The Farm Bureau Women’s Communications Boot Camp is open to all women who are Farm Bureau members and want to enhance their communication and leadership skills. Cathy Isom tells us about the crash-course helping women in farming be better communicators on and off the farm. That’s coming up on This Land of Ours.
Farm Bureau Boot Camp
From: American Farm Bureau
The intensive training offers sessions on public speaking, testifying, targeting your message, working with the media and seeking elected office. Participants this year completed an intense round of media interviews on their pre-selected issue and practice testifying on the issue. Feedback was given throughout Boot Camp in order to prepare participants to target their message to a variety of audiences. Women’s Communications Boot Camp challenges participants to become confident and powerful voices for rural communities.
Saylor
The training offers multiple interactive opportunities to build skills needed to communicate about agriculture and for Farm Bureau. Each participant also networked and developed relationships with Farm Bureau members and staff.
Sherry Saylor, an Arizona row crop farmer and chair of the AFB Women’s Leadership Committee; believes strongly in the benefits of the program.
“Our evaluations indicate this training is vital for helping Farm Bureau women successfully use communication tools and step out of their comfort zones to address key agricultural topics,” Saylor said.
“It is imperative that farmers and ranchers continue to be transparent about what we do to produce food,” she continued. “The women who participate in boot camp gain the necessary confidence and become powerful advocates in their communities across the nation, allowing the expansion and extension of positive messages about agriculture.”
Saylor added that women are already outstanding spokespeople for agriculture and they can have an even greater influence when speaking with the public and telling their story via social media.