Food Studies News
Building a Food System ‘Rooted in Social Justice and Equality’
Nel Gaudé, who was completing a master’s in food studies from Falk College, was working in the kitchens at Falk in March 2020 when the COVID-19 pandemic hit. Weissman, an associate professor of food studies and nutrition in Falk, started looking for ways for Gaudé and other students who lost their jobs to make extra money.
At the same time, Weissman was in conversations with the Lender Center for Social Justice at Syracuse University to create a 2020-22 Lender Center for Social Justice Fellowship for students who would help organizations such as SOFSA determine how food systems in Syracuse could better meet the needs of the community.
So Weissman introduced Gaudé to Maura Ackerman, SOFSA’s facilitator, and they discussed a summer internship for Gaudé, who would support SOFSA activities and build a bridge to the work that would be done by students during their two-year fellowship.
That conversation was the last time Gaudé and Ackerman would see Weissman, who died unexpectedly in April 2020.
“He remains the connective tissue,” Ackerman says. “Going through the process of grieving and mourning Evan’s loss really galvanized all of the folks involved in SOFSA to continue this work as part of his legacy.”
Jonnell Robinson, Weissman’s close friend and an associate professor of geography and the environment in the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs, was selected by the Lender Center to replace Weissman as the 2020-22 Lender Center Faculty Fellow. Following the lead of her friend, Robinson asked the Lender Center for a grant that would pay Gaudé a stipend for their work with SOFSA last summer, and the Lender Center graciously agreed.
“The last time I met with Evan was the first time that I met with Maura, and he connected us and that was the last time I saw him before he passed,” Gaudé says. “Jonnell and Maura, both knowing Evan better than I, knew his concern for his students and his dedication to supporting us, not just in the classroom but in life.”
Last summer and into the fall, Gaudé laid the groundwork for the creation of SOFSA bylaws that were passed in June and will serve as a “guiding document for the organization,” Robinson says.
“So many organizations right now are doing a lot of reflection and trying to undo some of those systems of inequality that have built up,” Robinson says. “This did present us a unique opportunity to think about these issues on the front end and build an organization that was paying attention to this kind of thing right out of the gate.
“This is what Evan had laid out and was really interested to see happen,” Robinson says. “His major vision was that we didn’t just develop a food policy council, but that we developed a food policy council that was rooted in social justice and equality.”
Giving a Microphone to Those With Food Insecurity
With Weissman as one of its founding members, SOFSA was formed in early 2019 and the organization developed this mission statement:
Our mission is to strengthen our food system so that it works for all people in Syracuse and Onondaga County. We bring communities together to foster relationships, develop projects, align resources, and advocate for policies to improve the health of our neighbors and our environment.
But how to get there? That’s where Gaudé–and the Lender Center student fellows–played prominent roles. Gaudé spent several months researching and reviewing bylaws of other food policy councils and looked more broadly at the idea of creating an accompanying document that would outline the organization’s justice and equity principles.
“Nel took on, with gusto, a national scan of what food policy councils use for their bylaws and led us through developing bylaws that were adapted for our local context,” Ackerman says. “We named a committee that worked through the process to make sure that our bylaws fit our ways of operating and our culture and how best to include what we want for our community.”
Gaudé, who points out that it required “many minds, eyes and hearts” to create the bylaws, says the committee’s main goal was to ensure that SOFSA was following its mission and giving voices to the experiences of people who are marginalized throughout the food system.
“People who have lived with food insecurity or are daily victims of racial discrimination, these people know this situation better than anyone else and that wisdom needs to be acknowledged,” Gaudé says. “They need to have the microphone. They need to be telling us what they need and it’s our job to try to do what we can to support them.”
Led by SOFSA project coordinator Steve Ali, SOFSA created a diversity, equity, inclusion and accountability committee that includes Lender Center Fellows Avalon Gupta VerWiebe and Nicky Kim ’24. VerWiebe and Kim helped create an equity and justice statement that’s included in Article II of the bylaws.
