Connect with the Sprout Up Community!

 
 

Connect with our community of students and farmers - Send us your worksheets!

You can email your worksheets, photos, questions, and ideas to education@sproutup.org!

Special Guests

 
 

Thank you to our special guests for joining us in this series! Learn more about them below.

 

Heather Bruegl

Heather Bruegl, a citizen of the Oneida Nation of Wisconsin and first line descendent Stockbridge Munsee, is a graduate of Madonna University in Michigan and holds a Bachelor of Arts and Master of Arts in U.S. History.  Inspired by a trip to Wounded Knee, South Dakota, a passion for Native American History was born.  She has also become the ‘’accidental activist’’ and speaks to different groups about intergenerational racism and trauma and helps to bring awareness to our environment, the fight for clean water and other issues in the Native community.  She is the former Director of Cultural Affairs for the Stockbridge-Munsee Community and now serves at the Director of Education for Forge Project. 

 

Kingston YMCA Farm Project

The Kingston YMCA Farm Project's mission is to educate, nourish and connect the Kingston, NY community with their urban farm. Their vision is to use the farm as a way to engage young people in the magical and empowering process that is food production. Children and youth are involved in all aspects of food production and farm care: seeding, transplanting, watering, weeding, harvesting, and ultimately preparing and eating. Participants learn how to turn the vegetables they grow into healthy snacks and dishes.

 

AJ Jordan, Kingston YMCA Farm Project

Aj Jordan is an Empowerment Coordinator at the Kingston YMCA Farm Project. He has been working with the Farm Project for almost 2 years now mentoring teens, participating and creating projects to help the community, and growing healthy food! When he's not working he loves to read and spend time with his family.

 

Estefany, Kingston YMCA Farm Project

Estefany has been part of the youth crew on the Kingston YMCA Farm Project for three years, where she has learned how to maintain an urban farm and how to give back to the community. On their third of an acre farm they plant and harvest vegetables for their Thursday farm stand that takes place in the lobby of the YMCA. Over the summer Estefany also works with camp groups and teaches them how to seed, weed, plant, harvest, and more! She is a senior in high school and she hopes to attend college to study early childhood education. 

 
 

Soul Fire Farm

Soul Fire Farm is an Afro-Indigenous centered community farm committed to uprooting racism and seeding sovereignty in the food system. They raise and distribute life-giving food as a means to end food apartheid. With deep reverence for the land and wisdom of our ancestors, they work to reclaim our collective right to belong to the earth and to have agency in the food system. They bring diverse communities together on this healing land to share skills on sustainable agriculture, natural building, spiritual activism, health, and environmental justice. They are training the next generation of activist-farmers and strengthening the movements for food sovereignty and community self-determination.

Brooke Bridges, Soul Fire Farm

Brooke joined the Soul Fire Farm team in 2019 as an Assistant Kitchen Magician (aka assistant chef) for the BIPOC FIRE immersion programs, transitioned to a part time farmer, administrative assistant, and public speaker in 2020, and is now all of the above, plus the social media manager and coordinator. Brooke brings a background of mental health and social emotional learning to the table; running her own consulting business aside from working with Soul Fire Farm called Building Bridges SEL. She works with children to help them become more aware of their emotions, thoughts, and behaviors, so they can live happier, healthier lives from the inside out. This is also why her passion is in food and farming, as we know that what we eat, just as much as what we think, shapes our minds and our hearts. 

 

White Feather Farm

White Feather Farm is a fledgling non-profit farm & creative hub. Their mission is simple, but a deep dedication to their core value system drives them to thoughtfully address the complex challenges facing both farmers and creators in today’s world.

 

Bryana Shevlin, White Feather Farm

Bryana comes to White Feather Farm with a passion for food justice, sparked while co-founding a food cooperative in 2012. She has a background working both within the food system and in collaboration with organizations providing relief from the disparities created by our broken system. Her desire to strengthen her relationship to the land brought her to White Feather Farm. At the farm, she can most likely be found with her hands in the dirt, while singing to the plants, and swooning over the beauty of the mountains.

 

Dallas McCann, White Feather Farm

Dallas hails from the streets of Bakersfield, California. At one point he was an auto mechanic, but he’s since found the world of food, farming and compost. He’s been farming for six years now and believes that small farms will save the world. Mostly he values communities, fairness and efficiency.

 

Jess Giacobbe, White Feather Farm

Originally from Northeastern Pennsylvania, Jess grew up with an innate connection to the natural world, riding horses and wandering around her grandparent’s veggie garden. She holds a BFA in Multidisciplinary Fine Arts from the University of the Arts in Philadelphia, PA. At White Feather Farm she is the in-house photo/video and wears many other hats. You can find her on the back end of most projects involving events, education, marketing, and of course the chickens.

 

Wild Hudson Valley

Wild Hudson Valley was founded in 2013 to teach about the rich history and environment of the Hudson Valley in a fresh, new way. Their walks, workshops, forest farmed products, and camping bring the past into the present and inspire others to become stewards of our planet.

 

Justin Wexler, Wild Hudson Valley

Justin Wexler, the co-founder of Wild Hudson Valley, has spent two decades deep in archival and ethnographic research on the Munsee and Mohican peoples who call the region their ancestral home. He works to connect the past with the present, teaching not only about historical indigenous lifeways but also about contemporary Mohican and Munsee communities and their efforts to preserve their beautiful languages and culture. He has a BA in History and Anthropology from Marlboro College in Marlboro, VT; a Professional Certificate in Environmental Policy from Bard College, and a Master of Arts in Teaching from Bard College.