Sault Ste. Marie Hub - Projects
Sault Ste. Marie Hub - Partners
SSM Hub Digital Storytelling
We briefly explore part of our stories in the Digital Storytelling video, and are grateful to have some of our members/ partners speak about their involvement with the project. This video includes the voices of our Algoma Hub – Dr. Nairne Cameron (Algoma University), David Thompson and Lauren Moran from the Rural Agri-Innovation Network (RAIN), Dr. Laura Wyper from Algoma University & NORDIK, Ricardo Velasco Guachalla who is an Algoma Hub Research Assistant, and Marissa Ditoro from the Algoma University Students’ Union. This video would not have been possible without support from Gavin Shields (Thunder Bay Hub).
The People's Garden
The People’s Garden project started as a Community and Economic and Social Development (CESD) Department initiative developed in the Environmental and Community Resilience course and demonstrates how CESD course work generates real-world projects that move outside of the classroom and are sustainable over long periods of time. This project also shows the working relations between Algoma University’s student body and academic departments as the garden has always been run by students with faculty support. Since 2016, the Department of Geography, Geology, and Land Stewardship has supported the garden and made new partnerships in recent years.
Algoma University People’s Garden Launch – Spring 2020
2023 People's Garden Updates
We are excited to share that the new raised garden beds are now on campus! This is an important milestone and we couldn’t be more thrilled. It was all made possible by the collaboration between Algoma University, Lake Superior Living Labs Network, AUSU, The People’s Garden, RAIN, and dedicated student volunteers. The People’s Garden has started transplanting some seedlings they had at the Food Pantry and they are looking great. We believe this will be both an educational and engaging space where people can meet, see the plants growing, and learn about the importance of food security.
2022 People’s Garden Photos
Don McGorman, Laura Wyper, and Amanda Matthews tend to garden plots.
Photo Credit above: Marissa Ditoro
Group Photo following a Planting Ceremony at the People’s Garden
From Left to Right: Lauren Moran, David Thompson, Paulette Steeves, Marissa Ditoro, Laura Wyper, Nairne Cameron, Amanda Matthews
Planting Day at the People’s Garden (Algoma University)
From Left to Right: Marissa Ditoro, Pallavi Bhatia, Amanda Matthews
Foro Internacional de Noviolencia
Laura Wyper and Ricardo VelascoGuachalla from the Sault Ste. Marie hub attended the International Food & Non-Violence Conference in November 2022 as part of LSLLN activities. The following summary and photos are from Ricardo VelascoGuachalla.
Arriving in Cajamarca for the first day of the 7th Non-violence International Forum was a fantastic experience. We met people from different parts of the world, including Colombia, Mexico, Guatemala, Brazil, Italy, Argentina, Venezuela, and others. Similar experiences, challenges and ideas were shared between people from different parts of the world, making us feel closer together.
Since the first day of the Forum one thing was clear, this was not just a group of expositions put together next to each other, this was a space to have a personal conversation, to share our experiences and learn from each other. We learned about seed conservation, exchange, and recovery in South America. We had the chance to see a facility that uses recycling to clean the environment, to provide free access to compost for farmers, and to help students in rural areas have notebooks. We heard the story of how a community at risk of being destroyed by gold extraction rose peacefully and in a celebration of life against gigantic multinational companies, how they were the first in Colombia that were able to stop these companies through citizen consultation, how they celebrated their traditions and defended their way of life.
We then moved to Armenia where the Forum was held at the University Of Quindio. The physical space changed, but the personal conversations were the main ingredient still. Empowerment and freedom, community and collaboration, going back to our roots and sharing our knowledge, rising and taking back what is ours, being sovereign in land and food. These ideas were presented in different conversations, experiences, and contexts; not by planification but as a natural result. Seed exchanges, recovery of traditional knowledge, social justice and reparation, and empowerment through education were some of the similarities we found in what is being done in many countries, including Canada and Colombia. One of the conversations took on the projects of the Lake Superior Living Labs including the promotion of agroecology, seed security, food security, and food education. Freedom and empowerment, seeds for life, sovereignty, and justice were some of the words we wrote after that afternoon as conclusions to some of the conversations held there.
Slow Food International - Terre Madre
Algoma University’s CESD 3406 Sustainable Indigenous, Rural, and Urban Community Development class went to Slow Food International’s Terra Madre event in Torino, Italy in Fall 2022 as a culmination of some Slow Food and LSLLN Projects over the last few years led by Laura Wyper. Students had a wonderful time. This was also Algoma University’s first faculty-led short-term mobility experience through the Global Skills Opportunity Grant.
The Food Bank Farm and Algoma University Cooperation
The Food Bank Farm and Algoma University Cooperation was formalized with the signing of two Memorandums of Understanding in 2018. The first focuses on food sharing, whereby excess food from the People’s Garden during the summer flows to the Food Bank Farm for processing and distribution. In return, during the school year, the Food Bank Farm may make some of their produce available to the University. Additionally, students will have an opportunity to work as volunteers on the Farm and the Farm is also able to share technical growing skills with the students and University. The second agreement relates to Demonstration Projects and Funding Collaboration between Algoma University and its Department of Geography & Geology and the Food Bank Farm. Cooperation in the spirit of this agreement has already begun by the planting of a culinary herb garden at the Food Bank Farm.
The Food Bank Farm also constructed a growth facility within a shipping container in 2020 (below). It is currently producing 36 heads of lettuce, 12 mustard green heads, 75 radishes, 3-4 bunches of kale, and 12 heads of bok choy on a weekly basis. There is continued experimentation for growing kohlrabi, beets, and spinach. Additionally, the water, electricity, soil, and temperature inputs (or self-generation) are being monitored to continue learning the best approaches in the growth chamber.
Bok choy (left middle), radishes (left bottom), and lettuces thriving in the growth chamber which uses grow lights that produce light in the red-blue range of the photosynthetic spectrum.
Photo by Colin Templeton, January 2021
Food Bank Farm early market
Building Resilience Through Food Literacy Video Project
Seven of 23 students from a Community Economic and Social Development Field Placement course (CESD 3017) worked together on a group placement project as a proactive response to a covid-driven work permit situation that developed for international students. This project then brought other students across Algoma University, Nippissing University, and Savonia University of Applied Science in Finland together to create the Building Resilience Through Food Literacy Video Project. Enjoy the five videos below – we hope you find some new inspiration for your kitchen!
Algoma University Urban Farm Education
Algoma University Urban Farm Education, Anishinaabe Binesi Summer Day Camp ran for three summers 2014-2016 and was funded by the NSERC PromoScience Program. It was developed by Algoma University faculty and staff (Departments of CESD, Geography & Geology, and Biology) in partnership with Algoma University’s Anishinaabe Initiatives Division and the Rural Agri-Innovation Network (RAIN). It was a day camp hosting elementary school students, and taught about urban farming and food in a hands-on format within a science-based context, and incorporated Anishinaabe culture and custom teachings.
