CATALYZING POSITIVE CHANGE IN THE FOOD SYSTEM
We grow cover crop such as this buckwheat to feed and restore our soil. This is the second year of a long-term crop rotation that puts a quarter of our cultivated acreage into cover crop in order to improve drainage, enhance and diversify our soil’s microbiome, reduce erosion, and increase habitat for beneficial insects, all while providing research opportunities for students.
Hello Friends,
This year, we ’ ve been able to activate a long-held vision. With increased support from Duke’s Office of Climate and Sustainability, we ’ ve evolved away from a CSA model to focus entirely on community food security. Our CSA program provided critical funding, a rich teaching tool for our student field crew and connections to wonderful colleagues and neighbors for thirteen seasons. We’re now able to offer our food to those with less access to nutritionally-dense foods and direct former CSA members to other regenerative growers locally, moving into truer alignment with our mission to catalyze positive change in the food system.
Giving away over 25,000 lbs. of produce in a meaningful way is not easy! We could not have embarked on this without the years – and in some cases decades – of on-the-ground efforts of our community partners. It’s an honor to be able to contribute to this work.
Our “train-the-trainers” theory of change was really put to the test this season – and passed with flying colors. Taking what they had learned from Field Education Manager Izzy Brace, Student Field Manager Lauren Ballejos, and Sloss Fellow Maia Matheny (who both came to DCF with no prior experience in sustainable agriculture) stepped in seamlessly to manage farm operationsand their peers - harvesting and delivering over 500 lbs of produce weekly while Izzy was on maternity leave. In our broader community, seven of DCF’s student team members were impacted directly or indirectly by Hurricane Helene. And they immediately organized to find conscientious ways – through their families, DCF alum, and their broader networks – to get DCF produce to those in need.
To me, this highlights the work that we ’ re most proud ofstudents with the sense of agency and community to respond with ingenuity, thoughtfulness, and care.
I feel incredibly grateful to work as part of such a dynamic team.
Keep growing,
McGinty Community Food Security Fellow Roo Jackson (MEM ‘23), the newest addition to our team, works directly with partners at Root Causes, Durham Community Fridges, West End Free Market, and the Graduate Student Pantry to 1) get DCF produce to those experiencing food insecurity on and off campus and 2) ensure that this work is rooted in authentic and responsive community partnerships. DCF is connecting students directly to a range of approaches to addressing hunger while inviting them to grapple with the realities of a food system that allows for food insecurity.
“Everything is connected and we try to acknowledge those connections, but there also comes a point where we have to work to sustain those connections more tangibly. I feel more human in this position, more grounded. I can make change, do tangible things like harvesting produce from the ground and placing it in someone ’ s hand. I feel less helpless because I do work that lets me feel how connected I am to my ecosystem and community and how food brings people together.”
- Roo Jackson, DCF McGinty Community Food Security Fellow, MEM ‘24
“At Duke it’s easy to forget the place and space you ’ re in, and the farm functions as a place to remind yourself of where you are. Duke can be so disconnected from Durham and from the greater Triangle region and its history; the farm mediates that. It's part of Duke, but it's also part of Durham.”
- Mira Polishook, T’24
“When you ' re when you ' re talking about you ’ re talking about disability justice. Wh food is denied, it is a root cause and a disability. So it's just very central to our mi are working to not only have food available also to reduce the barriers to getting to tha you come to the [West End Free] market, our no matter if you come at the beginning or feel a
- T Land, founder
rn American Indian Garden plots, we ’ re ith adaptive traits - plants that can thrive ty resilience through the continuance of ands-on workshops and conversations with with Chris Keeve (whose “floor seeds” are ties and landscapes that seeds represent.
We are entering our second year with the Heirloom Collards by venerated organic farmer and author Ira Wallace to revive varieties once common across the South. Each cultivar carrie unique to its Southern ecology, including the Jernigan Yellow Collards (pictured right) from Snow Hill, NC growing at DCF. collards lack the waxy coating and dark green color tradition associated with collards, with the sweet flavor and tender te preferred by those who like their collards raw.
n] is the m thousand ents so m to highlig te profes
reflects the diversity of the stories o love. It’s moments of love and care her, as well as people in the future dkeeper
The farm is a living classroom and laboratory where students can learn with and from their bodies, land, more-than-human organisms, and each other, in a markedly different way than most of their in-classroom courses teach. Last year, we began a longitudinal study with the Richter Soils Lab on the effects of our practices on our soils and the initial findings are promising (see below).
