- Author: Pamela S Kan-Rice
- Author: Rosalie Z. Fanshel
While tasting avocados and blackberries at Kearney Agricultural Research and Extension Center in Parlier, undergraduate students from historically Black colleges and universities got a taste of California agriculture. Participants in the HBCU-Berkeley Environmental Scholars for Change program took a field trip to the San Joaquin Valley on June 13–14. This is the second year that the program has visited the valley.
Six Spelman College and Tuskegee University students and five Berkeley graduate students, postdocs and research staff visited three locations: Scott Family Farms in Fresno, KARE and Allensworth State Historic Park/Allensworth Progressive Association.
Georgia-based Spelman students Sophia Davis, Jada Joshua, Zahriah Sellers and Eslen Trumble and Alabama-based Tuskegee students Emmanuel Fakunle and Evan Fewell are visiting California this summer to participate in the HBCU-Berkeley Environmental Scholars for Change Program.
“As a social science major, it was really fascinating to get a look at the research process of the people working in the applied natural sciences,” Davis said. “For example, I enjoyed learning about pests on farms, the different environmental challenges farmers deal with, and how people working within Cooperative Extension are devoting time to improve lives and labor of Central Valley farmers."
At Scott Family Farms, Will Scott, legendary elder farmer and president of the African American Farmers of California, taught the visitors how to stake tomato plants to support easy harvest.
“I really enjoyed my time at Kearney Ag Center and the experience of trying new fruits and learning about bug trapping and its importance to farmers,” said Sellers. “My experience there emphasized the importance of farmers' rights and their critical work reinforced the need to highlight and validate their efforts.”
At KARE, staff research associate Ryan Puckett led a tour of the facilities and introduced students to UC Cooperative Extension. Nathalie Baena-Bejarano and Reva Scheibner of the Houston Wilson Lab explained their research on tree nut pests, and had the students dissect navel orangeworm moths, or NOW.
“For our NOW dissections, we had the students looking for internal dye in the moths,” Scheibner said. “We rear some NOW on a red diet as a mark-recapture technique. So, we had the students dissect Moth A non-internal dyed and Moth B internally dyed and compare the two. The students were really into it and even asking for more moths to dissect and compare; it was very inspiring to see their excitement.”
UC Cooperative Extension specialist Mary Lu Arpaia described avocado breeding and sensory evaluation in Kearney's postharvest facility.
“It was inspiring to see so many scientists all working on agriculture, but doing unique and very interdisciplinary projects,” said Fakunle.
On the second day of the tour, the group visited Allensworth, a town founded by Black people in 1908. Allensworth was envisioned as the “Tuskegee of the West” to support Black agricultural and economic sovereignty. Members of the Allensworth Progressive Association introduced the town's long history of resilience in the face of ongoing racism by state policymakers and neighboring white farmers. The visitors toured the historic park and APA's demonstration regenerative agriculture community garden, and over lunch learned about the APA's many food, water and economic justice projects.
Rosalie Z. Fanshel and Benji Reade Malagueño, program staff and Ph.D. candidates in the Department of Environmental Science, Policy, and Management at UC Berkeley, hosted the tour. Kristin Dobbin, assistant professor of Cooperative Extension and close collaborator with the APA, joined the group for the second day.
Since 2021, the HBCU-Berkeley Environmental Scholars for Change Program has brought students together with UC Berkeley faculty and their lab members who do research in a wide range of intersecting environmental fields, such as agri-food systems, biodiversity, climate and water, all with a throughline of justice. Spelman and Tuskegee faculty work with applicants and the Berkeley program co-directors, ESPM associate professor Tim Bowles and Fanshel, to match student interests with faculty research projects at Berkeley.
Over the two-month program, visiting scholars conduct research in one or more of these areas with ESPM graduate students, postdocs and research staff. For students interested in pursuing graduate studies, it also introduces them to the UC Berkeley community.
In addition to the research experience, the program develops a community of belonging through mentorship activities that foster relationships with Black faculty, staff and graduate students at Berkeley and connects participants with vibrant Black environmental and cultural spaces in the Bay Area and beyond.
The scholars also partake in interdisciplinary environmental science skill-building and graduate school preparedness workshops, and field trips, such as the recent one to the Central Valley, to garner exposure to a range of postgraduate environmental science career tracks in academia and community organizations.
These are the 2024 projects:
- Davis is working on drinking water access and environmental justice with Dobbin
- Fakunle is working on animal behavior ecology and diversity with Damian Elias, ESPM professor
- Fewell is working on grassland soil ecology and climate change with Laureano Gherardi, ESPM assistant professor
- Joshua is working on environmental impacts of farm-to-school programs with Bowles
- Sellers is working on water access and climate change with Meg Mills-Novoa, assistant professor in ESPM and the Energy & Resources Group and director of the Climate Futures Lab
- Trumble is working on dryland forest co-stewardship and adaptive management with Miranda Redmond, ESPM assistant professor
The first three years of the program were funded by Berkeley Food Institute, UC Berkeley Office of Graduate Diversity and Spelman College, supplemented by the UC Berkeley Lewis & Kala Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Fund (initiated by UC ANR's very own Vernard Lewis), the Maxwell/Hanrahan Foundation, crowdfunding, individual faculty labs, the UC Berkeley BigC fund, and other small entities. Bowles and Fanshel recently received a $414,210 UC-HBCU Initiative grant to fund the next three years of the program.
