It could be said that the Fresno County Farm Bureau has kept it all in the family for many years.

Debbie Jacobsen became its first female board president in 2002, but she wasn't the first in her family to preside over the grass roots organization. Her father, Don Laub, was board president from 1986 to 1988. Debbie's husband, Ray Jacobsen was on the county Farm Bureau's board the year their son, Ryan Jacobsen was born.

Ryan became chief executive of the county Farm Bureau in 2006 after serving as the organization's membership coordinator and government affairs director.

Debbie Jacobsen was recently honored by the California Farm Bureau Federation for her distinguished service to California agriculture. A third-generation farmer from Fresno County, she and her husband farm wine, raisin, and table grapes in Fresno County.

Outside of farming with her family, Jacobsen spent much of her time in ag education. This includes time spent volunteering with California Agriculture in the Classroom and a several years serving with the ag booster's club at Washington Union High School in Fresno. That's not all.

Jacobsen previously served on the Big Fresno Fair board. Rather than seek the gubernatorial reappointment to the Big Fresno Fair, she resigned at the end of her term in early 2020 and went to work with the Friends of the Big Fresno Fair, a non-profit foundation.

Work with Farm Bureau

Jacobsen's work with Farm Bureau and agricultural issues began decades ago, when meeting rooms were dominated by men. That dynamic continues to change as more women continue to be elected to county Farm Bureau boards and the California Farm Bureau Federation board.

The state Farm Bureau award Jacobsen received honors her for her work across the state, including ag education, which began during her father's tenure on the Fresno County board. That interest drew her to the early days of the California Foundation for Agriculture in the Classroom, a nonprofit organization that promotes ag education in public schools.

"As a family we believed that we had the ability to share our story and could bring schools out to the farm," she said.

From that Jacobsen's family adopted a classroom in Los Angeles County. "We started writing to this classroom," she said. That snowballed into communications between them and the school. Over time the Jacobsen family visited the school, then invited the classroom to Fresno where Jacobsen's father hosted a tour of two classes from the Los Angeles school at his Fresno County farm.

The visits continued. One year the Los Angeles students visited the Big Fresno Fair, where they got to see the livestock and farming exhibits and stayed overnight at the Fresno Farm Bureau office. After visiting the county fair exhibits, students were bused to a local dairy farm and a food processing facility in Kerman where they learned about food production.

'We changed their mindset'

"Not only did we help change that classroom, but we changed their mindset of what agriculture was, and about all the people that came with it," she said.

She continued: "So dad felt, as we all did, that this was something we were passionate about. You can relate to a child so easily and they ask the most innocent of questions. This class in LA asked great questions.

"What I loved about it was how the teacher put butcher paper on the wall. Anytime during their lessons on agriculture, kids could ask questions and she'd write them on the wall. Here in the Valley when we did these programs, we knew we might have a classroom with a lot of farm workers' children, so we got to focus on the importance of what their family does."

Jacobsen continues to work with the Friends of the Big Fresno Fair. She was previously honored as the Fresno Chamber of Commerce's agriculturalist of the year for her contributions to the Fresno farming community.