Get involved with these organizations and others:
“Even on this small scale, we were pulling out dozens and dozens of pounds of fresh, beautiful food,” Horne says, speaking of his time working with FoodCorps. “It made me really want to learn how to grow food on a master level.” That’s when Horne immersed himself in a yearlong agriculture program at The Farm School, a nonprofit training organization based on a 100-acre farm in Athol, Massachusetts. Through the program, Horne also learned another important skill: how to write a business plan to start a farm of his own, which he did later in 2018. Today, Horne Family Farms provides the kind of education around agriculture that the farmer would have appreciated as a kid himself. “I feel this tremendous pull in that direction,” Horne says of educating local children about fresh produce. “Not only because it’s where I came from, but because I know a lot of these kids have no backyard or green space whatsoever. Being able to connect them to the land in any way has always been super important to me.” In the way Berkeley has provided an encouraging home base for The Edible Schoolyard Project over the years, Horne
says that Lowell is also welcoming these types of school agriculture programs. “It’s a small mill town that’s very densely populated and very culturally diverse,” he says of the area. “We have this vibrant community with a huge public school system, and between here and Boston and all these small cities in between, there’s a lot going on in terms of school gardens. There’s a lot of good stuff happening.” Horne says community donations and grants from the local government help support Mill City Grows, FoodCorps, and other nonprofits. The area also recently incorporated the innovative “Harvest of the Month” initiative, developed by the nonprofit organization Massachusetts Farm to School, which serves locally grown fruits and vegetables to the area’s public schools. Grassroots community support is key when it comes to measuring the success of these types of programs as well. “In pretty much any school garden I’ve ever planted, any lesson I’ve ever done, kids are naturally really excited,” Horne says. “And I think that’s partly because they hear stories from parents or grandparents, who still want to be a part of gardening or farming in some way. I see these kids start to light up a little bit in terms of understanding and grasping where things are coming from.”
cross the country, Christopher Horne provides organic produce and school
gardening programs from his organic farm, Horne Family Farms, in Londonderry, New Hampshire. From his half-acre plot of land, just over a half-hour drive from Lowell, Massachusetts, Horne serves the Lowell Public Schools system (which the farmer once attended himself), and hosts visits for local students so they can learn about agriculture. (The farm also supplies a number of restaurants in the area.) Horne is passionate about his work, as someone who was born and raised in an urban part of Lowell, about an hour’s drive northwest of Boston, without much access to nature. “We never even had a backyard growing up,” he tells The Rooted Journal of his family home. “I had never even been around a raised garden bed before I was 19 or 20.” But college lit a fuse in Horne, and, during his time at UMass Lowell, he developed a keen interest in agriculture. He credits it to his youthful idealism and his interests lying at the “intersection of economics, environmentalism, and philosophy,” all of which he was studying at the time. Outside of classes, he began to get involved with Mill City Grows, a local food- justice organization that maintains a network of community and school gardens. But just as Horne was finding his passion in farming, things at home took a turn. “During that same time, both my parents had a serious heart attack and a serious stroke within a 10-month period,” he says. “All those things came together and culminated in a 20-year- old existential moment of, ‘Okay, what is this all really about?’” His parents’ health scares only solidified Horne’s belief in fresh, local food as a healing force. After graduating and continuing to volunteer with Mill City Grows for a few years, he began to work for FoodCorps, a national organization that brings healthy food education and gardening lessons to children in public schools.
THE EDIBLE SCHOOLYARD PROJECT edibleschoolyard.org
For close to 30 years, Alice Waters’ nonprofit organization has been teaching “edible education” to kids through gardening, cooking, and providing fresh produce to cafeterias. Volunteers lead interactive experiences that address issues like climate change, food inequality, and public health.
FOODCORPS foodcorps.org
FoodCorps works with public schools and communities to improve kids’ health by supplying nutritious food and educational experiences. Educators provide gardening lessons, host taste tests, and advocate for food-justice policy change.
SLOW FOOD USA slowfoodusa.org
Many wonder if kids are growing disconnected from the natural world during a time when a great deal of value is placed on technology and innovation, not harvesting greens from a garden bed. To Horne, though, the idea that kids aren’t interested in nature couldn’t be further from reality. “You could easily cast a stereotype of kids not even wanting to get their hands dirty, but in my experience, it’s just the opposite,” he says. “I have photos with a group of students around a raised [garden] bed, and we’re all just smelling the soil, because it was this fresh compost that just dropped, and I was telling them about all the living organisms in the soil and how that makes us happy and releases dopamine. The kids are just cracking up laughing at it, because they all have this big fistful of soil and are shoving it in their faces.” The farmer adds that “the food part” doesn’t have to be center stage for experiences like these for kids to make them meaningful. Rather, he says, “It’s having the experience of putting your hands on something real.”
Slow Food USA runs a series of programs across the U.S. with the aim of “dismantling oppressive food systems to achieve good, clean, and fair food for all.” Through its School Garden Network, the organization works to help kids develop farming and cooking skills in their schools.
KIDSGARDENING kidsgardening.org
With free educational resources and grant funding for teachers, KidsGardening supports educators and caregivers by giving them the tools they need to provide gardening lessons to kids.
NEWMAN’S OWN FOUNDATION newmansown.org
With a focus on food education and healthy school meals, as well as Indigenous food justice, the Newman’s Own Foundation partners with programs that make nutritious fare available to kids. It also supports organizations working to nourish Indigenous children through food and culture.
4-H 4-h.org
As America’s largest youth development organization, 4-H hosts a series of programs focused on teaching kids about agriculture, health, science, and civic engagement. Its network consists of approximately 500,000 volunteers and 3,500 mentors who work with close to 6 million children nationwide.
70
71
ISSUE 01
Made with FlippingBook - professional solution for displaying marketing and sales documents online