Past Interns

Ryan Albers
Agronomy Sales Intern

          Ryan Albers is from Iowa and is currently an Ag Studies student. Ryan accepted an internship with FC as a Sales Intern in Bayard. He said he decided to take the internship because he had heard that FC is a good company to work for and because he thought it would be a good experience. Ryan learned about scouting fields for weeds and plant diseases. He also learned a lot about assisting customers with their needs. Ryan really enjoyed the summer intern trip and the Income/Outcome training.  
          “FC really offers something for everyone, especially the ability to start at any level and have opportunities for career advancement,” Ryan stated.

Aaron Anderson
FC 101 Intern

   I’m Aaron Anderson from Alleman, IA. I’m attending Iowa State Univer­sity and studying Agricultural Systems Technology. This summer, I was an FC 101 Intern located out of Ames, IA.
   If I was to list everything I learned, I’d be writing forever.  A few of the high­lights of my experience were strengthening my commu­nication skills, learning the ins and outs of the co­operative system, and learning how each different department within FC works and what they do.
   I felt the interns were treated with a great amount of respect and given a good amount of responsibil­ity. I really enjoyed the relationships that I made with employees and with other interns and felt that the internship was a great learning experience and a great networking tool.

Matt Balek
Agronomy Sales Intern

          Matt Balek was FC’s Agronomy Sales Intern at the FC-Hampton location this summer.  Matt is from a small farm in Iowa and he is majoring in Agricultural Business and Economics. Matt chose to intern with FC this past summer because he had heard good things about FC’s program from students and was sold on what FC had to offer after seeing them at a career fair. Matt said the most important thing he learned this summer is how the cooperative operates as a whole, from operations to application, and from the budgeting process to sales.  More specifically, during his sales internship he learned an endless amount of information about weeds, pests, crop diseases, chemistry, seed varieties, plant populations, fertilizers, and how it all works together to raise the ideal crop. Matt also learned how to interact with the farmer and how to provide them with the best-quality service possible. 
          About the overall experience, Matt says, “One thing that surprised me about FC is the amount of trust they have in their interns; they let us see things that a lot of companies wouldn’t let interns see, and I think that is very eye opening.  Lastly, I doubt you could ever find a better group of people to work with than at FC.  Everyone loves their job, is great at what they do, and most importantly, has a great time doing it.  Thanks for the great experience!”

Barry Buehler
Operations Intern

          Barry Buehler is from Iowa and is majoring in Ag Studies.  This summer, Barry was the Operations Intern at the Ida Grove and Yetter locations.  He decided to do an internship with FC this summer because, living on a farm and having done business with FC, he thought it would be a good experience to see what all goes on behind the scenes and how everything works.  Barry learned a lot this summer about agronomy, grain handling, and many other aspects of running a business.  Some of the major things he learned were how to mix and load dry fertilizer, the whole process from making work orders to spraying the field, how important maintenance is, the importance of grain segregation, and how to grade grain.  The highlight of Barry’s summer with FC was the intern trip to Omaha and visiting Union Pacific Railroad and AGP.  Barry said, “FC has a great internship program and working with them this summer has been a great experience.”

Aaron Colgin
Feed Operations Intern

          Aaron Colgin is from Kansas and was FC’s Feed Operations Intern based out of FC’s Earlham Feed Mill location. Aaron selected FC for an internship after talking with previous interns about their great experiences. Aaron said the experience he gained this summer cannot be replaced by any amount of classroom time, “The openness of the company and the willingness of the staff to share information is great.”
          Throughout the summer, Aaron was exposed to everything he was interested in learning about the feed department. He enjoyed getting to know everyone involved in the company and being able to gain experience in this business. 

 

Jason Dubberke
Operations Intern

           Jason Dubberke grew up in Iowa and is currently an Agricultural Business student.  Jason said he considered FC’s internship program this summer because of its reputation among past interns who had spoken highly of the program. After researching it a bit more, he decided it would be a good fit for him based on his skills and education. 
           Jason said he learned a lot interning at FC - learning daily grain and agronomy operations from working at the locations; gaining insight on how FC makes decisions by sitting in at meetings; and overall, observing how everyone works together to run FC effectively. 
          What surprised him about FC is how hard the company works to really make the internship experience as beneficial as possible.  “Everyone is always willing to answer your questions and explain things thoroughly.  They make sure you learn as much as you are able, and experience as many different aspects of the company as you can,” Jason stated after being asked about his internship.
          One of his highlights this summer was going on the intern trip to Omaha, Nebraska.  Interns had the opportunity to tour Union Pacific’s headquarters and their dispatching bunker where they manage and dispatch all of their trains across the entire western part of the US. 
          “My internship was fun and it was a very productive summer. It’s hard to put a value on all the opportunities and experiences I had while working at FC,” Jason concluded.