The inaugural of the Soil Fertility Fellowship led to an honors thesis in Biology by Abby Saks (T ‘24). Her findings show that the regenerative practices employed by the farm over the past 14 years have led to a 7.5% increase in organic material in our soils since 2010, a significant impact both ecologically and agriculturally.
”A lot of the narratives that we ' re told about agriculture and about humans and their relationship with nature is that when humans come into contact with nature they destroy it...That's what I like about regenerative agriculture – we are helping the environment by building up soil health. Getting to experience that is inspiring, because then you realize that you can have a positive impact on the environment.”
- Vancie Peacock, Community Work Day volunteer, Ph.D. CEE
29 students in our Field and Programming Crew
117 produce deliveries made to our community partners in 40 weeks
25,284 pounds of produce planted, tended, and harvested by our student crew
127,800 Jernigan Yellow Cabbage Collard seeds saved and returned to the Heirloom Collards Project
1500 seedlings offered to students, Durham schools and community gardeners, and Duke faculty and staff.
visitors weeded, mulched, and harvested at our weekly Community Work Days
5
students honed their systems thinking skills in our first crop planning workshop
11
cultivars of heirloom beans trialled for climate resiliency alongside the NC Agroecology Educators Network
first year students explored the farm during Duke’s Experiential Orientation
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program collaborations with Duke groups ranging from Duke Arts Create to NAISA
One of our key educational strategies is to empower our students to be thought leaders who understand their place in food systems and climate work, and then translate this understanding into meaningful action within their chosen field. This year several members of our student crew partnered with DCF to create and teach a House Course “Regenerating our Food Systems,” teaching the basic principles of sustainable agriculture, its role in climate change, and its connections to racial justice.
Our ‘24-26 Sloss Fellow, Christina Ferrari, (T’24) translates DCF mission into action at our weekly community workdays, helping volunteers from Duke and Durham communities see how their hard work fits into a bigger picture, both within our program and in our farm systems.
The Duke Campus Farm joined campus farm faculty and colleagues from Elon, Appalachian State, and Central Carolina Community College for a panel at the Carolina Farm Stewardship Association’s 2024 Sustainable Agriculture conference. We each shared the unique strengths and challenges of our programs and gathered input from regional growers on how campus farms might better serve the broader farm community.
“I think we all have a lot of climate anxiety, and to me, educating people about how food systems works is one of the most effective ways you can combat climate denialism. Being involved in the production of your own food, increasing food sovereignty, promoting food system awareness, [and developing] the curiosity to ask questions about where thi f outside of food...those are all applicable skills for enga -Olivia Ares, House Course instructor, T ’25
Our soils tell a distinct story to those who listen. We help students to recognize patterns of harm visible in our soils, and offer methods for reparative action. New courses such as “Reading the Landscape” and “Life’s Work”, combine experiential learning with m seminar forms through, for example, connecting 16th c North Carolina indigenous agriculture with 19th century DCF’s plantation-era past and our on-going work to re
With “Going to Ground,” Saskia Cornes, used her dual role as DCF director and FHI faculty member to take a traditionally hierarchical format - the academic talk - and collaborate with faculty, students and community members at the University of Toronto to pair an immersive soil-focused experience with a more formal keynote for the Oxford-Penn-Toronto IDC in Environmental Humanities.
Background: plates of soil from our production space (top) and the field outside our acre (bottom) used to illustrate varying soil properties and quality.
Students worked with local artists Julie Hinson and Claire Alexandre to alchemize soil and plants found on the farm into usable clay and ink.
ENVIRON 209: Food, Farming, Feminism
RACESOC 795T: Bass Connections: Tracing the Roots of Nutrition Access-University to Community
GLHLTH 571: Global Maternal and Child Health
CEE 690: Applied Climate and Sustainability Engineering
XIANTHE 890: Theology of Place
FRENCH 204S-1: Terroir
ETHICS 89S: Writing/Ethics
SPANISH 303: Sazon Latina
DOCST 370S: The Environment in Literature, Law, and Science partner m this year,
Although we grow over 25,000 lbs of food in a growing season, our primary output continues to be food-literate leaders. See what some of our former crew members are up to now!
