Elijah Earnest

As a student with an interest in the food animal agriculture industry, I plan on working somewhere with livestock in the future. This summer I will be interning with Seaboard foods in Rolla, Kansas. The organization is one of the top producers of pork in the United States and continues to innovate and improve. During the internship, I will be working as a farm laborer while simultaneously learning/ training to manage a hog farm. For 3 weeks each, I will be learning what goes into operating a sow barn, nursery, and finishing house for a total of 9 weeks. For an additional week, I will get to experience behind-the-scenes responsibilities such as scheduling and production documentation. My hope is that through this internship, I will better understand how agriculture has become modernized to meet the needs of an ever-increasing population. After I graduate in summer 2023, I would like to intern with a large cow/calf or stocker operation out west. Back home, my family raises a few steers as grass-fed beef and our customers love the product and I personally like the idea of minimal inputs for raising livestock. I plan to apply to a larger beef operation where I could learn more about rotational grazing, land regeneration, and cost-effective cattle raising. Currently, I am a part-time farm laborer at the Penn State Haller farm which is the commercial beef operation of the university. I began this position in summer 2021 where I learned a lot about rotational grazing and how to properly set up fields to graze efficiently. My responsibilities at Haller consist of monitoring herd health, feeding, fixing fence, equipment maintenance, and other various tasks essential to farm upkeep. I plan to continue my job at Haller until I graduate in summer 2023. During my sophomore year at Penn State, I realized it would be beneficial to gain experience with more than one type of livestock. Since I work with beef during the school year, I planned to work with a swine operation over the summer. Between my experience at the Penn State Haller farm and the knowledge I hope to learn this summer with Seaboard Foods, I feel I will be well equipped to work as a farm manager or assistant manager in either type of operation. The possibilities with this industry get me excited and I would like to continue to learn more and contribute what I have already learned.