- Welcome to the session on Growing Farm-Based Education
in a Post-COVID World.
This is being recorded
and the recording will be posted online afterwards.
And we'll also send out an email to everyone who registered
with a link to the recording,
as well as a link to resources and contact information
for the folks who have joined us today.
Closed captioning is available
and there is a link in the chat box.
And if you click on that link,
it'll open up a separate window
and you can view closed captioning
while the session is going on.
We'll also share an email link with you afterwards,
where you'll be able to get the recording.
And I wanna acknowledge our funders,
USDA/NIFA grant
and Northeast Extension Risk Management Education Center.
My name is Lisa Chase
and I'm with University of Vermont Extension
and the Vermont Tourism Research Center.
And I am very pleased that here with us today,
we have Vera Simon-Nobes
from the Farm-Based Education Network.
JoAnn Coates-Hunter from Fox Haven Farm in Maryland,
and Christine Scales from Billings Farm in Vermont.
And we are talking about growing farm-based education in a,
we put post-COVID world there,
but we kind of mean transitional COVID world.
And at this point, I'll hand it over to Vera Simon-Nobes,
who is the coordinator of the Farm-Based Education Network.
- Great. Thanks Lisa.
Thank you all for being here.
It's really nice to see familiar names, new names,
and I'm not sick of Zoom world because it connects us
in a really nice way across geography.
So I just wanna appreciate you all for
coming to this session today in June,
the busiest time for many of you.
So thank you very much.
The Farm-Based Education Network is a free member network
dedicated to creating, and strengthening,
and supporting the work of farmers, educators,
and community leaders who provide access
and experiences of all kinds on working farms.
I'm reading the slide
and you all can probably see that yourself.
So I just wanna say that we are a free network
that you're all invited to join
if you're not a member already.
And we really are interested in taking ideas
from our membership and putting things into action
so it can serve you in your farm-based education work.
The list of logos you see
are the collaborators that are on this project,
which is specifically sort of responsible
for bringing this session into this workshop series today.
And finally, Lisa, I love that word transitional.
I wrote the title of this workshop
and then heard somebody later say that
it's a little bit insensitive
to all of the people throughout our world
who are still in the midst of COVID.
We in the U.S. are so fortunate
to maybe be starting to say post-COVID,
but I've really recognized that
we are in that position of privilege to use that term.
And I should probably say transitional,
as you mentioned, Lisa.
So thanks for your patience there
as I made that little slip.
And so, yeah,
I wanna just share the plan for the day
is that we'll hear from JoAnn Coates-Hunter
and from Christine Scales.
JoAnn is with Fox Haven Farm in Jefferson, Maryland,
and Christine is with Billings Farm.
I think you probably had maybe had a moment
to check out their websites and if you haven't,
definitely do so after the workshop.
One thing that really jumped out at me,
which I didn't realize when I invited
JoAnn and Christine to present it's, I think
your organizations have some of the best named programs.
I saw it recently like Pollination in Poetry,
Wine, Wit, and Wisdom, I guess maybe I like alliteration,
but there's something really beautiful about the way that
you're titling the programs that you're offering
and just the diversity of all kinds of programs
that you've had going on at your farm,
even during this transitional COVID time.
So JoAnn and Christine, thank you so much for being here.
I also wanna just open up the chat box a little bit
and invite anyone who's listening in to share
where they're coming from,
your location and your organization,
and maybe one way that you like to stay cool
on 95 degree days.
I'll give you a moment to type that into the chat box,
your location and the organization you're coming from
and a way that you like to stay cool.
"Popsicles," says Lisa, great.
"Jumping in the lake," says Carrie.
Awesome.
Hi Colin, that's great, root cellars.
Very cool.
Ellen, welcome.
"Cool water, splashes."
Laura, welcome.
It just went past me.
Let's see.
Laura says, "Ice cream."
Welcome Laura Lynn.
Welcome Juan.
Welcome Christie, "Kayaking."
"Watermelon water," thank you, Angelica.
That's a good idea.
Welcome, Rebecca.
Thanks Meg, "Ice cream."
Well, thank you all.
So feel free to use the chat box to type a question in.
If one comes to you during our presentations,
we're gonna most likely hold questions
until both JoAnn and Christine have spoken
so that we can then just make sure we get through
what they have planned for us.
So, just a final reminder,
which is that Lisa said we are recording.
If you prefer to be off camera,
you're welcome to leave your camera off.
If you'd like to show your shiny face,
you can use that camera on feature.
And now I'm wanna introduce JoAnn.
So JoAnn Coates-Hunter directs Fox Haven Farm
in Jefferson, Maryland.
JoAnn empowers and supports their stellar team,
oversees operations, directs educational programs,
teaches, and brings her knowledge and excitement
about the wonders of nature to visitors of all ages.
JoAnn's hope is that everyone leaves Fox Haven Farm
with a new understanding of self, nature,
and an interdependency with an action to take.
So JoAnn, thank you so much for making the time
and for being here to share with us today.
- Yeah, thank you for inviting me.
So yeah, everybody can go on our website at some point
and see Fox Haven,
but we're in our 10th year of offering farm-based education
and Peggy Eppig, I gotta give her credit.
She was the one when I was first starting the program here
at Fox Haven, she's the one who said,
"Hey, JoAnn got to get you involved in this."
