“A new understanding and appreciation for the marvel of growing things”: exploring the college farm’s contribution to transformative learning

Campus Food Provision as Radical Pedagogy? Following Students on the Path to Equitable Food Systems

“…CFSA collaborators should center Black, Indigenous and racialized leadership and look for alternative methods of decision-making and distribution that rely on collectivity and mutuality. The lessons of Grundtvig, Carver, Du Bois and Washington echo in the work of (some) CFSA-but in order to realize the transformative potential of these spaces our radical pedagogy must be made explicit and deliberate (see for example Green, 2021).…”

Critical food systems education in university student-run food initiatives: learning opportunities for food systems transformation

“…CFSA are however not inherently radical nor critical. These student-run initiatives have drawn criticism on their potential for advancing depoliticized and shallow education about food systems, which can reproduce oppressive systems of white supremacy, colonialism, and classism if not actively resisted (Gray et al, 2012;Aftandilian and Dart, 2013;Green, 2021;Classens et al, 2021b). Scholars have also suggested that student-run food initiatives must seek to have a broad impact in the food system to advance learning among student participants that is truly complex, critical, and transformative (Barlett, 2011;Aftandilian and Dart, 2013).…”

“…Finally, beyond-campus community engagement was observed to encourage students' reflections on their positionality and privilege in the broader food system beyond campus. Participants in CFSA reflected on McGill University as a largely privileged environment where students are often alienated from community realities: CFSA can thus allow students from privileged backgrounds to "witness power, authority, privilege and oppression in the food system play out in the daily lives of others, " a key point in critical food systems learning (Valley et al, 2018, p. 12) Engagement with community realities via service learning has indeed been observed to allow students to realize their relative privilege in contrast to marginalized communities (Kiely, 2005;Gray et al, 2012;Aftandilian and Dart, 2013), an important driver of transformative learning (Kiely, 2005;Green, 2021).…”

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“…The impact (real and potential) of college and university campuses in the context of broader food systems change has become an increasingly popular scholarly focus. Much of this work can be categorized into one of three categories: alternative forms of procurement (Bohunicky et al, 2019;Martin & Andrée, 2012;Stahlbrand, 2019); alternative forms of campus food production (Angstmann et al, 2019;Gardener, 2012;Green, 2021;LaCharite, 2016;Parr & Trexler, 2011); or critical food systems pedagogy (Anderson et al, 2019;Sumner, 2016;Valley et al, 2018). In aggregate, this growing body of scholarship and practice constitutes a "campus turn" in food systems scholarship and practice.…”

“…Scholars have focused on a variety of impacts of CFGS, from their role in sustainability education and farmer training to their interdisciplinarity and their facilitation of student leadership and sense of social responsibility (Angstmann et al, 2019;Gardener, 2012;Green, 2021;LaCharite, 2016;Parr & Trexler, 2011). CFGS, in other words, have impacts quite different from the land-grant model's positivist and productivist commitments to yield increase and the like.…”