne Casey, who managed the granary. I learned that this portion of Tosh Farms was put in place to supply their demand for corn to feed swine. Their storage capacity is over 6 million bushels, and they need 4 million bushels of corn per year to supply their hog barns. Wayne told me that he always makes sure to get enough corn to supply the needs of Tosh Pork, but also buys and sells soybeans, wheat, and even white corn based on the market. I was able to learn procedures for scaling incoming trucks and grading the grain. I learned so much more about the grain handling industry. I would like to thank Wayne and Tosh Farms for allowing me to visit.
Blog#2
Hello again! For my second portion of job shadowing, I went back to Tosh Farms. While there I was able to learn more about the feed mill. I was able to learn more about other ingredients and alternative feeds that are used to feed their pigs. I walked around the feed mill and watched as the alternative food sources were put into a separator and shredder. They then separated and bailed the disposables and put the food source into its own bay. This was the busiest part of the mill as people were loading and unloading trucks nonstop. I found it very nice to be able to learn more about the nutrition and feed requirements of hogs and how Tosh Farms was able to meet those needs. I want to thank Tosh Farms once more for being so helpful and giving me more experience in the industry.

​My name is Collin White, and I am a senior at Illinois College majoring in Agribusiness with a minor in Economics and business administration. My goal after high school is to return to the family farm to work alongside my brother and grow diversified row crops. As a kid, I spent a lot of time during harvest in the passenger seat riding back and forth to our local grain elevator which sparked my interest in what happens behind the scale. This made me incredibly grateful to receive the Illinois Grain and Feed scholarship and go on the immersion tour to learn more about the industry.
For my job shadowing this fall, I had the opportunity to work with Cole Stock at Western Grain Marketing in Prentice, Illinois. On my first day, I spent time with many of the staff members to walk through the day-to-day operations at the elevator and see what happens when a load comes from their point of view. I started at the scale learning about the different programs and systems used to process shipments and how to manage multiple trucks coming through at once. While working the front, not only did I learn about the importance of staying organized, but also how important it is to maintain connections with farmers and understand their different needs and operations. After working on the scale, I went out to the pits to understand how the flow of grain is controlled within the facility. We first went over some safety practices to not only ensure the safety of the people working when around moving trucks and pits but also to prevent accidents that could damage large parts of the facility. After talking about safety and getting a tour of the outside of the facility, we looked over the control panels and pits to go over the logistics of moving grain throughout the facility. This includes understanding what commodity is in which bin, how full they are, and what pits can reach which bins. We talked about the logistics of filling bins and when loads can be shipped out to ensure there is still enough space on site.
For my second day, I came back to the office to work more closely with Cole to understand his role and what needs to be done when preparing for post-harvest. With harvest winding down, farmers are now watching the market and making decisions on when to sell and how much to sell. When farmers call in asking for advice, there are typically two things to keep in mind: first are you profitable, and second are you comfortable riding the volatility of the market? Being there for farmers and maintaining that relationship is incredibly important for small, rural elevators so providing support for customers takes priority after harvest. Working with Cole, we also talked about winter operations of elevators shipping loads out toward end-user terminals and balancing the storage of the facility. On the line same, we discussed the margins of an elevator and what information is used to develop the basis. The biggest takeaway I got was the central role that a local elevator plays in a mutual relationship between customers and the elevator to ensure that both parties can navigate the market for years to come.

 Hello, My name is Jack Beetz and this fall I shadowed at Consolidated grain and Barge in Hennepin. I grew up on a family farm where we grow corn, soybeans, alfalfa, and seed corn. My family also runs Meriden Grain which is a member of the Grain and Feed Association which is an agribusiness that spans from seed sales and custom application to grain storage and drying at our elevator.  The first day I spent most of the time with Dan Aubry who is the grain Origination Manager and Taylor Pollock. Taylor showed me around the facility and then I watched Dan for the first day. He showed me how he goes about communicating bids with his staff and then looking over contracts that his team has bought and showed the process of how he reviews them and looks for any errors. The second day I spent  at CGB was with Taylor and we started by looking at different programs on the computer that she uses as an originator. She also showed me some pictures from different grain industry trips she has been on. Next, we went out to the grain probe and I learned how they do the tests on all the grades that they take. I also learned about the process of grinding and testing organic corn which isn’t something I was familiar with so I found it very interesting.