Welcome to my Professional ePortfolio!
A Collection of Personal, Professional & Academic Projects, with My Personal Reflections for Context!
Who am I ?
Lifelong Learner
I am a lifelong learner! My personal, professional and academic path has been curvy, complex, and spans decades. I am a Mom, an entrepreneur, and a student. I also consciously strive to be an effective critical thinker, problem solver, leader and a team player.
I love learning! In May of 2022, I graduated with a 4.0 GPA from the MS Information Design and Technology Program at SUNY Polytechnic Institute, along with multiple transcripts and degrees in different disciplines from Davis & Elkins College (Theater), SUNY Morrisville College (Agriculture AAS: 3.62 GPA), Mohawk Valley Community College (Business AAS: 4.0 GPA), and SUNY Polytechnic Institute (Interdisciplinary Studies BA: 3.95 GPA). I am currently enrolled in the MBA Technology Management program at SUNY Polytechnic Institute.
I am my best self, when I am involved with a food security cause or project that helps people learn how to utilize critical thinking to solve complex problems by using interdisciplinary methods. I want to live a positively, impactful life on this planet. I want to be on "Team Human"! Check out Douglas Rushkoff's podcast and book, "Team Human".
Farmer
I own a small farm called Underground Greens, where I breed, grow and produce specialty plants year-round. While we have reduced production since the COVID-19 pandemic, we plan to expand our plants, produce and products in the spring of 2024.
Underground Greens provides customers with a unique, diverse, variety of plants and produce, not often found in local stores. Microgreens, multi-colored tomatoes, and peppers with a range of colors and heat levels, from purple sweet peppers to rare, superhot peppers, like the Trinidad Scorpion and Carolina Reaper.
Underground Greens’ product lifecycle results in nearly zero waste. Plants and produce are grown from seed in our own soil mix. They are then harvested and sold as produce or plants, or transplanted into the greenhouse or field to grow on. Greenhouse and field plants result in more harvestable product that is sold, and the rest goes to “seed”. Seeds are harvested from unsold produce, and “leftover” plants are put into compost piles. The compost piles, incorporated with leaves and worms, provide Underground Greens with an important ingredient for the soil mix.
My mission is open a 2nd site to localize food production (growing, harvesting, packing, canning), food jobs, and food knowledge (shared knowledge through hands-on workshops), by developing a custom farm model for upstate New York and building a regenerative, soil-based, vertical farm in an old, nuclear fall-out shelter, on a beautiful canal, in the middle of a food desert, where the people need it the most.
Food Security Advocate
My Vision: To Develop a Farm Model which Creates a Sustainable Source of Produce & Knowledge to Solve Local Food Scarcity.
My passion is teaching people how to grow their own food through my workshops, which I often offer free in my community!
Underground Greens offers a series of workshops created by using an Interdisciplinary Approach to Develop a Series of Hands-on, Critical-Making-Centered Experiences in an Effort to Create a Sustainable Source of Plants and Produce, Develop Food Knowledge & Mitigate Food Scarcity in a Local Food Desert.
Workshops include:
- You Can Grow: Microgreens
- You Can Grow: Seedlings
- You Can Grow: Transplanting
- You Can Grow: Upcycling
- You Can Grow: Student Farmer’s Microgreen Production
- You Can Make: Microgreen Salad NEW for 2024!
Coming Soon!
- You Can Make: Salsa
- You Can Make: Hot Sauce
Photo Gallery