“I think that there was a lot of momentum last year to have conversations about this and creating an organization like SOFSA from the ground up that is designed to be a community-wide initiative gave us a perfect opportunity to incorporate anti-racist activities from the very beginning,” says VerWiebe, a second-year food studies master’s candidate in the Falk College. “This opportunity to bring together Native American, Black, white, Latine, rural and city populations in one space to talk about how to affect change in the food system is extremely special and exciting to me.”
Fellows Carry on Weissman’s Vision
The next step for all the stakeholders is to put the vision of the bylaws into practice.
This past April, the six Lender Center Fellows, Robinson, the SOFSA board members and representatives from 15 food system organizations in Onondaga County participated in a training hosted by Soul Fire Farm. Soul Fire, according to its website, is “an Afro-Indigenous centered community farm committed to uprooting racism and seeding sovereignty in the food system.”
The training, Robinson says, helped SOFSA and the food system organizations understand where they stand in terms of engaging in anti-racist activities and that helped set the agenda for the new diversity, equity, inclusion and accountability committee.
“What does the history of inequality in the food system look like?” Robinson asks. “The Soul Fire Farm training did an amazing historical overview to show that there are deep chasms in equality. How, as an organization, do we change that course?”
To that end, the Lender Center Fellows have been participating in new SOFSA initiatives such as the “Chop, Chat, Chill” event that creates a welcoming space to people of color and others who have been excluded from various food planning initiatives; and a Political Coffee Hour event that enabled those from across the food system to meet with local policymakers.
On July 14, VerWiebe and Lender Center Fellow Taylor Krzeminski, a second-year graduate student, joined Robinson at the launch event for FoodPlanCNY, an initiative imagined by Weissman and Matt Potteiger to improve the health of residents through access to healthier food (Potteiger is a landscape architecture professor at the SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry). VerWiebe and Krzeminski led activities asking visitors for their thoughts on how to improve the local food system.
“We’re with the Lender Center for Social Justice, so for us fellows working with SOFSA it’s a wonderful opportunity to engage with an organization in the community that’s trying to establish itself as a social justice-based organization,” VerWiebe says. “SOFSA down the line won’t just be about policy, it’ll be about creating and transforming our community and creating spaces for change, accountability and justice.”
In addition to their work on the bylaws and with the diversity, equity, inclusion and accountability committee, the Lender Center Fellows are supporting SOFSA’s efforts to develop relationships with marginalized communities and learn more about their food stories so SOFSA can focus on projects that acknowledge the communities’ struggles and elevate their causes.
“There’s a particular energy that comes with the framing of this Lender project that Evan left us,” Ackerman says. “That’s his legacy that Jonnell is really committed to–and that the Lender (students) are just incredible advocates for—and they really seem to embody that energy, that vision and the drive to do this life-changing work.”
A Syracuse University News story by Matt Michael originally published on Friday, July 23, 2021.
Food Studies Newsletter
The food studies program in Falk College has just released this year’s newsletter. Food studies, a rapidly growing field of study and practice, encompasses food delivery systems, social stability, human rights, public health, human and landscape sustainability, and urban/regional design and planning. Click on the link below to read about interdisciplinary research and scholarship, student accomplishments, and more happening in food studies at Syracuse University.
Alumna receives Fullbright to study global food cultures
Vivian Whitney, a 2021 graduate with a bachelor in magazine, news and digital journalism from the Newhouse School with minors in food studies in the Falk College and French and francophone studies in the College of Arts and Sciences, is one of four Syracuse University students/alumni to receive 2021 Fulbright U.S. Student Program awards.
Whitney has received the Fulbright/Casten Family Foundation Award to attend the University of Gastronomic Sciences in Pollenzo, Italy, in their Master of Gastronomy: World Food Cultures and Mobility program. The program starts in October and comprises 10 months of actual school-lectures, workshops, tastings and fieldwork-and three study trips-one in Italy, one in Europe and one outside of Europe (COVID restrictions-permitting). The program concludes with a 14-week internship or final research project conducted in Italy. Whitney’s specific master is focused on different world food cultures and systems and how they move and change, with a focus on sustainability and food sovereignty.
