IL Corn Internships Deliver Invaluable Skills and Insights to the Next Generation

By Brianna Croft

IL Corn offers a summer intern program, Brianna Croft and Emily Bruch joined the small team by assisting the legislative, communications and marketing departments. Through real world experiences offered through these internships, IL Corn helps educate the next generation and develop the future of agriculture. Here’s what each intern learned over the past couple months.

Brianna Croft – Legislative Intern

• Locks and Dams
  • Locks and Dams are a huge priority for IL Corn, and she was able to see firsthand the impact our waterways have on farmers when exporting their corn. She visited two drained lock locations and had the opportunity to learn the importance of updating the infrastructure to be more reliable and efficient.
• Washington D.C.
  • As part of the legislative internship, Brianna helped to plan and attend Washington D.C. with ICGA. She coordinated meetings with 17 Congressional offices and both Senate offices for IL FFA State Officers and Section Presidents as well as ICGA and ICMB Directors to advocate for corn priorities.
• Ethanol
  • Ethanol is a major marketplace for corn. There are many pieces of legislation on the table regarding ethanol production. Brianna has aided the Legislative team by writing summary analysis papers that give an overview of priority legislation at both the State and Federal Level. She has also taken this knowledge learned from reading these pieces, to further be an advocate in Washington D.C.

"I didn’t know what to expect this summer and I quickly began learning all the ways in which we can use policy to help advocate on behalf of farmers,” said Brianna.  “I look forward to using my experiences in the future.”