After eight years as the Director of the Food Systems Graduate Program, Amy Trubek stepped down, and the program welcomed a new Director, Eric Bishop-von Wettberg, and Assistant Director, Teresa Mares, this past summer!
Bishop-von Wettberg is a plant biologist interested in understanding how crop diversity originates, and in dissecting the relationship between crop diversity and soil health. His home department is Plant & Soil Sciences, and he has been actively engaged in the Food Systems Graduate Program, particularly on the Admissions Committee, for the past couple of years.
"I love the transdisciplinary nature of our Food Systems program. To understand the environmental impacts and benefits of different approaches to farming, such as regenerative soil conservation practices, we have to understand how they reverberate through food systems to impact farmer livelihoods, equity for producers and consumers, and even the taste and flavor of food. We have an ideal setting, with Vermont as a food systems laboratory, to tackle these complex questions," says Bishop-von Wettberg.
Mares has also been an integral part of the Food Systems Graduate Program, and recently served as Interim Director during Tubek's sabbatical and Associate Director for Admissions during the past year. She is a cultural anthropologist working at the intersection of migration and food studies. Her two majors studies have examined how Latinx immigrants identify and navigate their food needs after migrating to the United States.
"I have worked with the Food Systems graduate program since being hired in 2011 and love collaborating with students and faculty in the program. This year I look forward to working on curriculum matters and teaching our Core Course, FS345: Food Systems, Society and Policy," says Mares.
While the 2020-2021 academic year will be different than previous years, we look forward to an engaging and productive year with new leadership and new students!