So that was pretty cool.
And it's just been a great journey,
both with FBEN and with her over the years.
We have four full-time staff,
we've got three part-time staff,
and we've got between
four and five seasonal contractor teachers.
And then we have between 15 and 17 interns per year.
And we get eight to 10 consistent volunteers,
but they just love it,
and they just come all the time and it's great.
And then we, of course, get a lot of other volunteers
that just come for a one-time visit or for a project visit,
that sort of thing.
I feel really lucky that we have such an amazing team.
I just love all the folks that help make this happen
out here.
We grow heirloom apples, some cherries, berries.
We have over 140 different medicinal herbs that we grow
for mostly apothecaries and herbalists,
some hobby folks.
And then we have our CSA.
And the CSA has a drop-off here at the farm.
And then we also have a drop-off in Baltimore at Larder.
And with that CSA, once a month you get a class
that teaches you how to use the herbs that you're receiving.
And we also sell fresh and dried herbs here at the farm.
And we sell honey at the farm.
We have 12 beehives all over the farm
and we just got one
over at the Antietam National Battlefield.
They're trying to start their old orchard there,
so that's been pretty cool.
And then we stored several wild spaces
that are specifically for ethical foraging.
'Cause we have a nine-month series of classes
with the forging program.
And then we engage, of course, in a lot of conservation
and regeneration of the soil and the water,
hit the waterways here.
The other thing that we do here is
we are a Rustic Retreat Center.
So we've got three farmhouses that we put on Airbnb.
And then we've got a repurpose dairy parlor
and a big red barn that's kind of, it's rustic.
It's not the fancy kind
that the people have lots of fancy bathrooms and stuff in.
It's not that kind, but we also don't have animals in it.
By barn standards, it's pretty nice as far as I'm concerned.
And folks can rent out those spaces
and that's pretty much that
and grants and our program revenue
are what kind of supports the mission work that we're doing.
And we serve kids and adults
through our farm-based ed programs, one-time classes, tours,
school field trips.
We go and visit schools, libraries.
And we also are engaged in research partnerships
with the University of Maryland School of Integrative Health
Hood College and Frederick Community College.
And then we do some consultations with landowners.
So that's kind of what we're doing.
The short story of COVID is that
when it hit us in March of 2020, of course, as you all know,
just like you probably had just gotten
all the field trips on the books,
gotten all of the interns trained,
had everything ready, and then everything shut down.
And so, we didn't panic though,
which I was pretty psyched about,
I think because, it's pretty thoughtful crew
and we just did a lot of reading
and we all have high-risk folks in our kin groups.
And so we were really clear that we wanted to make sure that
all of us were masked outside
and we just kind of quickly went to Zoom.
So we were kind of, I guess, early adapters, I don't know.
We started having our meetings and,
we had already had everybody signed up,
so everything was canceled,
but we did not cancel the Foraging program.
And we didn't cancel the CSA.
As you know, we already had plants in the ground,
we had all kinds of things happening.
But what we did do was we went online
and so, all of these classes that we were gonna have
that are just one-off classes we put online.
And then we also told the forging folks that
we would either give them a credit or a refund
or they could take online classes.
And all, but two people out of 30-some odd people
for that program.
No, we were over 40 people for that program
said that they would just take the online classes.
So, they were hopeful, I think,
that we were gonna go back to in-person classes
sooner than what we actually could.
But grateful for that, helped with the revenue stream.
And I guess there've been different points in time.
I mean, we just filed all the CDC regulations
to the nth degree.
We put up our signs everywhere,
even though it was just us out here
and we put up,
I had sanitizer everywhere, bottles everywhere.
I mean, there's no way you could walk 10 feet
without knowing that we were in a pandemic
and you needed to do something
to keep yourself safe and clean
and to keep everybody else safe and clean.
When early summer hit,
and all of us were kind of feeling it
of not having our volunteers and our interns around
because all of us were working like crazy.
We never had that downtime that people talked about.
Having that slow down period never happened at Fox Haven.
We were all kind of like, "We're waiting for January."
I just told everybody we were taking January off.
So that never happened for us.
But in early summer we decided,
"Okay, let's throw out the survey and find out
what we want and what folks were up for."
And people were great.
They said, "You know what?
We feel comfortable coming out, distance, masks,
and being outside."
And then for the folks that didn't feel comfortable,
what we would do is we would have the online class,
available for them through recording,
or they could do it live depending on the wind
because the wind ruins everything when it comes to,
I don't know if you all have experienced that,
but wind is not our friend
when we're trying to record things,
especially if you don't have the high tech stuff.
That worked out pretty well.
And the interns came back
and it was great to have them back.
And they were really disciplined about
all the COVID protocol.
Yeah. So that went well.
And then finally, after our harvest
and after we kind of were heading into winter,
we did slow down a little bit, which was great.
But we also were trying to do that strategic thing of,
as all of know,
how do you plan for something
when you have absolutely no idea what's gonna happen?
So we had a lot of laughs.
We did use our humor a lot
to kind of muscle through these times
and we would set up scenarios and act things out,
which was pretty humorous.
Yeah. Overall, we just kind of came up
with a plan A and a plan B.
