Eastern Upper Michigan Sustainable Agriculture Curriculum Initiative

As interest in sustainable agriculture is expanding, opportunities for young people to gain exposure to food production is often limited by lack of available educational opportunities. This is the case in Michigan’s Eastern Upper Peninsula (EUP), where Bay Mills Community College (BMCC) is located, and is even more lacking among Native American youth. One of the challenges facing agricultural today is, “The days when agriculture-related employers could expect to hire new employees with farm backgrounds are over. There are not enough “farm kids” available. Even the land grant institutions in farm states are largely and increasingly populated by students with urban and suburban backgrounds.” (National Research Council, 2009, pp. 17-18) This reality is of particular concern for Native American communities in Michigan as they: 1) do not have significant recent agricultural involvement; and 2) are the least represented ethnic minority group when looking at baccalaureate degrees awarded in agriculture and natural resources in the United States from 1995-2007. (National Center for Educational Statistics Completion Reports)

In Michigan’s EUP, there are no FFA programs or agriculture educators in the K-12 schools; local schools and the regional ISD currently lack the capacity to develop sustainable agriculture curriculum. Bay Mills Community College, and its partners, propose the development and implementation of a sustainable agriculture curriculum targeting middle school students that incorporates Native American values, and partners with local agriculture interests to provide regionally relevant, classroom, and hands-on learning opportunities. Additionally, we propose K-12 teacher professional development targeting sustainable agriculture concepts for their classrooms.

Since our last meeting, we have brainstormed efficient avenues to grant objective completion given the time and scope of remaining tasks until October 31, 2023.

Rather than reinvent the wheel regarding the curriculum that had been created prior to staff changes on the team, we are in the process of tweaking previously submitted curriculum documents in ways they have been in juxtaposition to indigenous epistemologies about reality and history. One of the contributing developers, Abbie Palmer, has expressed interest updating her contributions along those lines. Rather than pepper what has been built from a non-indigenous framework with Anishinaabe values, we are creating an additional module of indigenous science lessons to be titled “Indigenous sustainable agriculture and food sovereignty (or food systems).” The title will evolve as the lessons are created. The module as a whole would serve to present a larger framework of interconnectedness within indigenous perception and worldview and be pragmatic in that I will create lessons that will be useful to Bay Mills Indian Community at the Waishkey Bay Farm. The lessons will benefit teachers nationally as publicly available and yet still have risen from local tribal needs of this tribal farm. Lessons will have indirect ties to the other modules that have already been created.

We also propose to engage a minimum of 6 farm experiences for students this spring. 3 classroom settings and 3 field trips bringing students to farms. We are also on target to host an agricultural career fair locally for students this fall season. Additionally, we are looking into sponsorship for tribal youth participation in agriculture conferences or similar opportunities that are hands on experiential.

I am scheduled to provide two farm experiences for the youth track grades 7-12 at the Michigan Indian Education Critical Issues Conference March 2023. These two workshops will be included in the classroom farm experiences 2/6 total minimum. The theme of this year’s conference is Aanji-aki: The Changing Earth and Indigenous Adaptation:Indigenous peoples have adapted to changes on Shkakimikwe (Mother Earth) since time immemorial. We value repatriation as core to the revitalization of our traditional education systems. These traditions will help us bring our world back into balance as we restore healthy relations, especially for those who are most vulnerable, including women, children, and two-spirit. We will adapt to climate change as we continue to find our identity as rooted in Shkakimikwe (Mother Earth).
I have created two lessons for the curriculum that will be tested out in these workshops. The first is an experience reclaiming seeds as relatives. Students will engage hands on relational experience with our sacred seeds. Youth will engage a service learning project with Anishinaabemowin language and cultural teachings while processing relatives from a local 4 sisters tribal garden. We will engage arts based methods of discovery through nanda-gikenjigewin, indigenous science. In support of a local tribally owned farm, Three Dogs Seed Farm, I am purchasing the time the tribal farmer has dedicated to caring for these relatives and in return she is giving me plants that I will introduce workshop participants to and facilitate the building of a relationship with as they process the harvest. They will also express the relationship on blank seed packets through their own artistic expression. The completed seed packets will be gifted back to local tribal seed banks as well as the Waishkey Bay Farm.

The second workshop will be titled: Fun with Food Soverignty! A hands on relational Anishinaabemowin rich experience with various avenues to food sovereignty. Youthparticipants will engage centers based experiences with relatives in creation that have taken care of the human beings since original instruction. We will engage arts based methods of STEAM discovery through nanda-gikenjigewin, indigenous science. Indigenous STEAM centers on reconnecting the next generation to their relationships with the rest of creation and sustenance from Mother Earth as we adapt with resilience.
Centers will include pilot studies of indigenous STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, and Math) lesson plans for the indigenous unit. A digital classroom slide will be projected with interactive video links. Students will be able to explore a lesson involving the Mikinaak shell Anishinaabe calendar, seeds as relatives, and a bison activity regarding the relationship bison have in support of the plants in their biological tilling intelligence of hoof structure. There will also be exposure to the interconnectedness of plants and bees. All of which will be included in the SARE curriculum Indigenous Science and food systems/sovereignty module to accompany the lessons previously created before I assumed this position.

One of the lessons mentioned connects to a larger project that I’m working to manifest for the Waishkey Bay Farm. Student field trips are in process whereby youth can take part in the inspirational connected engagement of agricultural career capabilities at our Tribal farm. I have worked with a mechanical engineer to draft a life size turtle shell calendar experience. We are going to plant an interactive pollinator tea garden within 13 raised beds that represent the 13 moons of the year with a walking path measuring out the 28 days of each moon. This is the true scientific calendar of Anishinaabeg. I am working on creating lesson plans that involve hands on experience of this non-linear measurement of time for a planting calendar that engages seasonal activity.

I have enrolled in Rowan White’s Seed Seva mentorship program to seek new inspiration for lesson plan creation within the indigenous farming scope and sequence as it can benefit Waishkey Bay Farm and Bay Mills Community College as well as the larger community as a whole. I am also enrolled in the American Indian Art Institute’s Indigenous Bee Keeping Stewardship Program to work toward inclusion of indigenous science based apiary lessons to include in the module that will directly improve our Waishkey Bay Farm Experience.

I have established a relationship with Orv Kabot of Circle K Bison Ranch in Rudyard, MI. I’ve built my relationship with Bison in order to create lesson plans for this curriculum and am working with Orv to plan youth student experiences at his farm this summer. I have tentative schedules with the Sault Tribe Youth Program grades 3-8 to experience both the Bison Ranch as well as the Mikinaak (turtle) shell planting and seasonal calendar. I also have plans in the works with classes from Brimley Schools, Sault Area Middle School, JKL Bahweting Middle School. And I will be teaching one of the lessons on Earth Day in April to a number of local Girl Scout troops within the target age group.