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Dear Members,
Feedback, growth, and connection is in the air!
We’re seeking your voice to inform several of our 2023 offerings. Let us know how you’re adapting your programs to meet growing demand, what programs you want to hear from as part of our Youth Entrepreneurship Series, and what your favorite training resources are for onboarding new education staff! We’re also looking for help facilitating the 2023 Summer Camp Learning Community. This group typically meets February through May, as a biweekly drop-in space for those offering camp on their farms. If you want to co-facilitate, please email me!
Sending you warm wishes for an abundant season ahead. See you in the new year!
Vera Simon-Nobes
FBEN Coordinator
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Seeking Input on Two Upcoming Panels
Managing Growth and Demand: Have you been seeing growing demand for your farm-based programs? How have you been adjusting your programming to meet demand? We want to hear from you! We’re putting together a virtual panel discussion for FBEN members to hear from others who are thinking through these (and other) questions:
- How are you growing your program in a way that is sustainable for your people and organization, and responsive to the community's hopes?
- How do you onboard new educators so you are approaching your programming with common goals and values while leaving space for their individuality and creativity?
- How are you discovering what your community is seeking, and what strengths they bring to your partnerships?
If you’re thinking about these questions and others, and you’d be willing to share your thoughts during a virtual panel, please get in touch.
Training Newly Hired Farm-Based Educators: When you bring a new person on board at your farm or organization, what type of training or onboarding do they go through? We’re putting together a virtual panel discussion to hear perspectives and favorite tools for staff training. Contact me if you’d like to participate in the panel, or share a written resource related to the topic of training.
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Advocacy Stories: Stories of Self with Phoebe Gooding
Dec. 15, 6pm (Online): Stories are a powerful advocacy tool. They can change people’s hearts and minds. It’s easy to talk about policies or laws in significant numbers, but personal stories make these policy implications not just about numbers but about real people. Particularly when you are trying to get someone—like a Member of Congress—to change their mind on a piece of legislation, it can be powerful to have someone from their district or state share their story about how a bill would impact their life. Join this workshop led by Phoebe Gooding, the Program and Organizing Director for Toxic Free NC, leader of Just and Sustainable Agriculture program, and an FBEN member. As a woman of color farmer, she passionately advocates for policies to support small, sustainable farmers as solutions that will move us away from our industrial agriculture system, the injustices within it, and towards our toxic free future. As the 2023 Farm Bill approaches, Phoebe sees this as the current opportunity to make sure our legislators hear loud and clear what the people want. Register now.
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Workshop Series:
Youth Entrepreneurship in the Farm and Garden
Late Winter: What are the ins and outs of farm and garden entrepreneurship programs and who is running them? This workshop series, hosted by City Blossoms and the Farm-Based Education Network, will explore how young people can start, manage, and grow their own environmentally-driven businesses that are based in the garden or farm. This series is for you if you’re supporting a youth-run entrepreneurship program (whether you're just starting out or have been running a program for years).
We'll launch the series late winter, but before we set dates, we need your input! If you're interested in participating, help us design the series by filling out the survey by December 20, 2022.
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Become a Life Lab-Certified School Garden Educator
Starting Jan. 23: Become a confident and knowledgeable garden educator who inspires a love of learning, an appreciation of healthy food, and a connection to nature in every child through garden-based education! Participants will learn how to use a garden to breathe life into standards-based lessons based on Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) and Common Core Language Arts and Math. Classes start Jan. 23. Register now!
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This fall, Meagan from Chavitos Nature School in Pullayup, WA wrote looking to connect with someone about farm safety and ideas of how to best develop their location for their K-6 school. She's seeking a mentor to help her grow and address challenges as they arise. Are you interested in connecting with her? Please contact Vera or reach out to her directly: meagchavitos@gmail.com | | | | |
The USDA-FNS Farm to School Grant application window is open through January 6, 2023. The USDA awards grants annually to help connect students to the sources of their food through education, taste tests, school gardens, field trips, and local food sourcing for school meals. Grantees may include schools and districts, Indian Tribal Organizations, agricultural producers or groups of agricultural producers, nonprofit entities, and state and local agencies. Designed to increase the availability of local foods in schools, grants can launch new farm to school programs or expand existing efforts. Learn more through the program fact sheet or the USDA website. | |
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Are you applying for a 2023 USDA Farm to School Grant and in need of support? Have you applied in the past and are willing to offer guidance? The Kids Garden Community is hosting two Zoom sessions to tackle application questions and offer peer support. Sign up for one or both sessions:
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Exciting openings from members and partners:
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Seasonal Outdoor Instructor, Slide Ranch, Muir Beach, CA
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Communications Manager, Soul Fire Farm, Petersburg, NY
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Environmental/Sustainable Farm Educator, Hart to Hart Farm Day Camp, Albion, ME
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Stewardship Associate, Pearlstone Center, Reisterstown, MD
Are you hiring? Post a job on FBEN's forum.
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BLOG
Community Care Through Four Programs in Massachusetts
Farm-Based Education Network Learning Journeys provide windows into farm-based education programs and an opportunity for exchange. On September 30 to October 1, FBEN led a tour through Western Massachusetts to visit four programs, all of which offer rich connections between people and land through agriculture. We hope you’ll come along on this photographic learning journey, consider the reflection questions we offer after each "visit,” and gather insights of your own.
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In this seventh-grade humanities lesson, students make corn tortillas, beans, roasted squash, and cabbage slaw. They learn about the different agricultural techniques utilized by the Maya, Aztec, and Inca civilizations, including companion-planting corn, beans, and squash.
Get the recipe and lesson from Edible Schoolyard Project.
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The Vermont Farm to School Network launched "This Farm Feeds Vermont Kids" project, where Vermonters shared their stories about how their farmer-school partnership is impacting their school communities!
Read about Laura Butler’s home-based childcare program and Blue Heron Farm’s work together, and other stories from the field (and cafeteria!).
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Farming collaboratively is not a new idea. Modern challenges, such as the lack of affordable land, are inviting people to think creatively about “collaborative,” “cooperative,” or “collective” farming. This new tool from Land For Good and Accessing Land Together explores how you can find and use land in a group with other farmers.
Get the resource.
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The Farm-Based Education Network (FBEN) is a free member network established to strengthen and support the work of educators, farmers, and community leaders who provide access and experiences on working farms. Our mission is to inspire, nurture, and promote farm-based education. The FBEN is a project administered by Shelburne Farms and supported by regional groups, advisers, and founding partners. |
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