Whitney, who has a degree in magazine journalism, aspires to be a food writer. “I’m incredibly interested in food cultures and the when, where, why and how we eat food, especially as it relates to food justice and food sovereignty. I want to, in some capacity, share stories that will help build a better, more sustainable, equal, fair, just, compassionate, delicious food system from production to consumption,” she says. “I have the storytelling experience from Newhouse, but this program will help inform any food writing I do and give me a more global perspective of food, which will, in turn, help my understanding of food culture and systems in the United States.”
“I just love food and all our connections to it, and I want to share those stories,” she says.
Four Syracuse Students/Alumni Named as 2021 Fulbright Recipients | Syracuse University News
Falk College Welcomes New Academic Department Chairs 2021-22
As preparations continue for the start of the 2021-22 academic year, Falk College welcomes two new academic department chairs.
- Dyane Watson, Chair, Department of Marriage and Family Therapy
Dyane Watson, Professor of Practice, began her service as Chair of the Department of Marriage and Family Therapy in July 2021. Her areas of research include the adult couple relationship, the influence of marginalization and oppression on couple and family relationships, therapeutic outcomes for children and families, mental health training and service delivery for veterans and military families, and training program evaluation for mental health professionals.
Falk College thanks Thom deLara, Professor of Practice, who served in this role since 2007. During his time as Chair of the Department of Marriage and Family Therapy, he oversaw the expansion of the department and reengineered the curriculum to specifically meet the needs of children, and of those suffering from trauma across the life cycle. In addition, under his direction the department committed itself to educating students, and mental health practitioners, about trauma-informed care as an integral part of evidenced-based clinical practice. In recent years, his curriculum priorities included the development of a nationally recognized clinical program for educating and training mental health providers to work with veterans and military families and the development and implementation of Falk College’s online Marriage and Family Therapy M.A. degree program.
- Lynn Brann, Chair, Department of Nutrition and Food Studies
Lynn Brann, Associate Professor, will begin her service as Chair of the Department of Nutrition and Food Studies in January 2022. Her research interests include the examination of dietary intake and diet quality of children and adolescents related to growth, development, and health, as well as mindful eating to improve self-regulation in children. She is involved in a research collaboration with a colleague in Public Health examining the environmental toxicants, race, and cardiovascular disease risk in children.
Falk College thanks Rick Welsh, Falk Family Endowed Professor, who has served in this role since 2014 and will conclude his service in December 2021. During his time as Chair, food studies, nutrition science and dietetics programs experienced growth and continuation of excellence in research and internships, as well as a range of study abroad experiences. Food studies curriculum development maintained the program’s focus on social, cultural, political, economic, and environmental dimensions of the global food system. Nutrition curriculum elevated nutrition’s integral connections to public health, medicine, and policy. Under Welsh’s leadership, the two programs have continued to develop and strengthen interdisciplinary research and practice and prepare students to meet emerging trends in both professional fields.
Falk College department chairs continuing their service this year are:
- Keith DeRuisseau, Chair, Department of Exercise Science
- Eunjoo Jung, Chair, Department of Human Development and Family Science
- Lutchmie Narine, Chair, Department of Public Health
- Carrie Smith, Chair, School of Social Work
- Michael Veley, Chair, Department of Sport Management
For more information about Falk College academic programs, please visit Falk.syr.edu.
Falk College honors faculty excellence in teaching, research, service
Three faculty members from Falk College’s Departments of Nutrition and Food Studies and Public Health and the School of Social Work were honored for excellence in teaching, research, and service with 2021 Falk College Faculty of the Year Awards. The honorees, who are nominated by their peers for outstanding teaching, scholarship, and internal and professional service contributions, were recognized by the Falk Faculty Council with awards at the end of the Spring 2021 semester.
Kay Stearns Bruening
Dr. Stearns Bruening is an associate professor of Nutrition and Food Studies, and director of the Nutrition Assessment, Consultation and Education Center. She was honored with the Evan Weissman Memorial Faculty of the Year Award for Teaching Excellence. By attending numerous training sessions and mastering new technologies, she reworked courses to meet distanced and hybrid learning demands due to the pandemic. To provide formats that best met student learning needs and outcomes, she recorded 76 short lecture videos for the Medical Nutrition Therapy course she taught in the fall semester.
