Finding the Food in Farm Camps PDF Download

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Languages : en
Pages : 100

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Book Description
"In 1780, George Pyle purchased a spring and the surrounding acres in Central Pennsylvania from Robert MccTeear. The spring was a famous resting place for weary travelers and their horses, and so the farmstead was known as "Watering Trough Farm." By 1825, the Pyle brothers had built a distillery over the spring that would ultimately result in an infamous crooked county line still discussed today. According to historical record, the surveyors for the county line diverged from their straight path to go up to the still for a drink. After enjoying some refreshment, they continued along the Mahantango creek, the border between Juniata and Snyder Counties. This very place?the farm with the crooked county line?was where I grew up and where my interests in food and agriculture began. With 115 acres of fields, forest, meadows, and streams, my parents' egg farm provided me and my siblings with an extraordinary learning experience that remained unappreciated in my own life until recently. From exploring in the woods to collecting fossils, we were engaged in environmental science and imaginative play. We learned animal science while working in the chicken house. Cooking with garden produce and farm fresh eggs, we were learning food science and engaging in the culinary arts. Farm chores like unloading haybales, picking sweet corn, packing eggs, and weeding the garden, though hated at the time, taught us hard work and gave us a sense of ownership over the farm. Our work mattered. As I grew older, I wanted little to do with the farm, perhaps because I was not taught in school to value a career in agriculture. My parents encouraged me and my siblings to excel in school, attend college, and land well-paying jobs. And so we left the farm. Looking back, I know my experiences on the farm shaped my interest in nutrition. So iv how serendipitous was it that in 2008, at an American Dietetic Association conference, I found myself attending a session about the consolidation of agriculture resulting in the alarming loss of small-scale family farms. I left feeling hopeless and angry, yet a thought was formed that day that would later become a dream and now a plan to save my parents farm: a summer farm camp for children. Campers spend a week on the farm and learn to grow food, work with animals, cook with farm produce, spend time in nature, practice sustainable living, and most importantly, have fun. It seems that my dream is now part of a growing trend of educating children about where their food comes from. Programs include "Farm to School" education programs, school gardens, field trips to farms, environmental science with food crops, and non-profit, farm-based education centers, which offer summer camps and residential farm experiences. Pushing this "trend" further, some farmers are diversifying their businesses to include farm camps as an additional source of income. As of April 2012, there were a total of 295 farm-based education programs listed on the Farm-Based Education Association (FBEA) website representing 40 states and a handful of programs in Canada and Europe. Programs include large non-profits, small-scale farms, sustainability-focused schools, and environmental centers. Farm to School programs now total approximately 2,518 in all 50 states, involving 9,945 schools and 2,422 school districts (National Farm to School Network, 2012). The majority of garden- and farm-based education programs target school-aged children (grades PreK-12); students are concentrated in schools, clubs, and organizations making them a captive audience for such programs (Olson, 2008). In 2006, seeing a need to support farm-based educators, a group of eighteen representatives from educational farms formed the FBEA. Since then, membership has v grown to nearly 1,000 individuals. FBEA works to provide outreach, support, and promotion of farm-based education through its interactive website, webinar trainings, and annual conference at Shelburne Farms, Vermont. Programs continue to flourish and receive media attention, ranging from Michelle Obama's initiatives to health-based claims about the benefits of children knowing where their food comes from. Although there has been some education-focused review of Farm to School and school garden programs, research about the benefits of summer farm camps and residential farm experiences is limited. The general belief is that summer camp and residential programs that offer children and teens the opportunity to immerse themselves for several days to several weeks on a farm provide direct involvement in farm activities creating a sense of ownership over the space. Though not always explicit about these aims, farm camps and residential programs serve as models for sustainable food systems, where children learn about sustainability by participating in sustainable practices. From an educational assessment standpoint?and from a desire to improve the food system?these experiences may influence the practices and attitudes of campers over time and could potentially lead to increased environmental awareness, greater consumption of fruits and vegetables, nutrition knowledge, self-efficacy related to preparing and growing healthy food, physical activity, knowledge of the local economy related to agriculture, and self-esteem. While these are often asserted as benefits, currently there is not a significant body of research is to confirm such outcomes. In particular, to support their programs, farm-based educators often make claims about the individual and social rewards of such programs, suggesting a need for review. vi Considering my own experiences and goals with farm-based education, I undertook an analysis of the existing literature as well as developed a business case study of a possible farm camp. These two approaches allow me to consider the larger landscape of farm education, food systems and sustainability alongside the costs and benefits of a specific application. The literature review examines various research studies and reports that inform the potential outcomes of farm-based education. Pedagogical frameworks of farm-based education, business size, organizational structure, programming, audience served, and costs are examined. These factors are also considered in the development of a business plan for a family-owned farm in Central Pennsylvania." -- Introduction.