“I’m very excited,” Natalie said. “It was the most stressful, exhausting, rewarding, and exciting week of my life, and I met so many people and made lifelong friends in that week.”
Wright was one of 25 candidates who were competing to fill 10 state officer slots, and those candidates were put through a strenuous week of interviews and activities — all conducted under the watchful eyes of a nine-member nominating committee.
“Kids who are running for a state office are assigned duties, and it is a week-long job interview,” explained Bayfield High School’s Agriculture Education Instructor and FFA Advisor Bobbi Hanhardt. “They’re observed to see how the team will work together and fit together so they will be able to put together the best team available.”
While state officer hopefuls are given plenty to do at the state convention — this year they built a stage, hosted a family game night, and provided support to scores of other FFA members — the most taxing part of the process may be the series of judged interviews they participate in.
Each candidate begins by facing a series of short one-on-one interviews with each of the nine nominating committee members. In the next round, they undergo a more comprehensive interview via Zoom that is conducted by a member of Colorado’s ag industry, and the candidates answer questions on ag issues in Colorado while the nominating committee watches. In the third round, called Stand and Deliver, they are given 30 minutes to prepare a 5-minute speech on a Colorado ag issue and answer questions on their topic afterward, and in the fourth round of interviews, the nominating committee asks deliberately probing and personal questions. Natalie said the fourth round is sometimes called the “crying round” by those who have endured it.
“They ask very intense questions because they really want to see who you are, but that’s okay,” Wright said. “They saw the real Natalie.”
In between those interviews, the candidates are expected to perform their duties, participate in activities, and network with other members, and Wright admitted it was a pretty intense experience.
“You don’t get much sleep in those days, and you’re walking in heels everywhere so it gets kind of exhausting,” she described. “You’re also not allowed to speak to the nominating committee members unless they’re off duty, so I avoided them like the black plague because I didn’t want to get in trouble.”
How it Began
While the actual selection process for state officers is condensed into one action-packed week, preparation for that grueling process actually begins months earlier when candidates train for their moment through competitions, leadership workshops, and other exercises.
“Natalie has been prepping for this since March. She has been putting in a lot of work to get herself ready,” Hanhardt reported.
Wright said that she submitted applications and started reading as many articles as she could to prepare for the interviews she was going to face at the state convention.
“The interview process is pretty tedious for this position,” Wright admitted, noting that she traveled all over Colorado to participate in mock interviews in preparation for the trial she was going to face in early June. A retired state officer from Steamboat Springs named Kayla Rossi — who helped inspire Wright to seek a state officer position — interviewed her every Tuesday night for almost a month and helped Natalie grow more comfortable with the process. A mock interview in McClave, Colorado with that high school’s Ag Advisor, Lance Jagers, really gave her some momentum.
“That was an eye-opening experience for sure,” Wright said. “I still wasn’t 100 percent, but that mock interview definitely changed my life.”
That wasn’t the only life-changing encounter Natalie had in the course of her quest to be a state officer. In fact, the journey to the stage in Pueblo for the installation of state officers on June 7 actually began with a life-changing experience in the same building exactly one year earlier.
“I did little things in FFA but wasn’t very passionate about it until June of last year,” she explained. “I joined FFA my freshman year because my brother Guy had joined FFA to do livestock judging. I actually wanted to do theater and other things in high school besides just agriculture because I grew up on a ranch, and I really wasn’t that stoked about FFA until my junior year of high school.”
Hanhardt said that Wright went through the normal progression of degrees that members of the Bayfield FFA Chapter earn after they enroll in the program — beginning with her green hand degree before moving on to the chapter degree. As a freshman, Natalie even took second in the state in the FFA Creed competition and appeared to be on her way to even bigger things.
“This year she applied for her state FFA degree, and there are a variety of things they have to do to qualify for this opportunity,” Hanhardt said, noting that upon completion of the state degree, Wright became eligible to apply for a state officer’s spot.
2023 State Convention
A year ago, however, going for one of those coveted positions was the furthest thing from Natalie’s mind.
“FFA had always been a cool thing to me, but going into my senior year of high school I was in a low point in my life, and I wasn’t going to go to state convention because I really didn’t feel like doing anything at that point,” Wright revealed.
Fortunately, a younger member of the Bayfield FFA Chapter, Jordan Lott, was going to the state convention to compete in the Creed Contest, and she talked Wright into making the trip so she could serve as her mentor.
“I’m so very grateful that she made me go to state convention with her because I had an eye-opening experience,” Wright said.
While at the state convention in 2023, Rossi — the retiring state officer from Steamboat Springs — reached out to Wright and made a special connection with her. It was that connection that turned Natalie’s life around and started her on her own journey to a state officer’s position.
“I just felt so loved and welcomed and it brought me out of a low point, and I want to be that for another person,” Wright recalled. “I want to make a change and have an impact on someone’s life just like the officer team did for me, and I decided I was going to run for state officer. I remember crying with Bobbi Hanhardt about it and deciding this is the path God has put me on.”