Professor Stearns Bruening is a leader in dietetics education and accreditation, sharing new ideas and pedagogical advances with colleagues regularly. She is an active community collaborator, including ongoing efforts with Upstate University Medical College where she co-taught a Food as Medicine Course, creatively delivering the culinary medicine cooking event and demonstration from her own home kitchen.
The inaugural Evan Weissman Memorial Award for Teaching Excellence honors the lifetime commitment of the late associate professor of food studies who engaged students in community-based work to advance social change. Professor Weissman received this same award for teaching excellence in 2016 in addition to numerous other teaching awards.
Xiafei Wang
Dr. Wang is an assistant professor in the School of Social Work. She received the Faculty of the Year Award for Excellence in Research. In 2020, she published seven peer-reviewed journal articles, submitted two book chapters and three articles, and presented two posters and one paper. One of her co-authored papers, “Measuring the predictability of life outcomes with a scientific mass collaboration,” was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. The research findings, which demonstrate her significant commitment to interdisciplinary collaboration, reveal the complexities of child development and encourage researchers to rethink computational predictions’ effectiveness. An active grant writer, Professor Wang received funding through several external grants. She is dedicated to mentoring students to embrace research, creating two undergraduate research positions through the SOURCE RA program. Thanks to her mentorship, the students secured $5,000 SOURCE grant funding.
Brittany Kmush
Dr. Kmush is an assistant professor of Public Health. She received the Faculty of the Year Award for Excellence in Service. Since the start of the pandemic, she continues to apply her understanding of infectious disease epidemiology to benefit the Syracuse University pandemic response as a member of the Vice Chancellor’s Public Health Advisory Council. She coordinated the University’s mass testing efforts instrumental in the fall reopening plan, creating and overseeing the pooling lab with students and other volunteers. She oversaw the information and technology needs of the mass testing operations, working with colleagues from institutional research to ensure a data collection and test reporting system that followed students’ tests from collection, through pooling, and onto the result. An often-sought after expert for media interviews, Professor Kmush continues to be a source of insight into infectious disease dynamics, and strategies needed to undertake them.
Watch Falk College’s Commencement and Convocation Ceremonies
Chancellor Syverud addressed students in the School of Architecture; College of Arts and Sciences; Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs; David B. Falk College of Sport and Human Dynamics; School of Education; and University College during the ceremony Saturday, May 22.
During the commencement ceremony professor’s David Larsen and Brittany Kmush in Falk College’s Department of Public Health both received the Chancellor’s medal for their work helping Syracuse University to successfully navigate the COVID-19 crisis. Their expertise in endemiology and public health ensured that the University’s policies were informed by data and aligned with best practices. The Chancellor’s Medal is the highest honor Syracuse University offers and is rarely given. Both had also received the Chancellor’s Citation for Excellence during this year’s One University Awards for their invaluable contributions, extraordinary work and selfless efforts to ensure a safe, healthy and rewarding residential experience for our students, faculty and staff in the midst of the global COVID-19 pandemic.
Falk College also presented a live virtual Convocation at 11 a.m. ET on Saturday, May 22. Watch the recording below.
Class of 2021 honored with Food Studies Awards
The Food Studies program is pleased to recognize the outstanding work of its undergraduate and graduate students for excellence. Congratulations to our Award Winners!
Food Studies Award winners:
Emma Tyler Rothman
Community Engagement Award
This is awarded to a Food Studies major or minor who demonstrates the ability to create or implement progressive food-based initiatives which engage diverse politics locally, nationally, or internationally.
