Ellissa Chatfield, a 2015 Imbler High School graduate, has retuned to teach agriculture at the high school.

IMBLER — Imbler School District has expanded its agriculture program this school year in response to increased student demand and is welcoming one of its own to the faculty as an additional ag teacher and FFA adviser.

Imbler High School graduate Ellissa Chatfield is teaching junior high shop/ag classes, as well as woods, welding, small engines and career technology education, which soon will include electricity and plumbing classes.

She joins JD Cant in one of the elite ag programs in the state of Oregon. As a result of the program’s popularity among the students, “we offer almost double the classes now,” Chatfield said. “JD Cant took on a slightly different role. He lost a class or two, but he also had opportunities to open more classes because I had taken classes off his workload.”

About 95% of the Imbler students run through the ag program at some point, Chatfield said, so there was a demand for more classes and an additional instructor this year.

“We added more career technology education, agriculture and shop classes, and Ellissa is teaching a few of the new ones,” Cant said. “So, we both are teaching ag, and we are both FFA advisers.”

Cant has added in a comprehensive ag and CTE leadership class and has expanded Imbler’s forestry/wildland fire class as well as precision ag.

“The only other responsibility that I took on is helping high school students with post-high school plans,” Cant said. “They are calling it a career mentor/adviser role.”

Cant was Chatfield’s instructor starting in her seventh grade, and he became her mentor during the six years she took ag and FFA at Imbler. During those years, she enjoyed participating in several competitions, including livestock judging, public speaking, and Career Development Days at Oregon State University.

FFA was her passion and where she felt most at home while attending Imbler High, she said. She credited her FFA training for helping her to become a better public speaker, a skill set that she uses every day as a teacher.

“I decided when I was a sophomore that I would be an ag teacher, and I haven’t regretted it one bit.” she said.

Chatfield graduated from Imbler High School in 2015 and earned her associate of science degree at Blue Mountain Community College in Pendleton. Those two years at BMCC were covered by scholarships, she said.

She then attended Oregon State University where she earned her bachelor of general agricultural science in 2019, and her master of agricultural education in 2020 in a one-year accelerated program.

Following her graduation from OSU, she taught at Pilot Rock High School from 2020 to 2024. When she saw an opening to teach agriculture was available at the Imbler School District, she applied.

“It was an unexpected opportunity, but my husband and I knew we wanted to go back to Union County because it’s where we wanted our kids to grow up,” she said.

There is something about coming home to teach that felt right for her.

“My teaching schedules from Pilot Rock to Imbler are almost identical,” Chatfield said, “but my favorite subject to teach is junior high agriculture because they are so willing to do whatever you ask of them.”

Now she has the privilege of being on the Imbler High faculty with Cant, teaching and mentoring ag and FFA students, just as he mentored her.

“I’m really excited to return home, and I look forward to sharing my knowledge and expertise with students over the coming years in Imbler,” she said.

Chatfield lives in Pilot Rock with her husband Bradly Chatfield and daughter, Jay Lee, and she commutes to Imbler High School twice a week. Her leisure pursuits include enjoying her two dogs, four cats, a chinchilla, camping, hiking and reading.