SOIL

It’s About Dirt… and a Whole Lot More

OSU Soil Science professor, James Cassidy (and founder of the OSU student farm) spoke at a Farmer Luncheon at Eugene’s Hummingbird Wholesale. His presentation SOIL: What It Is and How It Works, was music to the ears of the many farmers and employees in attendance. James also spent some time talking about the student farm and pitched some funding opportunities for the club. Please support the student farm at OSU!
Buy a SOIL t-shirt (100% of profits go to the student farm fund) – Soilforward.org

Help them buy a new greenhouse to keep growing the future! – OSU Organic Growers Club Student Greenhouse Fund GoFundMe – https://www.gofundme.com/f/greenhouse-for-oak-creek

Oregon State University Student Farm Turns 20!

The student farm at OSU – the OSU Organic Growers Club – is turning 20 this year! The club was founded by 3 grumpy undergraduate students who felt that the classes they were taking didn’t include enough or any information on organic production methods and decided to start their own student farm on campus and teach themselves! As much a social experiment as a farming project, this 100% volunteer effort has held farm work parties every Thursday night (4:30-Dark – hot supper served at 7:30) spring-fall, and every Sunday morning (Sunday Skool 9-Noon) year-round since 2000! Dozens of students a week come out to the farm to produce veggies and fruit. The produce is sold in an on-campus CSA and at the Corvallis Farmers Markets which has funded the project with little or no support from the university but – that’s what makes it real! Not only are students teaching themselves about organic production, they are also learning about marketing, certification, and business! This is a DIY social experiment in agriculture that is working and I mean WORKING! Here’s 20 years of PROOF!!! – 10,000 students later, hundreds of thousands of volunteer hours later, 10’s of thousands of pounds of fruit and veggies later, 103 summer interns later, 100’s of Service Learning Projects later, we’re STILL growing! …and the students are still LEADING THE WAY!!! Growing their own futures! Students have learned that with land and labor they can create value! That’s not something you learn in a classroom though this lesson makes their classroom work all the more interesting and real and as a result, they are better students! It’s a hands-on, super-charged education experience!

IT’S ALL ABOUT SOIL!!!

And it ALL COMES FROM THE SOIL!!! The great giver of all. Every beat of your heart is energy that was captured by photosynthesis from plants that live in SOIL!!! Every atom that is in your body dissolved out of a rock, was taken up by a plant, and then either you ate it, or your mom did and that’s why you are here, now, reading these words! Now that’s power! And these students get it.
It’s their Future, all we gotta do is help ‘em! Or at least get out of their way!!!

THE PITCH

The OSU Organic Growers Club is expanding our propagation and teaching potential with a new propagation greenhouse at Oak Creek Center for Urban Horticulture in Corvallis. This will allow students to self-fund the next 10 years of students and learning!!! Our students go on to have real jobs in the organic industry, become LEADERS, start their own farms, change their degrees, and are work-ready.
Please help with any amount you can! GoFundMe right now!
Can you spare a few dollars for our Oregon students and their student farm? The OSU Organic Growers Club! We’re still here! Just think, there are little kids out there right now who don’t even know how much the student farm is going to impact them! They are going to love learning about SOIL!!!, Growing Food, & Building the FUTURE!!! One seed at a Time!!!
Please go to our GoFundMe now and shake a little out!!! – ITS FOR THE KIDS!!!

Please help us help them!
FORWARD!!! TO THE FUTURE!!!
Soil!!! There’s no alternative!
SoilForward.org