This summer, the RGK Center awarded several fellowships to UT Austin graduate students who were pursuing an internship with a nonprofit organization. Briana Cohen is an MSSW student at the School of Social Work who was awarded a fellowship to work with Dharma's Garden in Boulder, Colorado. Read her reflection on her summer internship below.
Every season I continue to learn that how we tend the Earth, the places we inhabit, our multi-generational relationships, and our vibrant bodies, is how we tend our lives and vitality.
I am so grateful that this Summer season I am tending the land and farm apprentice program at Dharma’s Garden, thanks to the RGK Nonprofit Internship Fund, caring people, and generous rainfall. Dharma’s Garden is a nonprofit educational farm in Boulder, Colorado, the traditional lands of the Hinono'eiteen (Arapaho), Nuu-agha-tuvu-pu (Ute), and Tsêhéstáno (Cheyenne Nation). As part of my role, I am co-leading the Farm Apprentice Program, which encompasses paid, experiential learning in regenerative agriculture for teens and young adults with the amazing team of Farm Manager Phoebe and co-founders/co-tenders Tim and Kerry.
I appreciate many elements of this work, including that Dharma’s Garden is a place-based, community-focused nonprofit that welcomes people to connect with the natural world, local food, soil, and soul through hands-on stewardship, educational workshops, and gatherings.
The internship is a reciprocal opportunity for me to contribute my skills in nature-based program coordination, community events facilitation, and local farming, while I explore more about what my role is within the farming, nonprofit, and social work/collective care fields.
In my graduate studies, I explore practices and organizations that embody relational care with nature, including our inner and outer landscapes, as part of the stream towards collective health and vitality. Dharma’s Garden is one model for land-based collective and ecological care, as they welcome people to engage in stewardship, leave wild uncultivated spaces for wildlife, and embrace bio-dynamic approaches in cultivated areas to share in food, flowers, herbs, and regenerative practices with the community.
Supporting the emerging generation of farmers, food justice advocates, and land stewards is so exciting, and I appreciate being a part of the leadership team and embracing collaboration. My responsibilities include co-facilitating apprentice farm shifts, organizing experiential learning, running on-site markets, community relationship-building, program communication, spreadsheet tracking, project meetings, co-creating structure, and especially supporting mental, emotional, and overall well-being of those on the farm.
Working with various nonprofits, specifically those that offer nature-based and experiential education, and in different countries, has contributed to my growth in sense of self, community, and place over the past 10+ years. I feel such presence and aliveness when I am working with my physical body, the land, and community, and tending our collective care and ecological health.
Reflection written by Briana Cohen