The Agricultural Community Resources for Everyday Sustainability (ACRES) student farm will not be in operation during the 2024 growing season.
As it currently stands, the ACRES student farm will not be operating during the 2024 growing season due to faculty oversight.
“We’ve lost two of our Horticulture people in the last year. We lost one to retirement and one took a new position in Colorado,” Kniss said.
“Dr. Norton is going on sabbatical beginning in August, so we are not going to run the student farm kind of in typical operation this year,” he said. “This year we will be mainly focused on the maintenance of the land to make sure things don’t get out of control.”
ACRES operates a 1.8 acre vegetable farm that is run by students and volunteers.
“It’s a student operated and run farm that acts as a transition from the classroom to the real world,” said Professor Ursula Norton, “students have first-hand opportunity to learn, make mistakes, and have successes in growing food at high elevation; 7200 feet above the sea level, which is quite a challenge.”
The produce generated by the farm is distributed to various places in the Laramie community.
“There are years where they sell it at the farmer’s market down in downtown Laramie. There have been years where they have donated the food to various Community organizations. They have grown pumpkins that have gone to altitude to brew a pumpkin ale,” said Plant Science department head Andrew Kniss. “The fact that it’s a student-run organization allows the students active in any given year to have the ability to determine where those the produce goes from that year.”
Despite the student farm being put on hiatus, the ACRES student club will still be hosting its biweekly meetings as usual.
“I think it’s a great club. I think it’s a great community. The common denominator is that we all care about food system sustainability,” said Norton. “We had a couple of students who met at the club, worked at the farm, and then got married. They now have their own farm in North Carolina” she said.
Just like growing crops, Dr. Norton says that the club grows friendships for life.
