Membership: What’s your story?

This column invites ASA, CSSA, and SSSA members to talk about their personal experiences with the Societies. Every member has a story. What’s yours? We’d love to hear from you. Email: Send Message.

Fernanda Souza Krupek

Being a member of the Societies has provided me with invaluable opportunities for developing work excellence, leadership, advocacy, and communication skills. I presented my master’s research at the 2018 Annual Meeting as part of an oral competition in which I placed second within my division. From this award experience, I learned that work excellence, through principles of teamwork, ownership, problem solving, accountability, humility, integrity, and discipline, always pays off. Attending the meeting also allowed me to meet my future adviser and co-adviser at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln where I am currently pursuing my Ph.D.

Striving for gaining managerial and out-of-syllabus experiences, I have immersed myself in a variety of leadership roles within the Societies, including supporting the planning and execution of several Graduate Student Committee Initiatives and serving as author/co-author of several articles in CSA News magazine.

I have also acquired skills, tools, and strategies that boosted my confidence and ability to engage effectively in science communication. I have expanded my presentations beyond the Annual Meeting to broader audiences in recent interview invitations for mainstream media resources and podcasts. Being a member has helped enrich my academic experiences and career development.

Tim Reinbott

As an undergraduate, I was a member of the Agronomy Club at the University of Missouri where I gained many valuable experiences with leadership roles and getting to know the faculty better outside the classroom. However, it was not until I joined and became active in SASES that my professional education became complete.

As the part of the leadership in the Agronomy Club, organizing our trip and accommodations to the Annual Meeting was a valuable experience, but the real lessons came once we got to the meeting and became involved in the activities. Our group was immediately mixed with other agronomy students from all over the U.S., and I soon became fast friends with some students from the Carolinas and Georgia. I was asked to give a nomination speech on behalf of one of my new friends, which really helped me gain confidence and a newfound desire to use my verbal skills to tell a story.

The meetings also gave me a taste of agronomy across the U.S. and the research that some of the students were involved in, sparking a desire within me to want to learn more through research. Since that time, I have put myself on a path of teaching others about agronomy. As someone recently said, “I envy Tim, he gets to do what he loves and then teaches others about it”. Hopefully, 40 years later, I can provide a path of inspiration to Agronomy Club and SASES members to discover what they truly love about agronomy.