- Author: Pamela Kan-Rice
Undergraduates from Historically Black Colleges and Universities visit UC for summer session
Na'Zyia Dowdy-Arnold and Destinee S. Whitaker, both of Spelman College, Christopher Bass of Morehouse College, and Carlos Jackson of Tuskegee University spent the summer getting research experience with UC Berkeley scientists. The four undergraduates from Historically Black Colleges and Universities were participating in the UC Berkeley Department of Environmental Science, Policy and Management HBCU Environmental Scholars Program.
“The program aims to facilitate two-way learning while fostering preparedness and belonging for HBCU students interested in graduate school at UC Berkeley,” said co-founder Rosalie Zdzienicka Fanshel, UC Berkeley doctoral candidate.
Now in its second year, the program, was co-founded by UC Berkeley professor Tim Bowles who also co-directs the program with Fanshel in cooperation with Tuskegee University and Spelman College faculty members.
“After two years as a mentor in the ESPM/UCB HBCU summer research immersion program, I was thrilled to witness the transformation of students,” said Vernard Lewis, emeritus UC Cooperative Extension entomology specialist. “This transformation included doing high-level science and increasing the feeling of belonging. The current cohort of four HBCU students have immersed themselves in lab and field sciences that include campus and ANR units. The hope is to expand the program and to increase the talent pool of HBCU students for graduate programs and careers at UC and ANR.”
During their two-month program, the students toured the San Joaquin Valley with Fanshel and Kristin Dobbin, UCCE water justice policy and planning specialist at UC Berkeley. They visited Allensworth, a utopian agricultural community focused on self-reliance in Tulare County founded in 1908 by African Americans, and UC Kearney Agricultural Research and Extension Center in Parlier, where they met Houston Wilson, UCCE entomology specialist.
Near the end of their stay, Lewis and his wife, Lisa Kala, who held administrative, research and teaching positions in UC Berkeley's Graduate School of Education for over 40 years, hosted a backyard barbecue at their Hayward home for the students to meet Black UC faculty, administrators and alumni.
Lewis assembled African American friends Mary Blackburn, Gloria Burkhalter, Bill Stevens, Bilal Shabazz and his daughter Amani, Fred Logan, Ben Tucker, Elize Brown, Gregory Bradley, Vincent Duncan, Maria Shalita, Carol Chambers-Blockton, Jariel Arvin, Frank McPherson and Charles Clary – some retired and others still enjoying long careers – to meet the young scholars on July 24. Harry LeGrande, emeritus UC Berkeley vice chancellor of student affairs who served in higher education for 45 years, joined the group by Zoom.
McPherson, who retired from UC ANR as UCCE director for the Bay Area in February, cooked up hot links, seafood gumbo and black-eyed peas, served with salad and fresh fruit for the occasion.
“It's okay to be different,” Lewis, the first Black entomologist hired at UC Berkeley, told the students. “You're not alone. We're all with you,” he added, gesturing to the older guests, who had described their professional journeys and how they navigated sometimes unfriendly environments. Some had graduated from college amid the civil rights movement of the 1960s.
Blackburn recalled being offered one of four coveted spots in UC Berkeley's new Master of Public Health Nutrition – Dietetic Internship program after graduating from Tuskegee University in 1963. It didn't seem feasible to move since her husband owned his business in Atlanta and they had four young children. But when the Tuskegee University president said she had to go, Blackburn understood that opportunity was not just about her and three days later she boarded a plane to California. In 1968, Blackburn became one of the first Registered Dietitians in the U.S. and completed her Ph.D. in human nutrition and health planning and administration at UC Berkeley in 1974.
“Find your allies; find your advocates,” Blackburn, UC Cooperative Extension's community nutrition and health advisor for Alameda County for the past 33 years, advised the students.
After the barbecue, the students began collecting email addresses and making connections with their new allies on LinkedIn.
“During our feedback sessions with the students, they expressed their appreciation to all those in attendance, especially Vernard Lewis, who orchestrated the event,” said McPherson. “One of the most important takeaways from the event was their desire to have this type of event with accomplished Black administrators and professionals continue to be part of the programming while at Berkeley.
“They also suggest that these events take place earlier, so that they might take advantage of the knowledge and experience these Black professionals bring to the table, not only as they return to their individual institutions and career paths, but also have access to this network while in the Bay Area.”
A week earlier, during a lunch with Blackburn and Lewis, the students had said they appreciated meeting the two accomplished Black scientists and wished they could meet more. That comment spurred Lewis and Blackburn to organize the barbecue. Despite the short notice, several of their Black colleagues attended. “They showed up because they care,” Lewis said.
They will continue to modify the program based on feedback from the students.
The first year of the program was funded by UC Berkeley's Berkeley Food Institute and Spelman College. The second year was funded by the UC Berkeley Office of Graduate Diversity; Department of Environmental Science, Policy, and Management; and donations from other campus programs and individuals. Each student receives a $5,000 stipend, room and board and travel.
Bowles and Fanshel have applied for a UC-HBCU initiative grant from UC Office of the President to continue the program for another three years.