BROOKINGS – Brookings High School graduating senior Carolyn Blatchford has spent her life steeped in agriculture, but she’s readying herself for a future in optometry.
Agriculture has been one of her greatest passions, and her extra-curricular activities reflect that. She has long been involved in 4-H, and she’s been in FFA since the start of high school.
Blatchford said FFA has been a great tool for self-development, and she’s even been named the South Dakota FFA reporter as of mid-April.
So far, she and other newly selected state FFA leaders have mostly had training and are preparing for upcoming events.
“I definitely wouldn’t be the same person if it wasn’t for FFA,” Blatchford said.
Through her work in FFA, she’s enjoyed the chance to advocate for agriculture and bring greater awareness of its role even in modern life. Getting to teach others a thing or two about agriculture has also been rewarding.
“One of my favorite experiences was always FFA Week when we put on the animal nursery every year. That was definitely something that I loved: Getting to see the reactions of the students, from the young elementary students even up to the high school students, (when they) see the different animals,” she said.
Even in a Brookings, which still relies heavily on agriculture, people and their children are increasingly removed from agricultural life and the lessons it provides.
Horses have always been a part of her life. At her family’s acreage outside of Brookings, they even provide boarding for other people’s horses. At the moment, they’re housing 12 horses, four of which are their own.
She credits her and her family’s love of horses to her mother, who grew up with horses as well.
“We’re really big into rodeos and horse showing; rodeo is something that’s really dear and close to our hearts, especially mine,” she said.
Blatchford got her start with rodeos when she was 11 and has been doing breakaway roping specifically for the last two years or so.
“I think the most important thing that I really enjoy about rodeo is the family atmosphere. In a lot of sports, things can get pretty competitive, but with rodeo, it’s different,” she said. “Everybody, even if you are competitors, you help each other out.”
Her plan is to continue to participate in rodeo this summer and next summer.
She’s now serving as the South Dakota 4-H rodeo ambassador, which she describes as a great opportunity to advocate for horses, rodeo and agriculture. Granted the spot last August, she’ll continue in her duties until this August.
“I travel around the state to different local rodeos and professional rodeos to represent 4-H in the rodeo program that we have in our 4-H division,” Blatchford said.
There have been other opportunities, too, such as attending a legislative session in Pierre this past February and meeting different officials like the lieutenant governor.
Something she’s also gotten into are rodeo queen competitions. Her mother was involved in those competitions in her youth, too, becoming the first runner-up at Miss Rodeo America at one point.
“I promised her I’d try at least one competition, and my first one, I really found that I enjoyed it,” she said. “I enjoyed not only practicing my interviewing skills but meeting all the other girls that tried out and I ended up winning that competition. It kind of went from there.”
Even though agriculture has dominated her activities, when it comes to her future, Blatchford’s planning on optometry. The science involved and the chance to help people are what interest her, “especially since I’ve always had this kind of fear with blood, but I knew I wanted to help people,” she explained. “Optometry kind of combined all my passions and interests into one.”
Even though she is busy with extra-curricular activities and their attendant responsibilities, Blatchford is setting the foundations for her education by working at Jones Optometric Clinic, where she does a lot of front-end office duties.
“The best part of it is being able to see the doctors work,” she said. “Whenever I have questions, both Dr. Jones and Dr. Jahn are always willing to let me either observe them or ask them questions about different patients or what they saw with this patient versus another. That’s been really cool to see that side of things, and they’ve been sort of mentors to me.”
This fall, Blatchford will attend South Dakota State University through the Honors program pursuing a major in human biology before she continues on to an optometry school.
She said choosing SDSU wasn’t a hard choice to make; it met a variety of her needs.
“I remember walking into the Honors dorm at SDSU the first time at one of my tours, and I just immediately felt at home and comfortable at that space. That’s something that really connected with me,” she said.
In the meantime, Blatchford plans to use whatever free time she has with her family.
To the next round of high school graduates, she offered this advice: “Life happens for you, not to you. I think that’s one of the major things that I’ve learned across my senior year, is just to enjoy every single moment. That sounds really cheesy, I’m not going to lie, but it’s extremely true. There are going to be times that are going to be really tough and you’re going to be pushed to your limits. You just have to remember that there’s a reason that that happened.”
Contact Eric Sandbulte at esandbulte@brookingsregister.com.
Courtesy photo: Carolyn Blatchford, a member of the Brookings High School Class of 2018, plans to attend South Dakota State University and then go on to study optometry.
