When I'm not farming (which in the winter is most of the time) I work at the Center for Sustainable Agriculture at UVM as the Local Food Program Coordinator. I've been here since January 2009, and am now finally starting to feel settled in my role. Get ready for some acronyms, because I'm about to tell you about some very cool programming! Part of my job is working with the Expanded Food and Nutrition Education Program (EFNEP) and the Vermont Campaign to End Childhood Hunger. Our collaborative project du jour is integrating local food purchasing and education into the Cooking For Life Program. Cooking For Life is a 10 year old program that focuses on providing nutrition and food safety education to low income Vermonters, specifically those that are enrolled in federal food assistance programs (like WIC and 3SquaresVT.) Basically, the gist is that each class series (and there are many, many series around the state every year!) lasts for 6 weeks. During each series participants do a nutrition lesson, a food budgeting or meal planning lesson, and some cooking with a volunteer chef. At the end of each class, the participants get to bring home a grocery bag full of food so that they can recreate the recipes that they made in class for their families.
The CFL/Local Food Pilot is designed to introduce some new curriculum (like container gardening, home composting, using food assistance benefits at farmers' markets, etc.)as well foster relationships between the class participants and an area farmer. During the series we'll purchase at least one type of vegetable or fruit a week from the partner farm and have at least one farm field trip or in class visit from the farmer. We'll also be hosting 4 local food celebration community dinners that give class participants, chefs, farmers, their friends and families a chance to get together outside of the classroom setting to show off their fabulous cooking skills and enjoy each other's company. You can find our more on our website at http://www.uvm.edu/~susagctr/?Page=Cookingforlife.html
I love my job!
