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| Celebrating Our COMCorps Members
Gad-ZUKES, what a summer! How is it that days are already notably shorter, cicadas are singing, and the landscape is shifting to golden?
When you cultivate a relationship with local food as we have the opportunity to do at CFI, you become intensely aware of the cycles and shifts that shape our environment. We start seeds, nurture the plant, harvest the fruit, and with a little luck get to save some seed for next year. Such an encouraging example of resilience!
It’s amazing -- bittersweet, but amazing -- that we also get to experience this cycle in our human environment through hosting COMCorps members at CFI. COMCorps volunteers have the opportunity to complete one or two years of service with us, after which we try to hold ourselves together while we send them off into the world: seeds that will sprout and grow and carry some part of CFI wherever they go.
We are so proud of Basil, Sierra, and Reggie, grateful for their service, and excited about where they’re heading. This newsletter is devoted to them. These three put in a total of 7500 hours of service, not to mention energy, sweat, & brain and muscle power. They helped us remember to smile, laugh, and breathe, and they truly feel like family. Below we’ve included a digital “scrapbook” in an attempt to visually summarize their terms of service, and we’ve also included quick updates on their awesome future plans. Please join us in wishing them well!
Joy and gratitude,
The CFI team
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| What's Coming Up For CFI's COMCorps
Sierra Faris (below right) served a total of 3290 hours with CFI during her two years of service! Sierra has accepted a position with Sunday Creek Horizons [SCH], which is an organization that advocates for community members of Appalachian Ohio. This means she will be staying in the region -- which is exciting for her and for CFI! In her role she’ll help communicate with Sunday Creek Horizons partners and make sure local organizations are getting the support they need from SCH. She’s looking forward to being their 4th employee and joining their small team.
Basil Stein (below center) served more than 3115 hours with CFI during their two years of service! Basil has been accepted at Sterling College in Vermont, an environmental stewardship college. In August they will be moving to Vermont to complete their degree in sustainable agriculture with a focus in agroecology. Basil’s current plans are to live in VT for the two years it will take to complete their degree, and then head back south where winters are a bit milder. We’ve asked them to promise to keep in touch and visit often! They’re hoping to get involved with the local food system in VT, and are looking forward to spreading the word about CFI.
Reggie Morrow (below left) joined CFI in January of 2020, and just over the past 7 months has served 1064 hours with CFI! Reggie says: “Being a part of AmeriCorps and serving with CFI has truly been a blessing. The work that I have been able to do has challenged me physically, mentally and emotionally; coming out on the other side has made me a better and stronger person with much more respect to how we see, eat and use food. I am happy to be able to continue this work as CFI's new Donation Station Coordinator!”
Did you catch that? Reggie will be joining the CFI team as staff! We are thrilled and filled with gratitude.
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| What Else?
Enormous thanks to Basil, Sierra and Reggie for all they've contributed to CFI and to the greater Athens County community. We're looking forward to seeing what their future brings!
Three new COMCorps members will be joining us in August, and we can't wait to get to know them. You'll be seeing them soon -- stay tuned!
How many other things do we want to share? More than there are seeds in a sunflower.
p.s. Spotlight on pollinators in our Community Gardens below. :)
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