Emma Rothman began her community engagement journey at the age of 13 with Hearts for Emma. Since then, she has continued pursuit of community engagement. She was the first Engagement Scholar at the Blackstone LaunchPad encouraging students to find ways to create community impact through entrepreneurship. While Emma’s interest in creating positive change in communities extends beyond the scope of food studies but she emphasizes that food is a powerful mechanism for change. Her internship has taken her to Salt City Harvest Farm whose mission is “growing food, culture, and community.” Emma has been the recipient of many past scholarships for her commitment to community engagement and we are proud to recognize her as the Falk College Food Studies Community Engagement recipient this year.
Trinity Benton
Food Studies Culture and Commensality Award
This is awarded is given to the Food Studies major who has expanded the Food Studies program to new audiences by sharing food knowledge and practice through social activism. Trinity is the Kitchen Technician for our culinary programming and earned her undergraduate degree through working and going to college part time. She’s a delight to have around. Always positive and friendly and an excellent student.
Lisa Bush
Food Studies Research Award
This is awarded to a Food Studies major who produces a research project and paper of exceptional quality. The paper should address substantial issues regarding the sustainability of the food system including food justice, human rights or ecological, economic, and social impacts of food production, consumption, processing and distribution.
Nel Gaude
Chef’s Prize
This is awarded to a Food Studies graduate who demonstrates exceptional ability in the culinary arts. This ability should also include food justice and community engagement goals of the Food Studies Program. Nel worked in the culinary industry before coming to Food Studies and was a Learning Assistant for our culinary classes. She is committed to helping her community wherever she resides through her work on making the food system more equitable and sustainable.
Sydney M Taylor
Food Justice Award
This is awarded to a Food Studies major or minor who demonstrates the ability to successfully address food justice related issues through a variety of mediums. Sydney’s practicum work at St. Martha’s Center for Rehabilitation and Health Care embodies the essence of this award. She facilitates the running of the food service to keep the residents nourished, full and content.
Anna Zoodsma (Graduate)
Roseane do Socorro Gonçalves Viana Human Rights Award
Viana Human Rights Award for the best graduate or undergraduate paper on the human right to food, nutrition, and/or health. Selection to be made by a committee: of two or three; headed by someone other than Anni Bellows from the Food Studies Program. Roseane do Socorro Gonçalves Viana, Brazilian nutritionist and right to adequate food activist and writer, left a powerful message of hope and belief in the essential goodness of each and every person, of the need to take on our individual and collective responsibilities to ensure the welfare and dignity of all and for each and every one, that all struggles are important and must be respected, and, most of all, that the voices of the affected must be heard.
Anna’s paper, “Migration as Recourse: The Human Rights of Migrant Women Across the Americas” received the first-place designation in the Graduate Paper category. Anna’s argument that migration should be understood as an act of human rights recourse is powerful and recognized as a very interesting theoretical contribution.
Emma Tyler Rothman (Undergraduate)
Roseane do Socorro Gonçalves Viana Human Rights Award
Viana Human Rights Award for the best graduate or undergraduate paper on the human right to food, nutrition, and/or health. Selection to be made by a committee: of two or three; headed by someone other than Anni Bellows from the Food Studies Program. Roseane do Socorro Gonçalves Viana, Brazilian nutritionist and right to adequate food activist and writer, left a powerful message of hope and belief in the essential goodness of each and every person, of the need to take on our individual and collective responsibilities to ensure the welfare and dignity of all and for each and every one, that all struggles are important and must be respected, and, most of all, that the voices of the affected must be heard.
Emma’s paper, “The Contradiction Between the Largest Anti-Hunger Program in America and Its Mission of Promoting Food Security Self-Sufficiency Among Recipients” received the first place designation in the Undergraduate Paper category.
Congratulations Class of 2021!
Along with Dean Murphy, the entire Falk College community of students, faculty, staff, alumni, community partners and friends, congratulates the Class of 2021! Over the past several weeks, departments across Falk College honored student achievements and celebrated the graduating Class of 2021, which are detailed on individual department websites.
Graduates and families should visit the main page on the Commencement website on Saturday, May 22 at 11 a.m. EST to view the virtual school and college convocations, including the Falk Convocation, and livestream of all Commencement ceremonies. Recordings of virtual convocations will be posted online so that graduates and their families can view them at a later date.
