Idaho FFA Alum Brings Ag Education to TikTok

On her family’s Idaho wheat and alfalfa farm, Gen Z creator and agricultural educator Saydee Longhurst has turned everyday fieldwork into scroll-stopping short videos — and, in the process, has helped thousands connect with agriculture on a personal level.

“I see myself probably as a documenter,” Longhurst said. “I treat social media like my own little virtual diary. And if people watch it and like it, that’s great, but more so like, I’m posting about what my thoughts are, what I would want to look back on and remember about whatever was happening.”

Longhurst grew up in the southeast part of the state.

“My parents are actually first-generation farmers, so they started farming full-time the year I was born,” she said. The family runs their operation in Shelley, Idaho, and Longhurst’s feed features everything from late-night cuttings to “fit checks” that she films with her dad before they climb into the tractor.

“People want a face to attach to where their food comes from, and social media has really allowed us to do that,” she said. “Here’s my family. Here’s my dad. You know, here we are in the tractor and the combine. This what this looks like.”

From FFA president to ag ed researcher

Longhurst’s path runs straight through agricultural education.

“My senior year of high school, I ran to be a state officer and was elected as a state president in Idaho, and did that full time for a year,” she said. That experience pushed her toward teaching: “I really enjoyed it and seeing the impact that an ag teacher could make.”

She earned her bachelor’s at Utah State University in agricultural education, then returned for a master’s and a research focus tailor-made for today’s classrooms.

“During my time student teaching, I started to see the need for social media and telling the story of what agriculture teachers do,” she said.

Her thesis looked at how ag teachers use Instagram and Facebook to highlight classroom work, FFA activities, and SAE projects: “The three hashtags I looked up were #agclassroom, #FFA, and #supervisedagriculturalexperience … and we analyzed posts and looked at how the audience was reacting to those type of posts: was it positive, negative or neutral?”

The takeaway, she said, is clear that social media can magnify the reach of ag programs.

“An astounding number were using it and shared that it was positive, especially in reaching students and highlighting student success,” Longhurst noted. “Students that aren’t taking ag classes are then seeing what you can do within FFA.”

Longhurst began sharing farm-life clips in 2020. What started as “haphazard” posts eventually took off.

“I went from like, 10,000 followers to 20,000 followers,” she said. “I never set out to be like a content creator, like a farm influencer. I’m just sharing what my thoughts are, how I see agriculture.”

The videos that resonate most often feature her dad, and a little levity. “We do like these fit checks, like on the farm, of what I’m wearing and what he’s wearing,” she explained. “Especially with farmers’ daughters and their farm dads … showing that relationship of like a father-daughter working together and the two generations.”

Brand recognition has organically followed.

“Recently, just in August, Case IH actually reached out to me and had me go back to the Farm Progress Show, and we did fit checks there,” Longhurst said. “Case IH is like the only brand of tractor that we use and love.”

Another collaboration with Dickies focused squarely on authenticity and education. “They had us create, like, a day in the life of a farmer wearing their gear,” she said. “They specifically asked us not to [make it salesy] … and so we enjoyed being able to share what it actually looks like.”

For Longhurst, the real power of TikTok is connection and clarity, particularly on issues that can seem abstract from afar.

“Water rights are huge out West,” she said. “We’ve been able to use social media to teach people why these water rights are so important … people that maybe drive past a field and see a sprinkler on it, but don’t understand how valuable that is.”

While her family hasn’t directly tracked sales from social posts, she sees a meaningful shift in public understanding.

“I personally haven’t seen necessarily with sales, but just more awareness, which I think you could value equally as much … being more aware of farmland is important,” she said.

That squares with broader numbers shared in a recent industry pitch citing an Oxford Economics report on TikTok’s role for small ag businesses: 90 percent say the platform expands their reach beyond their local community or state; 87 percent say it helps them grow within markets they’re already in; 82 percent report increased sales after promotion; and 70 percent have sold out a product after promoting on TikTok.

Even as she builds her digital audience, Longhurst keeps a foot in the classroom. She completed student teaching stints at Rigby High School in Idaho and at an agricultural high school in Milan, Italy, where she taught alfalfa production — and she continues to advise young leaders.

“My time as a state officer … that’s when I really noticed, like I was posting at least, you know, three or four times a week of what I was doing,” she said. “I knew that there were FFA members watching that, and so I wanted to communicate how I was representing them. I felt the responsibility of that.”

Today, she channels that educator mindset into content. “Because I come from an ag education background … I feel like that helps me in when I’m creating videos, thinking about teaching to an objective,” she said. “What’s the objective of why I am trying to document us, you know, harvesting this type of grain and taking it to the grain elevator?”

For the next generation, Longhurst’s guidance is simple: Start now, and be mindful.

“To educators … start posting like in college, documenting as if you were an ag teacher now,” she said. “You get to go out to the school farm and learn how to vaccinate swine — like that’s way unique. And so start documenting that now.”

For students, the blue jacket comes with a platform and a responsibility. “Always be in the mindset of, what does this look like as a reflection for the agricultural industry and for me as well,” she said. “If you’re wearing an FFA jacket or not, I still think that you have the opportunity to be an ambassador for agriculture.”

Above all, show the human side. “The fun, like cheesy reels are easy to make,” Longhurst said, “but … if they can share what it is that they’re doing in their ag class, or what they’re doing at National FFA Convention … that’s actually making them connections for their future that they wouldn’t have had the opportunity to do if they were still just at their high school in small town America.”

The little pieces that people don’t always see

Part of Longhurst’s appeal is letting viewers ride along for the tiny innovations and everyday decisions that shape a season. She laughs about her dad proudly remote-controlling irrigation pivots from his phone: “That was a huge thing that was awesome … when we showed people that on my Instagram Stories, people were like, ‘You can do that?’ ”

Even the agronomist has become a recurring character. “He’s always a hit when I highlight him, because he’s just a character,” she said. “People in ag share like, oh my gosh, that’s just like my agronomist. But then people who aren’t are like, this guy comes out to your field and does what, and tells you what to put on?”

That mix, which is technical insight with a neighborly vibe, is the point. “I never want it to just be about, what can I share online to get likes?” Longhurst said. “How is this making a connection to people that aren’t in agriculture?”

Right now, Longhurst splits her time between helping on the family farm and running social media for her local school district. Teaching is still on the table — as long as she can stay close to home. “I have a couple ag programs that, if there was a teaching job that opened up tomorrow, that I would probably apply,” she said. “But [I’m] wanting to stay close to our family farm as well.”

In the meantime, she’ll keep posting, not to perform, but to document. “I think that’s pretty unique about social media,” she said. “The storytelling that gets to happen through the eyes of so many different types of people.”

Heidi Crnkovic, is the Associate Editor for AGDAILY. She is a New Mexico native with deep-seated roots in the Southwest and a passion for all things agriculture.