Essock Awarded Turn The Key Award

Cierra Essock of Hustisford High School, has been honored with the Teacher Turn the Key Award and Scholarship from the Wisconsin Association of Agricultural Educators (WAAE). Essock was presented this honor at the WAAE Professional Development Conference held at the Radisson Center in La Crosse from
June 26-30, 2022.

The Teacher Turn the Key Award and Scholarship is given to an agricultural educator in their first years of teaching. Its goal is to allow early-career agricultural educators to attend the annual National Association of Agricultural Educators (NAAE) Convention, giving them an opportunity to become involved with their professional association on a national level. Ms. Essock’s teaching philosophy is simple. She says “Students learn best when the curriculum delivered is relevant to their personal interests, skills, and
future plans after graduation.” She accomplishes this by making sure lessons include real-world applications, career exploration, hands-on opportunities, and references to materials in core classes.

The current curriculum Essock uses includes Ecology as a local science credit, Animal Science as a dual-credit course with Lakeshore Technical College, opportunities for agricultural Youth Apprenticeship, and a variety of electives including Veterinary

Science, Food Science, Dairy Science, Agribusiness and Leadership, Wisconsin Commodities, and independent studies. Cierra is proud that all of her students participate in some form of an SAE program, completing at least 10 hours of work with an agricultural project.

About WAAE

WAAE is the professional association for agricultural educators in Wisconsin. Members include 410 middle school, high school, technical college and university educators. The focus of the association is to provide professional development, legislative support and educational resources for teachers to enhance their local agriculture education programs.

For more information about your local agriculture education program and to find out how you can support agriculture in your community, please contact your local agriculture education instructor or visit www.waae.com.