• Environment, Agriculture, and Food

Participants, partners, graduates, and friends of our "Feeding the City" (FTC) program and related research on Environment, Agriculture, and Food: You can stay in touch with our latest postings by subscribing to our blog. Click on the small icon at the bottom of the page to get updates to our "Events and News" through the RSS feed. You can also subscribe to any of the summer interns' blogs by clicking the icon on their individual blogs (see Student Team 2010).

Have an item you'd like us to share? Email pmartin at uchicago dot edu. Please put "Item for Events and News" in the subject line.

About Rachel Kenser Rachel joined Feeding the City in her third year at the University of Chicago. Prior to her matriculation at the university she spent two years in southern Africa earning an IB diploma and teaching HIV/AIDS education to both urban and rural youth in Swaziland. As an Environmental Studies major she is interested in the relationships between the environment, disease and public health. Through her internship with City Farm she hopes to learn more about sustainable, diversified urban agriculture and its implications for the community. Rachel *may* have been late I was late for my first day of work. oops!

About Hannah Radner: Hannah Radner will be an intern this summer at Sandhill Organics in Prairie Crossing, IL (Grayslake). Hannah just completed her second year at the University of Chicago, where she is double-majoring in Anthropology and Environmental Studies. She is a member of the varsity cross-country and track teams and a volunteer coach for Girls on the Run, an after-school program for 3rd-5th grade girls. Hannah is currently working as a research assistant in the University of Chicago Hospitals and also has experience a piano accompanist. Hannah has volunteered in Haiti, Burundi, Uganda, and Mississippi on projects including rural medical clinics, AIDS education, and hurricane relief. She is proficient in French and Spanish.

Hannah is interested in the environmental and social characteristics of small-scale agriculture and sees education and personal relationships as key to redesigning regional food sheds. These interests were strengthened last summer, when she worked as a baker and cook at a bistro in the Colorado Rocky Mountains that worked directly with local farms to source its ingredients. She is also interested in the role of agriculture in developing countries and is currently studying the environmental implications of farming in rural Haiti.

About Bobby Wengoronowitz: Bobby Wengronowitz is currently finishing up a Masters Degree at the University of Chicago. His MA thesis was a case study on the social impact of a community garden and a farmers market on the south side of Chicago. As many reading this post already know, these community based agriculture projects do much more than provide healthy food. They offer participants the opportunity to develop bonds with others and reengage with their own food culture. After completing his MS at the U of C this past spring, he intends to pursue a PhD in sociology where he'll focus on alternative food systems and their political, economic, social, and environmental ramifications. He currently lives in Chicago and is eagerly awaiting his marriage to Becky Romatoski this summer!

Beginning the week of June 21st Bobby will hit the road on south to work at Clear Creek CSA. He'll be developing performing a whole farm analysis, examining all of the farm's direct energy inputs like diesel and indirect inputs like compost. All of the farm's output will also be recorded; by the end of the season he should have a good idea about how a small, diverse farm like Clear Creek CSA stacks up in terms of energy efficiency and environmental impacts relative to other farms.Bobby completed his BA in sociology at the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign.

About Annemarie Thilmont: Annemarie Thilmont participated in program planning at Gary Comer Youth Center (GCYC) during the spring and is interning full-time this summer the Center. Annemarie will help with record keeping that former Feeding the City participant Sebastian Davis-Van Gelder has helped to set up at the Gary Comer Youth Center. Annemarie is a current undergraduate majoring in Public Policy at the University of Chicago. Her specialization is educational policy and is interested in connecting gardens to curriculum. This summer she wll not only be recording energy inputs and outputs on their rooftop garden, but will also have the opportunity to work with students as they explore various subject areas through the garden as a classroom. Furthermore, she will also have the opportunity to observe and help with the construction of the new South Chicago Garden being constructed across the street from GCYC.

About Bryn Adams: Bryn Adams, a second-year at the University of Chicago double majoring in Environmental Studies and Law, Letters, and Society, will intern at City Farm this summer. Bryn participates in our Environment, Agriculture and Food working group in addition to the Feeding the City Class. Bryn First became seriously interested in farming (small-scale and sustainable in particular) when she attended the Mountain School, an academic semester program located on a working organic farm in Vermont. After that, she worked on an organic farm in Cleveland, interned at a local start-up called Fresh Fork Market that endeavored to create a supply chain solution between local farms and local restaurants, and spent this past summer at the Cuyahoga County branch of the OSU Extension. At the Extension, Bryn worked with individual urban and community gardens as well as with the Cleveland Food Policy Coalition. On campus, Bryn works as a tour guide in the admissions office, serve as the Artistic Director of the all-female a cappella group Men in Drag, and acts in various University Theater productions. Along with the input/output data related to energy use, greenhouse gases, and production, Bryn will be gathering data related to local food marketing and the economics of urban agriculture at City Farm.