And we knew we weren't gonna have any field trips
but the cool thing was that the retreat people,
they had all canceled,
but all these families started renting because
they all wanted to get out of their homes
because they were driving each other crazy.
And so, our farm houses were rented solid.
And so, that increased our revenue,
which helped us tremendously with the program revenue loss.
But the other thing that we did too that I will say like,
because when I'm looking to the kind of outline
of what we're supposed to talk about,
program, the changes that happen there,
first of all, more adults, less kids.
So that was the thing we had to adjust to.
But you know, adults, they don't listen as well as children.
I'm just gonna put it out there.
But it's been fun
and we're all figuring out the adult versus kid thing.
We're gonna keep doing it.
Like we're gonna keep having a lot of adult programs
because now all these adults are hooked, you know?
And so we're like,
"Okay, I might have to hire another staff person
so that we can have the field trips starting back up,
but we're gonna continue with the adult programming."
And let's see,
I'm just trying to find a little bit of an outline here,
but yes.
And so, then we went ahead and we planned part A and part B,
like option A option B for, for classes.
And we sent out another survey.
I mean, we really tried to communicate a lot
with the people that we're serving
and to get as much input from them as possible.
And they did pretty well.
I was impressed.
'Cause you know, when you send out surveys,
you never quite know how many people are gonna respond,
but we've got a lot of responses.
So, we felt pretty good about the results
and moving forward based on those results.
And so, spring we kept going,
we did the mostly onsite classes with adults,
we did start to get a couple of homeschool groups
that wanted to come out,
but some of them did not wanna mask.
And then we were like, "I'm sorry, but you have to mask."
So that was an awkward situation.
And two of them decided they weren't gonna come
because they had to wear masks,
but two of them came and it was fine.
Yeah. So that was a different kind of a thing.
Here we are, end of June.
And I don't know about in your state,
but on July 1st, like two days from now, I think,
all of the Maryland protocol and regs are done.
That has kind of we're like, okay.
So we went ahead and sent out another survey
and asked everybody what they wanted.
100% of all the survey people.
And there were like over 40-some odd people,
you know, with the ongoing program folks
and the CSA folks, they all said,
"They're totally fine with no masks, distanced, outside."
And then there was a smaller number of people.
I think it was like 70-something, 72% who said that
they were fine with distance, no mask inside.
But all of them, like 100% of the people
said that they would wear a mask
if it meant that it would make one person feel
more comfortable being in.
So they were sweet, sweet people.
So, that was great.
And as far as the communication part, we just communicated,
communicated, communicated.
We took videos.
We posted on social media
so people could see throughout COVID
what was happening at the farm, what was growing.
We did these, identify this plant contests.
Yeah. And just did a lot of fun stuff like that.
Challenges, definitely.
Like I mentioned before with the renters
and the family groups that would come
and they'd just be kind of floating around not wearing masks
but sharing the bathrooms with the interns.
That was a little bit of a challenge,
but it ended up being okay.
And then those, a couple of groups that didn't wanna mask,
but wanted a program and were kind of insistent.
But then, we finally figured that out.
And I would say, of course the other challenge,
like just for everybody else, finances.
But we were able to get a big PPP loan
that turned into a full forgiven grant, which was great.
And I was able to get a SBA grant from Maryland.
And then we got a couple of nice donations.
And this was even with offering tons of free classes.
I guess a plus was that our reach was longer
with all these online classes.
I don't know if you all experienced that, but,
in one of our mushroom classes,
we had a guy from Australia,
we had a woman from England,
and I'm thinking, "How in the world
did they even find out about this stuff?"
So, yeah, so that was pretty cool.
Being able to host over 150 people for one of our classes,
I mean, we couldn't do that here.
So that was nice.
And the cool thing is that folks are still staying engaged,
which is great.
Some other things, as far as,
I'm just really super proud of our team.
I can't even say it.
I cry sometimes even now when I think about how amazing
everybody has been.
And this is not a technology crew.
The last thing they wanna do
is sit in front of a computer, ever.
And so, it was a push and everybody stepped up
and it was just amazing.
And I would say some other cool things that happened too,
is we had really started pushing hard
with our reparations program with BIPOC folk.
And I don't know what happened during COVID,
but it just flourished.
It went, it just boom,
went up and it was great.
And that's ongoing.
That's been a positive thing that came out of it
and continues to build on it.
I'm thinking, let's see anything else?
Well, and of course,
we continue with our partnerships
with a lot of other farmers in getting food
to the Food Security Network in Frederick
and to other spots.
And so, that's been pretty cool and those continue,
and we're very involved with the farm-to-school
here in Frederick county as well.
So yeah, I think my 20 minutes are over, right?
- Yeah. That's a good place to transition.
Thank you so much, JoAnn.
That was great to just touch into all these
different facets of where you've been
and where you'll be going.
Christine, I think we can pass it off to you.
Let me read your bio.
So Christine Scales, she/her
is the Interpretation and Education Manager
at the Billings Farm and Museum in Woodstock, Vermont.
At Billings Farm and Museum,
you can find her working with kids, both human and hooved,
leading a team of talented interpreters,
developing new mission-based programs
for people of all ages,
writing interpretive signage and tours, and more.
Christine feels passionately that
museums should serve their communities
and loves using the farm and museums resources
to empower people from near and far
to ask questions and to learn more about their world.
