Long before she graduated from Mizzou, Kate Thompson had a close connection to CAFNR. Her grandfather, G.B. Thompson, taught beef cattle nutrition classes in CAFNR in the 1960s, and shared his love of Mizzou with his grandchildren.

“Papa and Nana would take my siblings and me to Mizzou functions at the Reynolds Alumni Center and we had all manner of fun attending those parties as kids,” said Thompson. “They would always have a model train and Christmas village set up around the holidays, which we could stare at for hours. I even remember having a nerf war on that grand staircase.

“They were very covert about converting us away from our parents’ alma maters (Texas A&M and Oklahoma State). By the time I reached high school, my top three choices, naturally, were Texas A&M, Oklahoma State and Mizzou. When I was selected as a Missouri State FFA Officer, the deal was sealed as part of the contract was that I must attend college in-state.”

Thompson chose agribusiness management as her degree because of her understanding of numbers and close connection to the agricultural industry, but also explored other CAFNR opportunities to round out her education. She served as president of the National Agri-Marketing Association, which took home the national championship for the student marketing competition in 2022, and she worked as the CAFNR videographer during her time as a student.

While Thompson did not believe she wanted a corporate job, she became interested in commodity trading after taking a speculative futures class with Marty Foreman, and, after hearing from fellow CAFNR alumnus Kody Raines, a wheat midss trader with the The Andersons, found that the company was a great fit for her. She now works as western corn merchant in the with the company.

Thompson believes that all her CAFNR experiences, both inside and outside the classroom, led her to career success post-graduation.

“No day is the same in the grain business; there’s always a call you don’t expect and a new problem to solve,” said Thompson. “I love the fast-paced environment and the energy of the people in the industry. Most of all, I love meeting my customers and learning about their operations.

“There is so much meaning and history in agriculture and I’m so thankful to be involved in the way that I am. CAFNR prepared me with the soft skills to reach out to farmers, make an introduction, give them a bid, plan out when to haul, coordinate trucks and keep track of accounting throughout the whole process. Those kinds of entrepreneurial skills are the biggest asset to my education, which is why I can’t stress enough to current students how valuable it is to use experiences to apply your education. Get a job, join a club, find a topic to research or get involved in making something your own outside of the classroom.”