LITTLE ROCK – Arkansas Farm Bureau recognized Rodney Wiedower of Greenbrier High School as the state’s Outstanding Ag Educator. And Arkansas Tech University student Lindsey Triplett got the farm group’s social media award for her agricultural advocacy efforts. 

Wiedower and Triplett received their awards at the organization’s 81st annual convention Dec. 3 at the Marriott Hotel and Convention Center in Little Rock.

The Outstanding Ag Educator Award recognizes a high school agriculture education instructor for their efforts in teaching young people about agriculture, leadership and involvement in FFA. The program includes more than 400 students in ag education and FFA. Through his leadership, the program has had numerous students become state FFA winners in Career Development Event contests. 

Greenbrier High School is well known for its development of student leaders. The present state FFA president, Sam Harris, graduated from Greenbrier High School. Wiedower has been a vocational agriculture teacher for 29 years. He raises beef cattle. “There’s no way I could win an award like this without the help of my students and fellow teachers,” Wiedower said.

Triplett, 20, from Conway, earned the 2015 AgVocate of the Year award. She is an agricultural business major, with an emphasis in public relations at Arkansas Tech. Launched last year, the Arkansas AgVocate program is an effort to help individuals tell the story of agriculture using social networks such as Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Participants receive points for sharing ag-oriented content, recruiting new AgVocates and when their followers "like," comment or "retweet" the posts. Triplett’s posts reached more than 52,000 people.

“She understands the challenge of educating people about agriculture and has gone above and beyond to ensure this story is told,” said Farm Bureau Social Media Specialist Mollie Dykes.

The prepared content that AgVocates receive via email and then share to their networks helps inform people on current agriculture issues and dispel common agriculture myths. The Agvocate of the Year award recognizes the individual who is participating in the program and doing the best job of meeting these criteria. 

Arkansas Farm Bureau Assistant Director of Education and Ag-in-the-Classroom Andrew Guffey (left) and Faulkner County Farm Bureau President Chris Schaefers (right) present the 2015 Outstanding Ag Educator Award to Rodney Wiedower of Greenbrier High School at the organization's 81st annual convention in Little Rock Dec. 3.

Arkansas Farm Bureau president Randy Veach (left) and vice president Rich Hillman (right) present the 2015 Arkansas Farm Bureau Agvocate of the Year Award to Lindsey Triplett of Conway at the organization's 81st annual convention in Little Rock Dec. 3.

Arkansas Farm Bureau is a nonprofit, private advocacy organization of more than 190,000 families throughout the state working to improve farm and rural life.