 

Ronley King
Agronomy Research Intern

          Ronley King is from Iowa is currently studying Agriculture Education.  This summer Ronley was working as an Agronomy Market and Research Interns at FC’s Farnhamville location.  He first sought out FC for an internship because of its familiarity to him - his family has done business with FC for some time now, and he knew there were great people that worked for FC and he wanted the opportunity to learn from them.  His summer has been very educational. Through working with test plots and with his supervisors, Ronley gained experience in crop scouting, plant hybrid placement, weed and disease identification, fertilizer requirements, and many other areas of agronomy. 
          Ronley was both surprised and impressed by how customer-driven this FC is. “I learned that being a cooperative, everything that FC does goes back to the best interest of the farmers who own the company. That was impressive to me.”  Ronley said the highlight of his summer was getting to meet all of the different people that make this company run.  He also appreciated the fact that he had the opportunity to network with other agronomists as well as senior staff members - all of which has been very helpful and educational.

Joel Pudenz
FC 101 Intern

          Joel Pudenz is currently studying Agriculture Business, Economics, and International Agriculture. Joel was the FC 101 Intern based out of the Farnhamville location. Joel said this summer was definitely a great experience at FC. He said he originally chose FC for his internship because he knew that he would have a great experience learning while working. 
         As the FC 101 Intern, Joel got to work in the Grain, Feed, Agronomy Sales and Operations departments. Joel said he knew very little about scouting fields before this summer. Through working with a FC Field Sales Agronomist, he was able to learn about scouting fields and applying that knowledge in order to assist area farmers.

           In seeing so much of the company, Joel was surprised by how well FC treats the people they work with on a daily basis. As he moved through the various departments, Joel had the chance to work with a lot of different people. The most enjoyable part of his internship was being able to contribute to the success of FC while working alongside and building working relationships with many different types of people. “I am very pleased with my decision to work for FC and would encourage anyone to consider FC’s internship program,” he says.

Sam Pudenz
FC 101 Intern

Sam is majoring in Agricultural Business. Sam worked as the FC 101 intern out of the Bayard office during his internship. When asked about what surprised him the most he said, “The thing that most surprised me about FC is how safety-conscious everyone is when they are doing day to day work. I’ve also noticed how everyone always has coffee together in the morning before they get started just to shoot the breeze and get a general feel for what is going on that day. Both aspects seem to help keep things underway very well in morale and safety.”  Sam’s summer mentor was Chris Pearson and his supervisor was Mark Drake. Sam was involved in loading grain trains headed to an ethanol plant in California, tendering for the applicators, doing inventory, performing maintenance on applicators for post-application as well as numerous other duties.

Eric Schultz
Agronomy Market & Research Intern

          Eric Schultz was the Agronomy Research and Marketing Intern at FC’s Farnhamville location. Eric selected FC for his summer internship because he has had great experiences with FC in the past and FC has treated him well. He enjoyed the people that he worked with and he learned a lot from them. 
         This summer, Eric had the opportunity to work with test plots. He had not had much experience with plots prior to his internship and learned the importance of how much work goes into having a good plot. Eric also learned about new products and practices that are not commonly seen in large scale operations yet and he got an opportunity to show growers these new technologies and ideas to help them better their operation. It is no surprise that the highlight of his summer was the test plot tours. “I enjoyed being able to talk with the growers and presenters and show off the hard work that we had been doing to keep the plot in good condition and the viable and informational data that was collected,” he said of the experience. 
         The thing that surprised Eric the most about FC is the size of the company. “Not only is it the growing number of locations that FC has, it also surprised me how much business FC does all across Iowa.”

Kiley Swanson
FC 101 Intern

   I am currently attend Iowa State University. This summer I was the FC 101 Intern out of Farnhamville. As a 101 Intern you are never in the same place for long and constantly moving in order to see all of the different departments. I learned a lot about the company and what it has to offer. I got a hands-on look at what each department does and how they operate on a daily basis.
   Prior to this internship I didn’t even realize FC had a feed department, so it was surprising to see how it all worked. I really enjoyed getting the op­portunity to help load a train in Farnhamville while I was in the grain department. I had never seen the process before and what all it entailed.

Brandon Van Kerrebroeck
Operations Intern

   I’m from Illinois and attending Iowa State University. I worked this summer as an Operations Intern at the FC-Bondurant loca­tion and helped out at all of the FC Region 6 locations.
   Every day at FC was different for me. At the beginning of my internship, I had the opportunity to express what I was interested in doing for the summer. They were able to come up with a set of goals for me that included my suggestions as well as theirs. Because of that flexibility, I got more out of the experience. I have learned many new things in the agronomy department. I have also learned the day to day business that goes on at the coop­erative.  I found that I really enjoyed being more involved in the agronomy department and I can’t put a price on all the hands on experience and knowledge I gained.