So thanks Christine.
Pass it to you.
- Yeah. Hi everyone.
Good afternoon.
And it was really wonderful to hear from JoAnn
because I'm hearing a lot of things that really resonate
with our experience as well.
So that's awesome.
I am going to share a little presentation,
mostly just some pictures.
So this is our beautiful little slice of farm,
Billings Farm.
We're actually celebrating our 150th birthday this year
as Billings Farm.
And we are a museum and a nonprofit, private nonprofit.
So our mission is inspiring and engaging generations
through shared stories of Vermont's rural culture
and the continued practice of responsible agriculture.
So a little bit about us.
We are a commercial working dairy farm.
So we have a milking herd of about 50 Jersey cows.
And they're very sweet and adorable.
The dairy is really the only thing that we do commercially.
So we're part of Agromark
which is the farmers co-op that makes Cabot Cheese
and McCadam Cheese.
We also make our own,
well, Grafton Village Cheese makers,
they make Billings Farm our Billings Farm Cheese.
And we also sell to a really local micro creamery called
Norwich Farm Creamery who bottles our milk as well.
So you don't have any kind of processing onsite,
but we do work with
other farmers and small-scale operations.
We, like I said, we're celebrating our 150th year as a farm.
We have been a museum for a little bit over 35 years.
So we have a visitor center.
We have two floors of farming exhibits.
We have a restored 1890 farm manager's home.
We also have goats, sheeps, chickens, draft horses,
and two teams of working steers.
And some wonderful gardens.
We have some education gardens, some heirloom gardens,
and the chef's garden at our site as well.
So kind of a lot of different things going on.
But the working farm aspect is the dairy.
We don't really farm wool or anything like that commercially
that's all just for education
that we have the other animals.
So yeah, we were coming off of a great year.
We actually closed in March.
So we were closed getting ready to kick off
our 2021 or 2020 season when obviously the pandemic hit.
So very early into the pandemic,
we kind of dropped everything we were doing.
And there's the innocent little face here thinking that
we would just be working from home for two weeks
and then back at it.
I'm not even wearing a mask
because we didn't even know about it back then.
So, the very first thing we did was okay,
well, we have all these kids who are out of school,
let's make these kits that we can hand out to the parents
while they're off of school for a week or two,
and then there'll be back and it'll be great.
We'll just pick up where we left off.
And that obviously was not the case.
So once we realized that this was going to be the reality
for a while.
I'm really proud of our team also,
I know JoAnn said that as well,
but we really had a great group of people who,
we didn't panic, we just,
I remember my manager asked me,
"When we look back in 20 years,
what do we wanna say that we did to serve our community?"
What we wanna look back and be proud of what we did.
So then you have to think about,
"Okay, well, what are we gonna do?"
So we really dove in and we went digital.
So we were working from home and we, oops,
we were putting out tons of content.
So we were doing YouTube videos.
This is my frenzied face
as we tried to film as many videos as we could,
the day before lockdown.
We did a virtual baby animal celebration.
And we really put together recipes and crafts and videos.
And we were doing new content almost every day
at a pace that was honestly pretty unsustainable.
So, that eventually, that died down,
but it did feel good to kind of channel that anxiety
and that feeling of helplessness into something
and creating something that we felt
was doing some good for our community
and for the broader community as well.
So we were doing Facebook Live videos.
We really were trying it all.
And also not the most technology savvy bunch,
and also didn't have a lot of the equipment.
So it was a lot of making due and making it work.
We were all Zooming.
We were on Microsoft Teams all the time.
Our website and our social media
became much more educational rather than promotional.
So that's kind of how we proceeded for a few months.
And then we reopened.
So, we've been open for a year now.
We reopened at the end of June in 2020,
and that was kind of a fraught time for us.
So, I will definitely acknowledge that
we are very privileged to be in Vermont,
a place that always had low case loads
and where people had a mask mandate.
And people were pretty good about that kind of thing,
but a lot of our interpreters,
we have a part-time paid interpretive staff of about 50,
and a lot of them are older,
and they fall into that high-risk category.
So there was especially a lot of anxiety for us around that.
And so like, JoAnn, we sent out surveys.
So we surveyed our community, what they would want.
We surveyed our staff,
what they would feel comfortable with.
We surveyed them again and again.
And we talked to all of them over Zoom
and we let them tell us their anxieties.
And we brought that to our Safety Committee.
And then eventually we came up with the plan to reopen.
We did everything we could.
We required masks at all times onsite, even outside,
no exceptions.
And we enforced that.
So, that was really the important part because if you don't,
then it's just not gonna happen.
And it was awkward and it was uncomfortable
and it didn't feel good,
but that's the deal that we made to our staff
when we reopened.
And so that's the deal that we had to uphold.
I wasn't gonna sacrifice the safety of my staff
because somebody didn't wanna wear a mask.
So there was a lot of things that,
I had to do a lot of things I didn't wanna do, that's okay.
We were taking temperature checks,
we were taking contact tracing,
we were asking that people certify,
they followed travel restrictions.
What else did we do?
We have plexi up.
We had air purifiers up.
We had one way flow through spaces.
We had certain spaces that were closed off,
but we are really lucky to have wonderful outside space.
