Get Involved!
Lots of learning - and fun - happens outside of the classroom! Join one or more of our clubs and judging teams and enhance your leadership skills. Attend a professional conference, hear from experts in the field and start building your professional network. Many of these experiences are no/low cost to you, so take advantage of as many as you can!
The Beef Management Team is a select group of students who work with faculty and farm staff to manage the teaching herd at the farm. They provide input on breeding decisions, conduct calving checks and assist with managing herd health. The team also markets and sells beef raised on UWRF's Mann Valley Farm. They organize an annual production tour, visiting regional farms and ranches to learn about diverse operations. Members often attend Cattle Con, the National Cattleman’s Beef Association annual gathering, which includes educational sessions, demonstrations and a trade show. The team has also hosted educational events for area producers which featured guest speakers on topics such as genetics, grazing and meat quality.
The UWRF Block and Bridle Club is a chapter under the national B&B organization for students interested in animal agriculture. The club provides students with the opportunity to develop livestock skills and to interact with others interested in the advancement of animal agriculture. The club hosts educational agricultural experiences, service activities and social events including the UWRF Royal Showmanship competition at Mann Valley Farm and Prospect Weekend each spring to promote youth involvement with livestock, attracting hundreds of youth and their families.
CAPS expands member knowledge of companion animals and their related professions by hosting a wide range of guest speakers from area businesses, search and rescue teams, non-profits using therapy dogs to support individuals with a wide range of needs, dog agility sports and species-specific organizations focused on avians, snakes and reptiles, and pocket pets. They group participates in service activities, helping meet the need for pet supplies for the local food pantry and making blankets, toys and woven mats for shelter and rescue organizations. They hold some purely fun social events too, like evening bonfires complete with s’mores, trivia games and craft nights!
The UWRF Dairy Club is widely recognized as the largest active dairy club in the nation. Highlights for Dairy Club members include the Falcon Premier Heifer sale and trips to the Canadian Royal Winter Fair. Every other year the club organizes the sale of an elite line up of dairy heifers and embryos. While organizing this large event is a lot of work, the photos show that they have a lot of fun too!
On the off years, club members travel to Toronto for the Canadian Royal Winter Fair, the largest agricultural indoor fair in the world, taking the opportunity to tour several dairy farms along the way. Members participate in the Undergraduate Student Division of the America Dairy Science Association. The club also brings in guest speakers, participates in service activities and hosts social events including a fall picnic, a holiday party and a year-end banquet.
This is one of our newer student organizations and is a response to the growing interest in alternative medicine for horses. The club organizes guest speakers, often including demonstrations or hands-on time with practitioners of veterinary chiropractic care, acupuncture or other equine bodywork techniques. Our schoolie (campus) horses have benefited from their care! For fun, the group has organized games using Kahoot and traveled to Canterbury Downs to take in the Extreme Horse Skijoring event.
Food Science Club members often arrange behind-the-scenes tours of various food production and processing facilities, host industry speakers and perform service activities. Of course, many of their meetings and social events center around food! They’ve had fun constructing gingerbread houses, baking and decorating cookies, trying their hand at butter sculpting, making mug cakes and playing grocery bingo.
The Horseman’s Association welcomes all horse enthusiasts! The association hosts guest speakers, organizes activities such as halter making and perform a great service for our school horses by holding Schoolie Pamper Days, complete with massages for our hard-working campus horses! Members also attend the Midwest Horse Fair and staff a booth representing UWRF. For fun, the group has arranged field trips to local apple orchards, hayrides, horse bingo and Jeopardy games and hosted movie nights. Many members also volunteer at horse rescue farms or with therapeutic riding programs.
The UWRF Poultry and Swine Club is for anyone interested in the poultry and swine industries. Club activities include involvement in national poultry judging competitions, conducting 4-H workshops, organizing high school FFA contests, hosting industry speakers and the annual spring show pig sale.
The Pre-Veterinary Club introduces students to opportunities and information related to animals and veterinary medicine. With the assistance of faculty, the club organizes a range of wet lab activities, such as learning how to check for pregnant ewes, take blood samples, use an ultrasound, use dissection tools, treat and stitch wounds, disbud calves and simply how to be safe around animals. Members often attend the American Pre-Veterinary Medical Association (APVMA) Symposium, an annual conference for prospective veterinary students from across the country, offering many more unique educational sessions. Club members also volunteer time at local animal shelters and enjoy social events such as trivia nights!
The UWRF Rodeo Club is a group of students sharing the common bond of horses and the sport of rodeo. Students do not have to own a horse or rodeo competitively to be a member. Club members organize and host the two-day Falcon Frontier Days Rodeo each fall. In addition to the rodeo, the club hosts clinics conducted by professional cowboys/cowgirls in barrel racing, goat tying, roping and rough stock events.
Beyond the rodeo arena, the club participates in area parades and other public events to help educate people about rodeo. For fun, they hold trail rides, bowling nights and movie nights. Each spring the group hosts the Rodeo Round Up, where teams of UWRF students compete for prizes in a series of fun events like stick horse barrel racing, a boot scramble, tug o’ war and three-legged races.
Intercollegiate Competitive Teams
The Animal and Food Science Department sponsors 10 intercollegiate judging teams where students compete against their peers from other institutions from across the country. Team members not only gain knowledge in their subject area, but participation but helps them develop and strengthen their public speaking, decision-making, critical evaluation and justification skills, which will serve them well in their careers. The contests also provide an opportunity to network with their peers and industry professionals.
Teams participate in four events: Laboratory Practicum, Written Exam, Oral Presentation and Quiz Bowl. The local winning team goes on to compete at the Midwest Section meeting of the American Society of Animal Science (ASAS) and potentially the national ASAS meetings.
Teams compete in the American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA) Animal Welfare Assessment Contest where they assess the welfare of animals in a variety of settings using science-based methods and reasoning.
Teams generally compete in three different intercollegiate contests: the Accelerated Genetics contest and the competitions at the World Dairy Expo and the North American International Livestock Exposition.
North American Intercollegiate Dairy Challenge programs include competitions held in four regions across the United States, in addition to the national competition. Students work on an intercollegiate team to apply theory and learning to a real-world dairy.
Teams compete in the collegiate contest held in partnership with the Wisconsin Cheese Makers Association as part of the annual Cheese Expo in Milwaukee each spring. In some years, teams have also traveled to compete in the European Dairy Sensorial Contest.
The main competitive event for the Horse Judging Team is the annual AQHA World Championship Collegiate Horse Judging Competition in Oklahoma City.
UWRF fields both Hunter Seat and Western teams in the Intercollegiate Horse Shows Association (IHSA). UWRF competes in zone 7, region 3. Teams and individuals regularly compete at regional and zone finals and some have qualified for nationals.
The team has competed in the Sioux Empire Livestock Show, the National Barrow Show, World Beef Expo, American Royal, Minnesota Beef Expo and the North American International Livestock Exposition.
Students compete at the National Collegiate Meat Animal Evaluation Contest, a three day competition sponsored by the American Meat Science Association which rotates between host campuses across the country.
Teams compete in the National Collegiate contest hosted by the University of Arkansas and the US Poultry Foundation contest hosted by Louisiana State University.
