NEWS April 23, 2007
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE CONTACT: Jerome Saintjones
Animal Science Students Win Silver Award in the Dairy Challenge
Huntsville, Ala. ---- The Alabama A&M University animal science team recently brought home a silver medal from the 6th Annual North American Intercollegiate Dairy Challenge (NAIDC) held in Sioux Falls, S.D. The two-day event was hosted by South Dakota State University and Iowa State University, and a total of 116 students from 29 universities with the top dairy programs in North America participated in the event.
Charvais Bogan, Durandel Ford, James Miller and William Roberson composed the AAMU team, coached by Gamal AbdRahim, assistant professor in the Department of Food and Animal Sciences.
AAMU and six universities, including top-ranked teams Virginia Tech University and Guelph University were assigned to Division 4, the strongest bracket in the event. Other teams competed in Division 4 were: University of Minnesota, University of Illinois, University of Wisconsin-River Falls, and University of Vermont. Ruby, home to 4,500 milking dairy cows; 3,500 of them are milking cows, was designated as AAMU bracket’s farm. For that bracket, Virginia Tech University and University of Guelph were the winners of the platinum and gold awards respectively.
During the contest, the AAMU team had approximately two hours to view the dairy, six hours to view the data, and 4 hours to prepare the presentation. On the second day, team members presented their findings to a panel of four judges who have extensive experience in dairy management. That evening, the AAMU team attended an awards banquet.
AbdRahim said the exceptional performance of AAMU students at the event is an “outcome of the support” provided to it by the department and by the department chair, Lloyd Walker. “The students managed to effectively utilize the skills they developed during their stay at AAMU; they were very impressive,” he added.
In addition to competing in the event, the students had the opportunity to network with leaders in the dairy industry, including corporations’ representatives, and faculty. AbdRahim noted that national events, such as the NAIDC, better exposed AAMU students to potential employees, and to universities’ recruiters.
For more information on the event contact Dr. Gamal AbdRahim on (256) 372-4164, or visit the NAIDC website:
http://www.dairychallenge.org/default.asp ###
PHOTO CAPTION:
Seated: Charvais Bogen and Gamal AbdRahim. Standing: James Miller, William Roberson and Durandel Ford.
Posted By: Jehan Bunch
Wednesday, April 25th 2007 at 12:26PM
You can also
click
here to view all posts by this author...
