How we operate

The Student Farm has evolved to operate in a unique manner that fits the needs of our garden and farm production systems as well as our experiential learning mission. We are a community of learners with a shared vision that we work towards daily. 

Our stated operating principles are those of the Agricultural Sustainability Institute and can be accessed here.
 

Our Leadership Values

As a community, we have developed nine Student Farm Leadership Values that we strive to model and support within our community. These were identified and articulated with input from Student Farm volunteers, interns, student employees and permanent staff in 2014.

1) Good Communication -- including ability to provide and receive feedback, give clear directions, delegate effectively, admit when wrong, and listen well.

2) Strong Work Ethic – including reliability, follow-through, responsibility, efficacy, efficiency, and organization.

3) Knowledge Acquisition – reflected by continued self-education, nurturing the beginners’ mind, development of effective teaching style, and providing space for sharing amongst student farm participants.

4) Initiative – including self-direction, ability to identify new tasks, willingness to take on mundane tasks and problem-solving, both possessing and stimulating a feeling ownership and responsibility for the Student Farm as a whole.

5) Organization—such as ability to prioritize, manage time, put away equipment, and pay attention to cleanliness where it is critical.

6) Care for Community – including focus on relationship building and establishing a healthy place for people to interact with one another and the environment.

7) Kindness – reflected by empathy, compassion, thankfulness, supportiveness, and patience.

8) Good Humor – reflected by joy, fun, flexibility, laughter, love of work, and the ability to enjoy and share difficult or tedious tasks.

9) Vision—ability to think about the big picture, even while involved in the mundane or tedious, tempered by realism and pragmatism.


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