Five students in Sanford Regional Technical Center’s (SRTC) Agriculture program have an exciting week ahead. After winning first place in Floriculture at the FFA Maine State Convention in May, the team, led by Agriculture Instructor Jennifer Coverdale, will now advance to the FFA National Convention in Indianapolis on October 21, where they will compete against students from all across the country.
This will be Sanford’s first time sending a team to FFA Nationals since 2016, and the first time each of Jennifer’s students will be competing at the national level. One student, Esther Bronwyn, acknowledged feeling both excitement and apprehension as the competition draws near, her peers knowingly shaking their heads in agreement.
The students will compete in floriculture, a branch of horticulture focused on flowering and ornamental plants. At Nationals, the students expect to be evaluated on skills similar to those tested at the state competition, including plant identification, floral arrangement and design, general knowledge, pricing and budgeting, and presentation skills.
But the students haven’t waited for Nationals to put those skills into practice. To fund the costs of travel, lodging, and other expenses for the trip, the students launched a six-week dahlia Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) program at Sanford High School. The model allows customers to pay up front for their “share” of a harvest, receiving weekly vegetables, flowers, or other produce from a farm throughout the growing season. Together, the students secured 21 CSA members at Sanford schools alone, and operated the program from September through the first half of October before the frost.
The CSA generated over $1,000 in the first three days alone, allowing them to purchase flights with their initial earnings. They then continued harvesting, arranging, and delivering flowers to CSA shareholders throughout the season. Their work also led to scholarship support from FFA, which, combined with their CSA earnings, helped cover the costs of the trip. With their trip to Nationals now fully-funded, the students are welcoming donations for the spring.
That success was the culmination of months of preparation. The dahlia farm itself began as a simple grass plot at the front of the Sanford High School campus, which the students spent the last days of the 2025-2026 school year tilling, fertilizing with compost, and irrigating to prepare for planting. They then planted dahlia tubers they had propagated over the winter, along with young plants they had been cloning since February.
The project not only enabled their FFA ventures, but also provided an educationally enriching experience, as students had the opportunity to utilize new equipment and learn about irrigation and plant cultivation techniques. The class ultimately created a fully-functioning flower farm, designed and run by students.
For senior Amelia Halverson, the opportunities available through FFA extend beyond competition. “FFA is a great opportunity for community service and leadership opportunities, and a great pathway to go to college,” she said, highlighting the scholarships and other resources the organization makes available to students.
Alongside her team’s victory, Amelia placed first individually in floriculture at the state competition. She has also been interning in a professional florist’s shop since the summer. According to Jennifer, Amelia has taken a leadership role in preparing the team for Nationals, organizing her fellow classmates and developing study guides and shopping lists to help them prepare.
Jennifer has enjoyed watching Amelia and her other students grow throughout their time in the Agriculture program, many of them having joined the program during her first year at SRTC two years ago. She looks forward to celebrating this milestone alongside her students traveling to Indianapolis: Rowan Rhodes, Amelia Halverson, Esther Bronwyn, Avery Connatser, and Leo Carpenter, who will attend as an alternate.
With support from their school community and FFA scholarship funding, the team is ready to represent Sanford in Indianapolis. For Jennifer and her students, this trip represents more than recognition for their accomplishments - it represents the growth they have achieved and the character they have cultivated at SRTC, preparing them to flourish in whatever comes next.