And so, we tried to make as much of that as we could.
So we knew that it might be not the same experience
and kind of a bummer to visit the farm
with a lot of things closed,
with a lot of things looking different.
So that being said, we tried to rethink and redo
what we could.
So we really emphasized our outdoor areas.
This is our sunflower house,
which is bigger and better in 2020 than ever before.
And we had a lot of people come to walk through
the sunflower house and enjoy that space.
We did have our summer camps this year.
We have a very small Summer Camp program
that only has about 15 kids per session.
We have about four or six sessions each summer.
So this picture cracks me up because
it's just like the most COVID picture
with the mask and the gloves.
We weren't really sure about sanitizing
and if it could transfer to animals.
So we were just being as safe as we could.
It was really interesting because
we did more this year with our outdoor space in the winter
than ever before.
So we opened that up for snowshoeing
and cross-country skiing,
and we did s'mores around campfires.
We really tried to use outdoor space even when it wasn't
sunflowery and beautiful as well.
So for a while, it was kind of a whiplash
because we were virtual, virtual, virtual,
and then we were in-person, in-person, in-person.
How can we make this safe and make this work?
And then the fall came and things kind of slowed down
on the in-person end.
And so, we ended up kind of, I should mention this too,
because this is something that I am really, really proud of.
So in February, the Woodstock Elementary School came to us
and they had been doing hybrid in-person
and virtual learning because
they didn't have enough room on their site
to have all of the kids there
and to have all the kids there socially distanced.
They asked us if we would consider having the sixth graders
come to school at Billings Farm.
And we said, "Well, maybe for like a day or two each week,
that may be fine."
And then they said, "No, every day until mid-June."
And we said, "Okay, we'll make it work."
So the sixth graders actually had school here in our space.
This is our activity barn, and this is our theater.
Actually, we usually show like an introductory film.
So the sixth graders came to school on our site every day
for like four months.
So that was really wonderful.
And because the sixth graders
were able to come to school here,
that meant that they could reopen the school full-time
in-person for all of the grades,
because like having the sixth graders not on campus
meant that the fourth and the fifth graders
had enough space as well.
So that was something unique that we were able to do
with the in-person aspect as well.
For the most part,
we ended up kind of in this middle hybrid zone.
So we were doing in-person general visitation.
We were doing in-person some special events.
We were doing some in-person workshops,
the ones that we could do outside.
We really didn't do any inside at all.
But we were also doing virtual field trips.
So this is a picture of me
holding a kind of terrifying-looking artifact
from our collections.
My colleague, Gabby is filming me with some baby goats
for our virtual baby animal celebration.
So as we got more comfortable with the camera
and being on the camera,
we were able to kind of expand our offerings.
We did a Feelings Backyard workshops,
which are workshops for adults around themes of
self-sufficiency and sustainability.
So this is Emory doing a canning workshop,
and we've done a decent amount of those
when we did in-person and virtual.
And that's really where we are,
I think gonna live for a little while.
So we are still open to the public.
We actually had a few school groups come.
I think two school groups came this spring
and we offered them a different kind of experience
than usual, but still an in-person field trip
alongside the virtual field trips.
We really enjoyed the virtual field trips.
A lot of these schools were actually in-person
and still wanted the virtual field trips,
even though they were all together in their classroom,
they couldn't make it.
So I think it's a really wonderful way to extend our reach.
Same with the virtual Billings backyards
people can watch from anywhere
and they don't have to be here in-person.
So, that's really wonderful as well.
I will say it's almost more work to do the virtual stuff
than it is to just do a program in-person.
So, that is one challenge.
It can be a little bit exhausting to,
get the Zoom up and test that and make sure
you know everyone's technology is working okay.
And technology has a way of going poorly
even when you practice everything.
So for example, literally two hours ago,
we were filming something with the sheep
and the sheep ate the microphone.
So when you're on a farm, unexpected things happen.
Claribel was curious about the microphone
and it is no longer with us.
So, things happen that don't always happen
when you're in-person.
But there's pros and cons to everything, right?
I guess some of the challenges,
I will say definitely it's hard to balance
wanting to be a welcoming and inclusive place
with like having so many rules that you need to enforce
and people need to follow.
Again for me, we try not to make rules for no reason.
So having a really good sense of why we were doing this
and that the alternative was that we just weren't open,
helped me to justify that
and to have those uncomfortable conversations
that needed to occasionally be heard.
But I will be very happy someday to not have to ask people,
to pull their masks up over their noses.
And actually, we are having more trouble now,
more than ever.
We are still requiring masks in our indoor spaces
because so many of our visitors are under 12
and actually can't be vaccinated.
And we aren't checking vaccination status,
so we are still requiring masks indoors.
We have gotten more pushback than ever before.
So that's been kind of interesting.
Interesting, indeed.
The other thing is just managing the burnout
of having to rethink everything,
even programs you've done tens of hundreds of times
before you are completely different,
whether they're virtual or,
there's all these safety considerations in place.
And so, there were times last year when I was like,
I just wanna do one thing that I've done before
and it will be the same.
So that has really been the hardest part,
I guess, I would say.
So the lessons that I've learned in the past year
are really, truly, honestly,
the importance of communication with your guests,
your community, your staff, and listening,
and really taking that to heart.
