Fall Field Trips Underway

Carrots for Kids!

Over six hundred public elementary school children from 30 classrooms in Northampton and Easthampton
are taking fall school field trips over two weeks to experience Crimson & Clover Farm in Florence. While at the farm, students will have the opportunity to help with the fall harvest, explore the farm fields, and gain a deeper understanding of where their food comes from.

While most of these students have thriving educational gardens at their schools, many have never spent time on a vegetable farm.

Hope Guardenier, Co-Director of The Farm Education Collaborative, which runs the trips, said “The scale of a working farm makes a deep impression on kids of all ages, and helps them connect the experience of getting their hands dirty in a school garden or on a field trip with larger questions about how and where their food is produced.”

Students and teachers will decide whether to donate the produce they harvest, cook it their classrooms, or share it with their families.
With contributions from individual donors and grants from the Northampton Education Foundation and River Valley Co-op, the field trips are funded by Grow Food Northampton, which owns the Northampton Community Farm and leases land to Crimson and Clover Farm.
Clem Clay, Grow Food Northampton’s Executive Director, said “These field trips are a rich and thought-provoking experience, one that promotes more learning in the classroom and conversation at home, helping us to raise awareness about the benefits of growing food locally and making it affordable for everyone in our community.”