Northern Oklahoma College Livestock Judging Coach Jennifer Bedwell has been named the National Junior College Livestock Judging Coach of the Year.Bedwell, in her third year at NOC, earned the award after leading the NOC Livestock Judging Team to its first Team of the Year recognition after the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo on March 19.Bedwell’s team also had four All-Americans including Anna Hannon, Olivia Gerloff, Kale Campbell, and Cooper Thompson.“I am so blessed to have coached these kids,” Bedwell said. “They are the hardest working kids I’ve seen and the fact that I received an award for their hard work is more a reflection of who they are than who I am. They earned all the accolades and I was just fortunate to be with them.”.Interestingly enough, Bedwell never judged in high school at Fairview, Oklahoma. She came in as an “in-house” judging contestant at Oklahoma State University in the fall of 2016. In the span of a year and three months, with the help of her coaches, she taught herself the evaluation skills and oral reasons format in order to be competitive.In November of 2017 the team from OSU was named the 2017 National Champion Livestock Judging Team and Bedwell was named Fourth High Individual Overall. Upon graduating with her undergrad, she worked as the assistant coach for the 2019 National Champion Livestock Judging Team. She began working at NOC in May of 2020.Just over six years after her first set of oral reasons, Bedwell was named the first ever female to win “Junior College Livestock Judging Coach of the Year.” Along with this honor, Bedwell was the first recorded female coach to win The American Royal, The North American International Livestock Exposition and The National Western.“I can’t imagine where I would be had I not given that first set of reasons and turned in that first judging card in practice, but my life has forever been changed,” she said.“It is amazing what Jennifer has achieved in such a short period of time,” said NOC President Clark Harris. “From the very beginning, I could see the drive that she has to compete at a high level. A drive that she has instilled into her team. Coach Bedwell is an excellent mentor to her team and has been able to shape her team through work. That demanding work probably included listening to thousands of sets of reasons. This work has ...