Everyone has different comfort levels, different reactions,
and they're all valid.
Some of our staff didn't feel comfortable
coming back to work last year, and that was completely fine.
We gave all of them that choice.
Some of them who are initially weren't comfortable,
heard from others how it was going,
and then they felt more comfortable.
So, we tried to check in with Zoom at least every month
with everyone just to kind of gauge all of that
and make sure that
people were still feeling good about things
because if they weren't,
then that's rather than just kind of dwell
and feel uncomfortable,
it's something that we could address.
So really that listening,
that empathy for how other people are feeling,
being nimble and flexible
and willing to change what you're doing quickly,
even more so than I'm sure most of us are pretty used to.
Embracing the possibility of failure.
We definitely did things that didn't work.
The only place I was not willing to fail was on safety.
I was like, that's a non-negotiable,
we're all kind of trying new things.
We're navigating these new things.
And so, to fail is okay.
And a really smart person once told me that,
"If you're not failing, you're not doing your job."
And I really liked that.
So we definitely failed a couple of times,
but I think the pros outweighed the cons.
Just kind of getting over that initial fear of,
what if it doesn't work out?
And then really looking at the needs of your community
and filling them.
So for example, with the school.
But one of the resources that we have is space
and is this beautiful outdoor space.
And so we really were able to work with the school and say,
"Here's what we have, can we help?"
And then later they came to us and said, "Yes, please help."
So thinking about what your resources are on your site
maybe you have a lot of space,
maybe you have a beautiful landscape that during this time
we found a lot of people just wanted to come and be outside
and just sit and enjoy.
Maybe you have baby animals who can take people's minds off
some of the more anxious things in their lives.
Or maybe you have a platform and you can share information,
and resources, and elevate other voices
and other organizations as well.
So really thinking about your resources in a different way
and how you can use those
to fill the needs of your community.
Obviously other lessons as well.
But yeah, it was a strange year.
I'm sure all of you are familiar with that.
But I am really proud of what we were able to do
and that we kind of mobilized,
and I think we did a lot of things actually.
So, yeah.
- Thanks, Christine.
I'm so glad that you closed also
with sharing that word nimble,
because I heard that in JoAnn's presentation as well.
And I think people in agriculture
are really accustomed to adapting.
It's one of the things we do really well.
It's just been so key.
And both of you spoke about that with your teams
and just the importance of that nimbleness.
We have about 10 minutes to open it up for questions.
So I wanna invite anybody to either come off of mute
to ask a question of either JoAnn or Christine
or to type one into the chat.
And if you are having any trouble,
this isn't usually a group
that has trouble forming questions,
but if you're wanting a little prompt,
I'm going to offer,
I notice, I like, I wonder as sort of a framework
for how you could address,
how you could shape a comment or a question
for Christine, or JoAnn.
Of course, any kind of clarifying question
is really more than welcome as well.
- Well, folks are thinking,
should I jump in with some of the questions
that we saw in registration
and that have come up during the conversation here?
- Sure.
- [Juan] I have a question.
- Yeah, go ahead, Juan
- We teach children on the farm.
It's called leaf learning about the environment,
agriculture and food.
So we have food programs on the farm now,
and we have one virtually.
So what other suggestions do you have
to keep the children safe and to make them feel safe?
Because some of them don't really understand
why they have to keep on a mask for about two hours.
And of course they wanna pull it down,
and they wanna run around on the farm.
And so, I'm just trying to find some beautiful ways
of explaining to them about safety.
- Yeah. That's a really great question.
We found that kids are actually quite good
about wearing their masks better than most adults, actually,
which is very interesting, even on very hot days.
But I think what we try to do is,
talk about how, you're doing it for others.
And it's really an act of caring about others as well.
And as well as keeping yourself safe.
It's respecting your friends,
and the people that you're around as well.
So that has worked pretty well for us.
Yeah. Like I said, the kids are,
they're pretty good about it in our experience.
Okay. Thank you.
- It's funny because we just had a group here yesterday
and there were,
it's hard for the little ones, especially
because they don't even realize that their mask
is falling down.
But one of the things that actually that my daughter,
she is the STEM Director for Boys and Girls Club
in Frederick county.
And she did this thing where, I don't know how she did it.
I'll have to ask her, but she did something
'cause she's all about science.
And so she was showing them
what was coming out of their mouth and their nose
when they spoke,
like she made it really gross.
I'm just giving you forewarning.
And 'cause she had them make, what's it called?
The goo stuff beforehand.
And she used that I know as part of,
showing them like what was projecting out of their mouth
every time they would talk or sneeze or shout,
and then she had the mask to put over it
and the kids were so grossed out that she, I mean,
she was like, "Oh my gosh,
I think I might've marred them for life."
But you know, they were so grossed out by the fact that
all this stuff was coming out all the time,
that now she has absolutely no problem
with them wearing their mask.
And every once in a while they'll even say,
"Ms. Sadie, do you have your mask on right?"
And they're asking her,
because when she's talking on the phone,
sometimes she'll pull it up when she has to answer something
so I could ask her how she did it.
Like what she used,
if you wanna put your email or something in the chat,
but it sounded very humorous but effective.
So, I don't know.
- Thanks JoAnn, thanks Christine.