Natalie also discussed her desire to seek a state officer position with her mother, Chrissy, who is a past New Mexico FFA State Officer, and that sealed the deal. She then spent her senior year sharpening her leadership skills by serving as Chapter President and District 3 Vice-President and showed her ability to lead collaboratively by working alongside a district president in the latter role who was also on her way to becoming a state officer in June.
“We decided that we wanted to make more interactions with the students part of District 3, and we got to sit and really interact with the members who were part of our district at our Hesperus Camp,” Wright recalled. “Me and Aunica Naranjo (from Cortez High School) definitely made the change and left big footprints for the new officers to fill.”
Early in her senior year, Natalie also got a boost in her quest when the 2023-24 state officer team visited Bayfield High School in November and spent six hours providing Wright with advice, resources, and tools she could use in her pursuit of a state office.
“That past team was really supportive of me and sat and talked to me all day,” she said. “They gave me the highs and the lows of being a state officer because they were doing it right in that moment.”
2024 State Convention
The yearlong journey came to a conclusion with the hectic week in Pueblo in early June and by the time the big reveal arrived on the convention’s final day, Natalie said that she had truly come to embrace the moment and find value in the experience — regardless of the outcome.
“I wasn’t stressing or worried that I would get a state office because I got to spend the week serving the members and hanging out with a bunch of different members in holding rooms while they waited to go and compete in different competitions,” she said, noting that she realized she had already achieved her primary objective in seeking a state office — to make a change and have an impact on the lives of others.
Excitement and anticipation were still running high for Wright when the convention wrapped up with the long-awaited announcement of the 2024-25 state officer team at the final ceremony. As the Chicago Bulls’ theme song blared from the speakers, Natalie’s name was called and she joined the other members of the team on stage as her family cheered from the crowd.
“My mom started bawling and my dad was laughing his head off. It was definitely a great moment,” she described. “My whole family really did support me through this journey, and they have been in my corner backing me up. When I made the decision to run for state office there were a lot of people who weren’t in support, but my family support that I have at home has really gotten me to the point where I am.”
In addition to her mother and father (Nathan), Wright’s brothers Guy and Gary were also backing her play and telling her to take her shot, and they were in Pueblo to be part of the celebration as well.
“They’re awesome. I love them, and their reaction to me getting state officer was so wholesome,” Natalie said, noting that her brothers were on the edge of their seats as the names of the new state officer team were painstakingly revealed at the ceremony.
However, it may have been Natalie’s mother, Chrissy, who was most in tune with the highs and lows her daughter experienced in the quest to become a state officer.
“My poor mom has gone through so much. She has been on an emotional rollercoaster with me,” Wright admitted. “I’m her daughter for sure, and she sees herself in me. I sometimes can be difficult, but she is right there standing with me.”
Natalie’s achievement is even more notable because it was the first time the Bayfield FFA Chapter has enjoyed the mystique of being part of the state officer installation ceremony.
“Bayfield FFA has never had a state officer. She is our first. There have been some others from the region, but Bayfield did not actually get a chapter until 2016,” Hanhardt announced, explaining that BHS students participated in FFA as part of the Ignacio Chapter until the school formed its own almost a decade ago.
The Work Really Begins
When Wright was selected as a state officer, it meant that she would put off college to live and work with the nine other members of the team. They will spend the next year serving Colorado’s FFA members and acting as ambassadors for the state’s agriculture industry.
“There is a lot of leadership and communication. They will speak with members of Congress, the governor and ag personnel, and state officers visit each and every chapter in the state of Colorado. They go to regional leadership conferences throughout the state and spend two weeks at the Colorado State Fair,” Hanhardt explained, indicating that the team will also attend stock shows and farm shows and make a trip to the National FFA Convention at Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis, Indiana at the end of October.
“It is a full-time job for sure,” said Wright, who was preparing to make a trip to Montrose with another member of the state officer team. It will be the first of many such fairs she will attend over the next few weeks.
“From here until August 10 we are going to travel and visit as many county fairs as we can,” Natalie said, noting that the team will participate in a training on August 12 before heading to the Colorado State Fair in Pueblo to wrap up the month.
“That is a long two weeks. We will move into the little dorms they offer in Pueblo and be there to advocate for agriculture and talk to members. I’m very excited,” Wright stated.
When that event concludes, the team will return to the CSU Spur campus where they will live together for the next year, and Natalie is eager to use that time to help other students feel like they can truly find a home in Colorado FFA — just as previous state officers did for her.
“It’s a long year but it is going by so fast, and I know I only have a year to make a change so I am taking every day with that mindset in mind,” Wright said. “I think a lot of students might feel like me, and I want to be a person that has open ears and can listen to anyone’s story. I want members and students to feel like they have a home.”