Sep 19, 2014 - by Lucy Bergwall ’15, Sara Clark ’15, Robin Gimm ’14, and Josh Morrison ’16 On a Tuesday in late June, Zilkha Center interns Lucy Bergwall ’15, Sara Clark ’15, Robin Gimm ’14, and Josh Morrison ’16 along with Brent Wasser, manager of the Sustainable Food and Agriculture Program, piled into a college van and headed off to UMass Amherst’s award-winning permaculture garden for the 2013 Permaculture Your Campus Conference. While most of the interns had heard the term permaculture thrown around, we hoped to gain a deeper understanding of the alternative agricultural technique though the workshops, speakers, and interaction with the garden during the day. Permaculture is a term that is often heard but only vaguely understood, so the conference strove to demonstrate how the principles like holistic planning, multifunctionality, and biodiversity could be applied both traditionally to gardening and to larger community development efforts. After a delicious breakfast replete with local and organic items, our small group went to talks that ranged from permaculture garden implementation to the effective presentation of an idea to college administrators. From these sessions, we gained a new outlook on and a much better understanding of permaculture. One of the most interesting insights we gained from the conference was about the different structures through which schools run their garden programming. We were surprised to learn that UMass offers class credit to the students that run the permaculture and food activism organizations. This alternative structure made us realize how beneficial it may be to have paid interns during the school year continuing the work that Zilkha interns do now, specifically managing the garden and coordinating Real Food efforts such as running the Real Food Calculator. To have dedicated positions would ensure that these important tasks are performed in times such as exam periods when student…