Anyone else on the call wanna chime in with tips
for little people and mask wearing?
There was another mask question that came in ahead of time
with the registration form.
And it reminded me of the American Camp Association
and the CDCs Camp Field Guide for 2021.
So I just wanted to link that specifically.
There's a section on mask wearing just what's advice,
given that so many young people under 12
are still unvaccinated.
So just a reminder that this is a great resource
that goes directly to the mask section,
but the other general field guide is here.
And even if you're not running camp per se,
but you're doing programming with the young people
on your farm, this could be a good tool.
That's updated pretty often.
Any other questions for Christine or JoAnn,
anything that resonated with you
about something that they shared?
Thanks to Ellen for that question.
So, Ellen asks,
"I wonder whether there are things you developed
in the last 15 months that you will take into the future
to extend and deepen learning."
- So yeah.
We are definitely going to keep doing the virtual programs.
And I think I'm actually very excited about
where that could go,
especially with the virtual field trips
and with a lot of students in schools
who are maybe in an area of the country or of the world
that don't have a lot of farms around them.
And so, it really is,
maybe they've never set foot on a farm before.
And so, to be that entry
and that explanation of where their food comes from,
we all know that field trips are expensive for teachers.
They're hard to fit into schedules.
So I think the virtual field trips are really exciting
because you can fit that easily into your day.
We don't charge much for ours at all.
And we were doing them for free for awhile.
And the challenge with that is technology, of course,
being able to show the actual farm
with WiFi, and with data, and that kind of thing.
So we have an iPad now that we use for that kind of thing
for Zoom, so that we can go out on the site and show people,
our farm and our animals and what's growing,
but it's less reliable.
The picture isn't as good as now I'm sitting here
with a wired connection.
So fair warning, that is a challenge for farms, specifically
being able to go out onto the farm,
farms don't always have great WiFi or data.
I'm looking forward to exploring that a little bit more
because most of the virtual field trips we did
were kind of like me or one of our educators in the office.
So bringing that authenticity a little bit more
into those virtual field trips.
So we always tried to have an artifact or an animal
or something like that.
So that's what I'm really excited about specifically.
- Yeah, I agree.
We're gonna continue doing online classes
and continuing to offer free
or as-you-can-pay kind of options.
And I think that one of the things
I thought was really interesting was the ethics,
like the conversations that we had around ethics
of conservation and ethics of foraging, for example,
because people went gangbusters with foraging during COVID,
holy mackerel.
And wild places need to be cared for and stewarded.
You can't just go out and take much as you want.
It's almost like capitalism flowed over into foraging,
I noticed.
And so, one of the things that I thought was really cool
that came out of it was that we really worked hard
on an ethics of foraging class.
And now, that's like the groundwork class now
that starts that whole series from now on.
And we offer it as it's own class as well.
And actually the folks at Hood and Mount St Mary's,
they're interested in it.
Sometimes it's easier for people
to have those hard conversations online versus in-person.
I don't know what it is,
but that's just one of the things we discovered.
So my guess is that class will continue to be offered online
no matter what, but also in-person, both.
Maybe people are less judgy, I'm not sure.
And then the other thing too, I would say going forward
is again, more grace,
more compassion,
more patience with each other as team members.
Because even though we're a pretty nice group to begin with
our kindness quotient went up big time during COVID.
The little things that used to bother us.
It's interesting I found
that they didn't matter as much anymore
and we've talked about it.
And I think that that's a beautiful thing
that we're gonna continue working on into the future.
Just really being more intentional about
that kind of reflection as a team
and not feeling like that's the light stuff.
But that it really is the center of what we're doing
so that we can do it well
and with compassion for one another.
So I think that's a biggie that we're gonna definitely carry
in to the future.
Good question.
- Yeah. Yeah.
Great responses too.
It's not that that stuff is not peripheral.
That's so core to us being able to do our jobs well.
Janet had a great question for anyone.
So Christine or anyone who's working with animals,
"Do you have everyone's sign any kind of liability release
or acceptance at the possibility of unpredictable nature
of being around animals?"
And some of the past workshops
that have happened in this series
have stressed the importance of this.
So curious, just sort of what's the ground truth,
checking in this group around what people are doing with
interaction with animals and visitors.
- We do not.
We might for our camps just because the kids
are getting a little bit closer to the animals.
But I also don't know if we might have a different insurance
since we're a site that's open to the public.
So I don't know if anyone else who has a farm,
that's not a site for the public,
they have different experiences with that.
- I'm looking at the question,
"Do you have a liability release?"
We do, actually.
And that was in place before
with the foraging in particular,
because sometimes people just pick stuff up
that they shouldn't be eating without thinking, right?
And so we always made sure that
we have that liability waiver that everybody signs
and then people also, I mean,
we really have just gotten into the habit,
like this last field trip group that we had
I made sure everybody signed the waivers
both online and in-person.
We've been doing.
And all the adults,
anybody that shows up signs to the liability waiver,
but you know, in the end they can still sue you.
But anyway, let's stay positive.
- Yeah. And if anybody missed,
there was a workshop specifically around managing liability
with a insurance provider
that would happen earlier in this series,
but the recording is available on the website.
So definitely check that out
and we can drop that into the chat as well,
or send it out afterwards.
