The conventional agriculture that we’re so familiar with produces high yields, but at the cost of an unsustainable impact on human health, the environment, the economy, and the social fabric. Surprisingly, even organic agriculture is usually not fully sustainable.  Enter the concept of the living soil, as developed by Dr. Elaine Ingham, one of the world’s leading soil biology experts.  Basically, it holds that with the proper balance of soil bacteria, protozoa, fungi, nematodes, and microarthropods, any soil in the world can provide all the nutrition required for a healthy crop.  This track teaches students how to prepare the compost and compost tea required to restore that nutrition to soils, first through hands-on class work and then fieldwork on a practicing farm.

Courses:

SL-G195 Living Systems

SL-g201 Ecology

SL 5350 Plant Biology

SL -A301 Living Soil

SL – 401 Planning a Family Farm (recommended)

The Fundamentals of Sustainability track starts from the awareness that “sustainability” is a concept that is used differently by different people, institutions, and governments. In fact, it is a normative concept, meaning that it is based on human definitions of “norms.” Another way of putting this is that the various definitions of sustainability come from various ways of answering, “what is it that we are choosing to sustain?” How a person, institution, or government answers this question depends upon their understanding of equity, ethics, philosophy, and spirituality. Therefore, the Fundamentals of Sustainability track focuses on these foundational belief structures as a way of understanding the myriad conceptions of “sustainability” at work in the world today. Perhaps a more eloquent way of putting it comes from Wendell Berry:

Before going further, we had better ask what is it that we humans need to know. We
need to know many things, of course, and many kinds of things. But let us be merely practical for the time being and say that we need to know who we are, where we are, and what we must do to live. These questions do not refer to discreet categories of knowledge. We are not likely to be able to answer one of them without answering the other two. And all three must be well answered before we can answer well a further practical question that is now pressing urgently upon us: How can we work without doing irreparable damage to the world and its creatures, including ourselves? Or: How can we live without destroying the sources of our life? (“The Way of Ignorance” p. 59)

The energy track is for students who want to go into greater depth about energy and sustainability. Currently, Energy 101 is offered every year, and Energy 201-203 are offered in two year rotations. Good basic math skills, including addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division, working with decimals and fractions, basic trigonometric relation of angles, areas, and volumes, basic algebra, and simple statistics like averages and mean, are needed for deep understanding and success in these courses. The suggested sequence of courses for the energy track and descriptions of each course are listed below:

• Energy 101: Energy and Sustainability: The Energy Basis of Humans and Nature
• Energy 201: Renewable Energy Technology: Solar, Wind, WaterPrerequisites: Energy 101, Math for Sustainable Living, Physics and Chemistry for Sustainable Living or permission of Instructor
• Energy 202: Renewable Energy Technology: Biomass, geothermal, fuel cells, batteries, Power electronics, transportation technologies, other misc energy conversion pathwaysPrerequisites: Energy 101, Math for Sustainable Living, Physics and Chemistry for Sustainable Living or permission of Instructor NOTE: It is recommended, but not required, that students take Energy 201 before taking Energy 202
• Energy 203: Modeling and Monitoring Energy FlowPrerequisites: Energy 101, Math for Sustainable Living, Physics and Chemistry for Sustainable Living or permission of Instructor

Policy is extremely powerful. There are ample technical solutions available to transform society to sustainability. But all too often there are blocks to implementation at the policy level. In the Policy and Governance track students seek to understand how those blocks are rooted in human consciousness and psychology. Students study the strategies that can be adopted to shift society’s mindsets and what policies large organizations, especially corporations and governments, can adopt to create a sustainable future. In the process, issues of food and water security, energy and climate stabilization, and many others are addressed from local to international levels.

The agricultural track is for students interested in working to create food systems that nourish and sustain communities. Students learn about sustainable agriculture, organic agriculture and going beyond organic to food production that is regenerative – an agriculture that renews the land, people and communities. Students learn about the living soil, taught by world-renowned soil biologist Elaine Ingham. Season extension is another important subject for temperate climates; students learn about greenhouses, passive solar hoop-houses, low tunnels and other ways to grow food earlier and later in the season. A farm planning course enables student to create a business plan for an economically sustainable farm. Practical hands-on courses and internships on organic farms give students real life experience. Possible job opportunities for graduates of this track include: organic farmer, farm manager or assistant farm manager, community garden manager, Farm to School coordinator, Buy Fresh Buy Local coordinator, School Garden Program Manager.