Our Crowdfunding Groups
Thank you for visiting, this crowdfunding campaign has closed.
Please visit the homepage to find another WWU student priority you want to support or you can visit www.wwu.edu/give to make a gift to any area of WWU including this one!
Why Support this program today?
Gifts enhance the already existing food and gardening programs at Western Washington University. Donations will be used to begin gardens across campus, as well as to develop the Arntzen garden as both an annual and permaculture growing site.
Most importantly, gifts will support food/farming field trips, new courses, and student presentations at national conferences. Gifts also will support students conducting farmer interviews as part of the Farm Resilience Project. Videotaped interviews will be incorporated into an interactive map available to the public.
About:
The Sustainable Food & Farm Studies Program at the College of the Environment has a long and rich history—beginning in the 1970s with Professor Ernst Gayden and his human ecology classes. Gigi Berardi took over some of those studies in 1995 and, together with students from across campus, is growing the program. There are however, some resource needs—from shovels and other gardening tools to funding for new sustainable agriculture classes.
Excursions (Field Trips). Food and farm learning is most effective when it is experienced. Your donation can fund field trips that contribute enormously to student learning—a hallmark of study at the College of the Environment. Excursion in the San Juans found here in the photo above.
Kale seed saving practica.
Wetlands delineation and farm planning practica.
Student research. Students undertake research in the campus gardens and present the results of their work at national-level conferences. Some of the research involves the Resilient Farm Project at CENV—an ambitious project originally funded by the United States Department of Agriculture.
National funding ended in 2012, at which point the work was funded by smaller grants. The money allowed for the construction of an interactive map for Whatcom County. Unfortunately, most of the data set was lost in transferring it to a different hosting platform. The interactive site is now hosted at Western, but needs to be rebuilt. Your donation for the “farm resilience interviews” funds students to interview farmers for reconstruction of the map.
It allows us to continue our critically-important partnerships with farmers, such as here:
Students work together with berry farmer Randy Hancoop on integrated pest management techniques.
Garden construction. Constructing and maintaining vegetable and seed gardens advances food security and resilience across campus.
New courses. New courses in food and farm studies are the lifeline for innovative thinking and problem-solving. Just $1400 funds a new instructor, a new course at the College of the Environment. Such courses address gaps in faculty-student learning-teaching.
Please consider a donation to help support offset the cost of our strong Sustainable Food & Farm Studies Program at CENV! There is no doubt the students benefit mightily from it.
Thank you!
A gift of $25 provides funding for purchase of much-needed tools for the maintenance of the Arntzen gardens.
A gift of $50 provides funding for three bales of hay or straw as mulch for the Arntzen gardens.
A gift of $65 provides funding for two students to interview a farmer and upload the content onto an interactive map as part of the Farm Resilience Project.
A gift of $75 provides funding for the purchase of seeds and starts for the gardens on campus.
A gift of $100 provides funding for four students to participate in a county-wide field trip.
A gift of $350 provides funding for a student to travel and register for a national food and farming conference in order to present his/her research.
A generous gift of $1400 provides funding for a new one-credit course on sustainable foods and farming at Western. The gift also supports existing courses that are only occasionally taught.
