Dartmouth Takes on the Northeast Organic Farmers Association Conference!
- Admin
- Mar 28
- 2 min read
Updated: 5 days ago
This piece is written by Jack Walker, Sustainability Program Coordinator
Winter time at the Dartmouth Organic Farm is akin to a still-life. Frigid days when the students and I gaze out of the barn windows at the production field covered in snow, dried corn stalks outlining the basic shape of the rows, but otherwise blending seamlessly into the rolling heaves of powder. It’s easy to imagine the O-Farm as a blank canvas during midwinter, a space that carries endless possibilities for producing memories and vegetables in equal measure.
A mainstay of our O-Farm winter programming is building a more thorough understanding of our local farming system through attending the New Hampshire and Vermont NOFA (Northeast Organic Farming Association) Conferences. To truly understand where the O-Farm fits into our local food system and with our local farming community more broadly, it’s important to allow students the opportunity to engage directly with farmers and learn from experts outside of our own staff. These conferences are an excellent way to bring our students directly to the source. Throughout the day the students engage in talks on a variety of agricultural topics and get the opportunity to connect with organic growers throughout the state, and beyond!
O-Farm leader Reva Gandhi ‘27 sums it up perfectly: “Getting the opportunity to attend the NOFA conference opened a representative window into the farming community—a community so central to the livelihoods and culture of Vermont and New Hampshire. Attending the conference as a college student was particularly interesting, since we aren’t a part of the farming community in a super ‘traditional’ way…It was absolutely fascinating to attend the conference to soak up as much knowledge as we could—purely for the joy of learning!”
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