After enjoying an outstanding junior year that included a visit to North Carolina and a trip to state, Reed Pottebaum is looking forward to spending his senior year as the Montgomery County High School FFA’s president.

Pottebaum will lead an officer team that has seven seniors, three juniors and one sophomore. He spent his first day as president at the MCHS FFA Spring Awards Banquet on May 8 at the school’s gymnasium.

“I’m just ready to serve this chapter,” said Pottebaum, who will also serve as the Area V chaplain. “We have a great group of kids and a great community to back us, so I’m just ready for sure.”

The other senior officers are Dallas Hans, Lily Hillebrand, Lafe McCurdy, Ann Rose, Olivia Spurgeon and Jillian Weekley. Hans and Rose will share vice-president duties, Hillebrand and Weekley are secretaries, McCurdy is the treasurer and Spurgeon is the reporter.

“It’s a great group,” Pottebaum said. “We started when we were coming in as sophomores and we’ve grown more and more every year. We’re proud of that group. I know that we got big things ahead of us and we’re going to maybe change some things that need to be changed around here.”

Pottebaum will serve his third year as an officer. His older brother, Landon, was president in the 2024-25 school year. Pottebaum shared vice-president duties with Hans and Hillebrand this past school year and served as secretary in his sophomore year. Pottebaum replaces Gracie Cobb — who graduated in May — as president.
Hans, Rose and Hillebrand will also return for their third year as officers, Weekley and McCurdy will be back for their second year as officers and Spurgeon returns to the officer team after a year hiatus.

Five of the officers — Hillebrand, McCurdy, Rose, Spurgeon and Weekley — helped the agricultural issues team place fifth in state competition at the Missouri FFA Convention in April. The team made presentations of the data center and the agricultural and environmental impacts it could bring to Montgomery County.

The other officers are juniors Emma Cobb (vice president), Thomas Happe (sentinel) and Owen Hillebrand (historian) and sophomore Anna Kay Johnson (parliamentarian).

During his junior year, Pottebaum helped the soils team — which also included Owen Hillebrand, Keane Ridgley and Thomas Happe — finish 21st in state competition at the state convention. He also went to Raleigh, N.C., to participate in the Power Technology Ag Systems Next Gen Conference.

“It was definitely a good year,” Pottebaum said. “I stepped out of my comfort zone. I definitely saw some other people step out of theirs. It was a good thing to see.”

Pottebaum said going to the Next Gen Conference was beneficial for him since he plans to be a diesel mechanic in the future.

“That was a really great opportunity to see all of that stuff and it’s really cool being out there and meeting everybody,” Pottebaum said. “You meet people from across the country. Meeting new friends is really great.”