Details about Syracuse University Commencement weekend, May 22-23 are available, including specific information about safety protocols for those attending in person.
“To the Class of 2021, as the newest Falk alumni, you join an accomplished community of socially responsible citizens who can and who must lead change,” notes Diane Lyden Murphy, dean, Falk College.
We know you will lead the way! Congratulations, and best wishes!
Falk College announces the Evan Weissman Scholarship Fund
Professor Evan L. Weissman was a tireless advocate for equity in the food system. A highly approachable, committed teacher who engaged students in community-based work to advance social change, his efforts provided the foundation for many communities regionally, nationally, and beyond for grassroots food justice initiatives.
He passed away unexpectedly while at home with his family on April 9, 2020. To honor his legacy and to continue the work he believed in so deeply, his family has created the Evan Weissman Scholarship Fund. The scholarship will defray tuition costs for food studies graduate students.
As an educator, mentor, scholar, and friend, Professor Weissman was committed to the human condition. He taught and inspired students and colleagues alike by rolling up his sleeves, working side-by-side with them in grassroots efforts, most of which he envisioned and ultimately led, to address food disparities in the Syracuse community. His work continues to serve as a national best practices model for bringing food justice to communities across urban America.
“We know how much Evan loved his students: he was so delighted to see them not only learning in the classroom but also learning in and from the community. He firmly believed that food justice was both a human rights and civil rights issue,” says Marsha Weissman, Professor Weissman’s mother. “In creating this scholarship, we are keeping Evan’s spirit alive.”
Those who would like to make a gift to the Evan Weissman Scholarship Fund can make a secure gift online. To make a gift by check, please make it out to Syracuse University and mail to Falk College Advancement, 427 White Hall, Syracuse, NY 13244. If you have any questions, please contact David Salanger, Assistant Dean for Advancement and External Relations at 315.443.4588 or dasalang@syr.edu, or Megan Myers, Assistant Director of Development at 315.443.1817 or mmyers01@syr.edu.
“Professor Weissman was a dedicated educator and mentor who engaged students by connecting them to real-world experiences, including involvement in his own scholarship, advocacy, and community work to build a more equitable food system. By bringing students out of the classroom and into the world, Professor Weissman’s students became active change-makers for social justice, learning values and skills that will serve them well as leaders of tomorrow,” says Diane Lyden Murphy, Dean of Falk College. “We are deeply grateful to the Weissman family for their meaningful gift. The Evan Weissman Scholarship Fund honors Evan’s legacy and his deep commitment to his students.”
Professor Weissman joined Falk College in 2012 and played an instrumental role on the collaborative team that successfully launched a bachelor of science in food studies in 2014 and additional academic programs since that time. In addition to his service as undergraduate director of the Falk food studies program, Professor Weissman was an affiliated faculty member in Syracuse University’s Aging Studies Institute and the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs’ Department of Geography. He was an active research collaborator at Syracuse, SUNY ESF, and beyond.
He was a founding member and served on the board of Syracuse Grows and served on the Onondaga County Agricultural Council. He was also involved with the Syracuse Hunger Project. His unwavering dedication to these causes also helped launch the newly-formed Syracuse-Onondaga Food Systems Alliance (SOFSA), a multi-sector coalition of stakeholders from across the food system in Onondaga County.
His scholarship was directly and consistently focused on equity, diversity, and inclusion through community-engaged, participatory teaching. Shortly before he passed, Professor Weissman was awarded Syracuse University’s Lender Faculty Fellowship. This project continues with the leadership of his colleague and friend, Maxwell School Professor Jonnell Robinson and student fellows focused on creating a local food system that prioritizes access, sustainability and resiliency.
The newly created scholarship honoring Professor Weissman will support current and future students in advancing his life-long commitment to food justice and using food as a tool for social change.
Forests of Food in the City of Syracuse
Prospective students in search of an interesting college major might come across “food studies” and imagine an appealing mix of skills that could lead to a career as a chef, nutritionist or cooking show host. But food studies is actually something quite different. It is one of the fastest-growing fields of study in North America, preparing students for careers in policy analysis, research, marketing, community outreach and more. Syracuse University’s Falk College has taken food studies to new levels of relevance, encompassing everything from food delivery systems to social justice, public health and policy, landscape sustainability, urban design, and human rights.
