St. Cloud Conference on Deck to Inspire Women in Agriculture

ST. CLOUD -- Women who are looking to further their careers in agriculture have the chance to, through a University of Minnesota Extension event in St. Cloud.

The third annual Women in Ag Network Conference will be Thursday at the Holiday Inn and Suites.

This year's theme is "overcoming adversity." Katie Pinke is the publisher of AgWeek and blogger of The Pinke Post. She will be the keynote speaker at the conference. Pinke's presentation is going to be about accepting interruptions in life and how to move forward after those interruptions.  She says she likes to start out the conversation by sharing her family's history.

"My great-great-grandmother who was an immigrant from Norway and share that story. When she had her seventh child, in her house, her husband died. I can look back and think my life might be tough but I know my ancestors went through much greater tragedies and interruptions in their agricultural life than I have ever experienced."

Pinke says her great-great-grandmother then became her family's first female farmer. After talking about her roots, Pinke says she likes to talk about some of her personal interruptions in life that have affected her agriculture career.

"Little interruptions as well as big interruptions in my life. They can come through my career, I've had different changes in my career. I was a single mom at age 18, so I can look back, now I have a 20-year-old son, but I can look back to those interruptions and share strategies I've learned and how I've grown from those."

To wrap up the event, Pinke will be a part of a panel discussion on overcoming adversity, through health challenges, a weather event, a farm transition and other farm challenges.

Registration for the conference begins at 8:45 a.m. and the event runs from 9:15 a.m. - 3:30 p.m.