Staff Perspectives on DEI

How do you aim to approach your work in Erie County to engage authentically with diverse audiences?

Garden-Based Learning

We aim to approach our work authentically realizing that we all have different perspectives and experiences. In serving our community, we want to respond to the whole person recognizing that they likely have encountered trauma and that healing needs to take place on several levels. We also strive to:

• Be available to partners to allow them to access the Extension resources that they need in ways that are appropriate for them.
• Support transformation of our Extension Association to support these efforts.

SNAP Nutrition Education (SNAP-Ed)

The SNAP-Education team believes that everyone is an expert in their food journey, and all people deserve access to nutrition education and its power to prevent disease, regardless of socioeconomic status. We open our classes with questions that welcome participants into the learning space and our sessions strive to honor all food experiences.

SNAP Ed has recently:

• Started utilizing a train-the-trainer model, when appropriate, to assist with community engagement of participants who speak multiple languages or to guide inclusion of culturally relevant content and examples
• Hired a bilingual educator to assist with reaching Spanish speaking audiences.
• Received trauma-informed nutrition training to try to understand trauma’s role in, and the ability to recognize the role stress plays, in behavior and promoting resilience.
• Started to explore additional curricula to have more tools for education to be tailored to audience needs.

Harvest NY

Reaching diverse audiences is a key goal for Harvest NY. To this end we seek to center voices that have traditionally been underrepresented. For example in each of these videos, below, our approach was to remove the extension educator as the primary source of knowledge, and instead center diverse farmers.

Urban Integrated Pest Management at Urban Fruits and Veggies, Buffalo,NY - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0S5qS9_lH1Q

Using Row Cover and Exclusion Netting at Common Roots Farm, Buffalo, NY - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iTvg7dtLguY

Taste NY

In addition to our main location on Grand Island, we also have a kiosk at 75 Exchange Street Buffalo, NY 14203. At this location, there is the possibility of doing a Farmers Market which would include a multitude of diverse urban farmers and other food businesses across Erie County.

Cornell Vegetable Program

The Seneca Nation of Indians has a robust agricultural food sovereignty program. Cornell Cooperative Extension supports Gakwi:yo:h Farms staff in reaching their goals.

Last updated April 23, 2024