These days, you’re likely to find food studies students scouring parks and forests for edible plants, accompanied by student researchers from a variety of other disciplines. They are all part of the Syracuse Urban Food Forest Project (SUFFP), an interdisciplinary research initiative between Syracuse University and the State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry (ESF).
Led by Falk College food studies professor Anne Bellows and ESF professors Stewart Diemont (environmental biology) and Matthew Potteiger (landscape architecture), the two-year undertaking examines the connections between ecological and human systems in the urban forests along the City of Syracuse’s southwest side. Poverty, food insecurity and chronic health issues are prevalent along this corridor, but the wooded areas there contain a surprising number of edible plants that can be harvested for human consumption and other purposes.
“This is a project that is about making connections—across the disciplines of ecology, food studies, design, traditional environmental knowledge—and the very fundamental connections between people, food and place,” Potteiger says. “It has opened up opportunities for students from these different fields to collaborate and engage directly with communities.”
The pilot project will assess the existing and potential ecological productivity and community engagement around managing and harvesting edible plants. The team is developing designs for how to increase the availability of wild edible plants as well as shared foraging knowledge about them and public access to them. A longer-term goal is to have connected “edible ecosystems” across Syracuse to benefit city residents, plants, animals and landscapes.
“Interdisciplinary and multi-institutional collaborations are key to resolving societal challenges such as food insecurity, environment and global climate change,” says Interim Vice Chancellor and Provost John Liu. “The collaboration here between Syracuse University and ESF researchers is an excellent example of working together to generate synergy.”
Foraging for Answers
The group’s research seeks to answer a number of questions. What are the best (and worst) practices to employ when managing urban food forests, and to what extent should the community be involved? What funding is necessary to maintain the forests over time? And what lessons can be learned from the urban food forest in Syracuse? The challenges include water access, invasive species, vandalism, contamination and funding, to name a few.
Seed funding from a Syracuse University Collaboration for Unprecedented Success and Excellence (CUSE) grant and an ESF McIntire-Stennis research grant made it possible for the faculty to build interdisciplinary teams to advance their research.
Additional funding came from the Syracuse University Office for Undergraduate Research and Creative Engagement (SOURCE). The SOURCE provides grants of up to $5,000 to fund projects designed and implemented by undergraduate students guided by faculty mentors. This year, the SOURCE has also allocated funds for a pilot faculty research assistant grant for faculty mentors to hire undergraduates for remote work that supports their ongoing research. This enabled Bellows to hire food studies students to work as research assistants for the project.
“Including undergraduate and graduate students brings enthusiasm and energy that goes beyond completing assigned tasks and pushes the project beyond our field of vision,” Bellows says. “They tie the field work into their diverse curricula and seamlessly incorporate classroom, research and service in their SUFFP engagement.”
Student Engagement and Research
One research assistant is Lisa Bush ’21, a senior from Canton, Connecticut. “As a food studies major, the idea of having a food forest in Syracuse is inspiring,” Bush says. “It allows people to source locally grown ingredients for home use, encourages community participation and helps bring food to those who are food insecure. The SUFFP also provides a way for the Syracuse community to utilize locally grown ingredients rather than purchasing from an outside source.”
Bush consolidates information, reviews similar projects in other locales and brainstorms ways to get the community involved in SUFFP through school, community and social media. She believes that her work on the project will resonate long after she graduates. “I’ve come to realize that the collaboration of different minds, schools of thought and backgrounds creates an impactful, quality project,” she says. It has opened her eyes to the amount of work and collaboration a community project like this demands. “It’s been an invaluable experience, and as I move forward in my career, I hope the skills, research methods and thought processes I have gained will be put to good use.”
Briana Okebalama ’22, from Alpharetta, Georgia, is majoring in earth sciences through the College of Arts and Sciences and pursuing an integrated learning major in environment, sustainability and policy through the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs. “Learning about the food forest has broadened the scientific knowledge related to my major,” she says. “And connecting with the community as a way to address food insecurity has added to my knowledge about environmental policy.”