Vic Bolling, DCF Field Crew Alum, B.S. Biology, Env Science and History minors, T’24
“I work at the University of New Hampshire as the lead agroforestry technician on a grant to develop climate-adaptive agroforestry solutions in New England. DCF showed me what a profound relationship with my food feels like, which has led me to my job where I research agroforestry practices that can facilitate New England refocusing their food system on deeper connection to food with protecting their forests. It’s really important that Duke develops more spaces like DCF where we talk about sustainable agriculture, especially because food can get really devalued in academia. Since working at DCF, my attitudes around consumption have changed and I am more intentional with the seasonality and origins of what I buy.”
Mira Polishook, DCF Programming Crew Alum, B.S. Biology and Env Science, T’
“I am currently a lab manager in the Vilgalys Fungi Lab in Duke’s Biology department. My time at the farm was a perfect compliment to my STEM classes. When I first started studying soil legacies at the farm, it was from the perspective of the stories that soil tells in its history, the people who used to plow it, and the culture that grew from that soil. And my classes taught me about the life that soil lends to microbes, to plants, and to us. That felt very mycelial to me because this network of all the information I learned at the farm ended up connecting to my lab work, and also what I'll hopefully study in grad school.”
Kendall Jefferys, DCF Field Crew Alum, B.A. Env Policy and English, T ‘21
“[Following a Rhodes Scholarship], I’m in the second year of my DPhil. program in Geography and the Environment at the University of Oxford where I study pollinators and their interactions with plants. Through my work at the farm I learned the power of observation. Studying ecology at a theoretical level is interesting, but it doesn’t become real until you actually go to the space you ’ re studying, sit, listen, look, and smell what’s happening around you. That’s when you start asking better questions and feeling a deeper connection to place. Working at the farm helped me to imagine a new food system that honors the labor of growing food and the importance of feeling a sense of belonging to land.”
Our network of support is what makes our work toward food systems change possible. Your continued generosity is essential to sustaining our program. We welcome your financial gifts here.
STAFF
Izzy Brace
Saskia Cornes
Amy Curran
Christina Ferrari (Sloss Fellow)
Roo Jackson (McGinty Fellow)
Maia Matheny
STUDENT LEADERSHIP TEAM
Braden Scherting Ph.D ‘26
Lauren Ballejos GLS ‘25
Gurnoor Majhail T ‘25
STUDENT CREW
Victoria Bolling T’24
Alyssa Briggs MF ‘26
Chloe Joy Chang P ‘27
Erin Chen T ‘27
Emma Childs MEM/MF ‘24
Anna Clauer MEM ‘26
Luke Dauner MEM/MF ‘25
Amylyn De Paz De Paz T ‘28
Connor Ennis T ‘28
Addie Geitner T ‘25
Kerinna Good T ‘24
Simon Heinberg MEM ‘25
Eddie Huang T ‘27
Skijler Hutson T’24
Emma Kaufman MEM ‘25
Haru Koga MEM ‘24
Chase Locascio T ‘28
Tsveti Milkova T’28
Abby Saks T ‘24
Aakanksha Saraf MEM ‘25
Laura Poma Gomez T’24
Mira Polishook T’24
Sam Tolbert MEM ‘26
Abby Walden T ‘26
Connor Weis MBA/MPP ‘25
Luke Yeatman T’25
COMMUNITY WORK TRADERS
Tirza Angerhofer
Christina Christopoulos
Kelly Creedon
Maryn Gardner
Samantha George
Adam David Lohman
Sarah Miles
INSTITUTIONAL PARTNERS
Office of the Executive
Vice President
Office of Climate and Sustainability
Duke Forest
Duke Gardens
Duke Department of Gender, Sexuality, and Feminist Studies
Franklin Humanities Institute
Duke and Durham Community Affairs
Native American Studies Initiative
Center for Sexual and Gender
Diversity
Duke Women’s Center
Duke Arts
Duke Athletics
Duke Rec/Outdoor Adventures
FINANCIAL SUPPORT
Duke Campus Farm Fund
Olsher Family Student
Leadership Fund
COMMUNITY PARTNERS
Root Causes
West End Market (CANDOR)
Durham Community Fridges
Graduate School Student
Pantry (GPSG)
Durham Beekeepers Association
