It took a year studying international relations in Sydney, Australia, to make me realize just how much I love Nebraska, my home state.
I grew up in several small Nebraska towns before graduating from high school in Cedar Rapids, a community I’m still proud to claim as my hometown. The countryside is beautiful, and the people are kind and hardworking.
The community is also where I learned the value of hard work and gained an appreciation for animal husbandry while working weekends and summers at a farrow-to-finish hog farm. I liked the experience so much that I told my parents I wanted to be a hog farmer after high school.
They pointed out that hog farming was not a good career choice—in the late 1990s hog prices collapsed and farmers were getting out of the business—and encouraged me to go to college. I listened, but I also retained a passion for agriculture.
I attended Wayne State College in northeast Nebraska, where I majored in social science with a minor in environmental studies. Then, I attended Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia, earning a master’s degree in international relations.
After returning to Nebraska, I would go on to work for the railroad and then at an ethanol plant. But my love for agriculture remained, and I wanted to find a way to be more involved. I decided to buy a small acreage and started Hideaway Farm near North Bend, where I planted a big garden, orchard, and berry patch and started raising chickens, pigs, and cattle. I have been selling my products at farmers markets in Omaha and Lincoln ever since.
Underlying my passion for agriculture is a deep commitment to land conservation for wildlife and water conservation for human health. I’ve been dedicated to using and promoting practices that work with nature to protect our shared natural resources while producing high-quality food.
I am thrilled to now be working for the Center as an agriculture and conservation policy associate where I can help others achieve their goals in agriculture. It has been a long and winding road, but it’s brought me to right where I belong.
Connect with Andrew by email at andrewt@cfra.org or by phone at 402.590.7096.
