Seed Farm Interns during the Inaugural Year (2022). Photo by Barron Bixler
Summer Internship Program on Racial, Indigenous, and Environmental Justice through Seeds
Faculty Lead: Tessa Lowinske Desmond
Collaborating Partners: RISE Fellowship (Recognizing Inequities, Standing for Equality), Native Roots Farm Foundation, Ujamaa Cooperative Farming Alliance, The Utopian Seed Project
The Seed Farm is staffed by students all year. During the summer, interns from various programs across campus come together to plant and tend the crops. During the school year, The Seed Farm serves as a home base for the Food Justice Cohort of the Service Focus Program hosted by the Pace Center for Civic Engagement. Along the way, students in select classes and programs also volunteer for short durations.
Interns working at The Seed Farm are expected to develop understandings of historical contexts for the seeds that we work with, which include rare, culturally-meaningful varieties from African, Native American, and other global diasporas. Through readings, films, discussions, and teachings from our community partners, interns at The Seed Farm learn about the histories, growing practices, and meaning of seeds in their cultural contexts.
Interns at The Seed Farm have been supported by many campus partners including the Derian Internship Program supported by the Program for Community-Engaged Scholarship, the RISE Fellowship hosted by the Pace Center, and through High Meadows Environmental Institute internships hosted by the Conway and Rubenstein labs. In summer 2024, The Seed Farm will be offering a co-curricular program on Racial, Indigenous, and Environmental Justice through Seeds supported by the RISE Fellowship Program. The program will include interns based at The Seed Farm as well as interns based on-site with our collaborators. Students working at Native Roots Farm Foundation, The Seed Farm, The Utopian Seed Project, and the Ujamaa Cooperative Farming Alliance will participate in weekly cohort meetings to learn, share, and reflect on their experiences together through the lens of racial, indigenous, and environmental justice.