Okebalama’s role as a student researcher is to expand community outreach and engagement for the project. Working with community partner Antonisha Owens, she created a newsletter containing information about the project’s history and background on products that can be foraged locally. Also included are photos of food foraging walks, recipes and upcoming SUFFP events.
“Having the opportunity to work within the local community is especially important when you consider the privileged environment we inhabit as students,” Okebalama says. “It’s good to step back with an understanding of and appreciation for the community and use it to benefit that same community. With senior year approaching, I feel this has really helped me progress as a student. I’m gaining excellent skills that will also help me build a resume.”
Grace Taylor, an ESF senior majoring in environmental studies, assists in the project by creating interpretive materials like annotated maps, waysides and workshop plans for foraging. “I’m trying to understand what will appeal to the broader community,” she says. “I want my materials to guide those who were initially interested in the project, but I also want them to be useful for those who stumble upon our foraging sites by chance in the years to come.”
An Unusual Introduction to Syracuse
For Marie Claire Bryant, a graduate student pursuing an M.S. in food studies at Syracuse University, the project has unfolded in unexpected ways. Bryant moved to Syracuse after working on urban agricultural projects in Nashville, Baltimore and Washington, D.C., and she started working on the project at the height of COVID-19 precautions. While no restaurants or other venues were open, she was still able to participate in foraging, which happens in small groups outdoors. “Being introduced to Syracuse through foraging was really exciting as a food studies student,” she says. “We have found so much naturally growing food that we didn’t expect. One time we came across a large patch of water mint and watercress growing together in a stream. A ton of it! The aroma of the mint hit us suddenly and we realized what we had found: fresh, edible greens growing naturally in an urban forest. People need to know that there is food growing right in their neighborhoods.”
The thrill of discovery is only the beginning. “The next step is learning how to responsibly harvest so that the food source doesn’t disappear, which is a major part of what we hope to instill in the entrepreneurs we work with,” Bryant says. The group has also applied for grants to purchase hundreds of trees to be planted by local youth in conjunction with existing youth empowerment organizations. “As a graduate student, my focus is on land governance, foraging on public land, and the laws and social dynamics that challenge growing food and harvesting on cooperatively owned land. My interest in the project has grown immensely since I got involved, and I am so grateful for this experience.”
Growing Community Connections
Antonisha Owens, an entrepreneur who owns a salon on the South Side of Syracuse, joined the project as a community partner. She learned about the SUFFP from Cimone Jordan, a planner for the City of Syracuse Department of Neighborhood and Business Development, and decided to join the group on one of their many foraging walks. “I was amazed at how many of the ingredients I use in my natural products can be found right outside my door,” Owens says.
After learning how to microbraid her own hair when she was 16, Owens quickly developed a following of loyal customers. She earned a cosmetology license and opened AficaPure Artisan and Hair Clinique, a hair salon and boutique where she styles hair, provides beauty treatments and sells her line of homemade natural beauty products—soaps, scrubs, shampoos, conditioners and body oils.
She loves learning to identify and harvest the plants that grow in local forests, like water mint, burdock root, rose hips, wild basil, paw paw fruit, juneberries and many more. “A lot of the ingredients I use in my beauty products are costly because I want the best quality, so it helps to find them in nature for free,” she points out. Someday, Owens hopes to start a small farm where she can grow her own ingredients. “I want to work together with nature to provide cleaner, safer products in an ethical and humane way.”
Food studies professor Anne Bellows has been amazed at the cooperative spirit of the community partners, students and faculty that has made this undertaking flourish. “The Syracuse Urban Food Forest Project has developed, survived, and is blossoming because of a network of actors and interests that sustains us individually and as a group,” she says. “It is in the synergy of the alternate waves of creativity, insight and productivity that we find inspiration in the pure camaraderie and fun of working together.”
~ A Syracuse University Story by Mary Beth Horsington originally published on March 30, 2021
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