Rebecca, your comment is great.
I'm not totally clear about
who takes the six-week training.
Is that for staff?
- [Rebecca] We have kids who do chores for our animals.
We have varying types of livestock and like fiber animals.
And so, they're trained in what the chore expectations are
for those animals.
And they do that with an adult and a returning member,
and they can go longer if they need to.
But generally, it's six weeks before they're left
to their own to take care of the animals.
- Other questions for either Christine, JoAnn,
or just the group at large here
which has a lot of wisdom in it?
- I'll chime in to touch on the liability issue
and remind folks that many of the states that you're from
have limited liability statutes
specifically for agritourism.
For those of us in Vermont, as of July 1,
we have a brand new Act 31, which is going into effect,
which is a limited liability statute for agritourism.
And like what's happening in a lot of other states,
what it means is there's a warning sign
that should be posted at your farm with specific language.
And that language should also go into any
waivers or contracts or sort of slip that language in
wherever you can,
and that will help protect you.
And it's not specific to animals.
It's all of the issues and possibilities
of things that can go wrong on a farm.
It just helps protect the farmer there,
the farmer and their property.
- There was a question that came up,
in the pre-registration as well, I'll put it in the chat,
but what it really is speaking to is,
how we all young people, junior farmers, or not
are different after COVID
and we've all experienced varying levels
of anxiety or trauma.
And so I'm wondering,
does anybody on this call have good resources?
Or are you doing anything differently
to prepare your staff for welcoming groups of kids
who may be experiencing trauma,
whereas in the past that same summer camp cohort
or something, maybe you didn't need to be prepared
for that type of situation.
Does anyone have action that you're taking
or a resource that you're interested in related to that?
- Yes.
Big answers is yes.
And because we do mindfulness,
just mindfulness in nature kinds of things anyway, here
we start all the different,
well, first of all, I make sure that all the staff
are trained in basic trauma.
Like just the most basic kinds of things,
because we've got all these great connections
with these yoga trauma people here in Frederick.
And so, I usually get somebody to come out
and they're awesome.
But just doing the real basic kinds of things
of acknowledging that everybody's coming with different
fears and anxieties just about bugs, right?
Simple stuff.
We need to be kind to one another,
like basically the biggest role out here is kindness.
And I mean, that is the rule
is we have to be kind to one another
and to everything that's on this land.
And so breathing, like we always start with breathing
because we want to try
and get them in touch with where they are,
like planting their feet where they are.
So at every field trip,
we do this both with adults and kids.
Because adults come with lots of anxieties too.
Just the breathing exercises to begin
and any kind of exercise that we're gonna do,
any kind of class that we're gonna do.
And that acknowledgement that we're all coming here
with different kinds of baggage that we're carrying.
We'll use different language
and that we need to honor that in one another.
And basically, making it plain and making it okay
that people have fears or whatever.
And that seems to work pretty well.
Not getting real fancy or therapeutic or anything like that,
but just real basic kinds of...
- Thanks, JoAnn.
And Tri, yeah, you had your hand up.
Do you wanna weigh in?
- Yeah. I will.
I just wanted to say, so my name is Trinice,
but everyone calls me Tri.
And I do work around restorative justice and social justice.
But I also have a farm.
And one of the things that we look to is
helping people want to set up norms and values.
So having whatever group of students or adults
who are part of it being a part of the setting up
of safety and filling
what do we need in order to feel safe in this environment?
And looking at triggers,
and kind of helping people to identify that
is not so much in their brain, but in their body.
So what does it feel like?
And asking people to remember something positive
and grounding for them,
so that if there's something that's going on for them,
what is something that makes them feel safe?
And can they use that in the moment
to help them process whatever they're feeling.
We also offer the option of opting out.
We talk about how important it is to have observers
to whatever's happening
as well as people who are participating in it.
And we validate wherever people are and in the moment
and try to support them through it.
So those are some of the things that we do.
- Thank you so much for sharing that.
And I'm really interested in digging in.
I will be following up about a workshop that we could create
centered around some of these questions.
So, huge thanks to the speakers, Christine and JoAnn.
You just rocked my day here
and I'm really grateful how you can make the time
to be part of this series.
Thank you to everyone who showed up, Christy, and why am I?
Carrie and Carrie Peck.
Amazing, guys.
Thank you so much for managing all the tech
and just being one step ahead of us at all times,
that was really helpful.
And Lisa, thanks for leading the series.
We hope to see you at future workshops as part of FBEN,
as part of the University of Vermont
workshops around COVID safety.
And we also have opportunities at that link
to have farm visits,
whereas somebody can come to your farm
specifically to walk around
and give you some safety suggestions
as it relates to visitation in general, not just COVID.
Thanks for staying a couple extra minutes.
Really appreciate all of you.
It was great being here
and hope you have a really wonderful rest of your day.
- Thank you so much, Vera,
and thanks to the presenters
and to everyone else for this great conversation.
If you didn't notice it,
there is a link in chat to a short survey
that just asks you,
how did this session work for you?
And what are you interested in the future?
What else should we be talking about?
What would be helpful?
So take a moment to click on that link.
As we mentioned earlier,
we will be following up with an email
so please stay in touch, reach out,
and let's keep this conversation going.
Thanks everyone.
- Thanks everyone.