Violet Stone

I grew up on a 600-acre wildlife preserve nestled in a rural farming community in Northeast Pennsylvania. Although the fields and woods were my backyard, our weekly visits to the Delp’s dairy barn to refill our glass milk jugs impressed upon me the sense of connection that comes from sharing food and land in a community.

My current work focuses on creating opportunities for educators and earth workers to explore their inner landscapes.  These development opportunities are Circles where participants from all ages and backgrounds are invited to call upon their gifts, strengths, passions and values to live and work with greater integrity and courage.  I see this work as contributing to a more inclusive ‘culture’ of agriculture where all voices are warmly welcomed, honored and celebrated, including the voices of our ‘inner teachers’, sometimes named soul or spirit.  In this highly technological age abundant with ideas, assertions and resources, we have much to learn from the act of offering one another genuine listening, open-hearted attention and wonder.

I have a Bachelor’s Degree in Environmental Studies from Oberlin College and a Certificate in Ecological Horticulture from the UC Santa Cruz Farm and Garden Program. Prior to joining the Small Farms Program in 2007, I facilitated farm-to-chef sales for a 30-acre organic vegetable farm in the San Francisco Bay area and worked as a farmers' market manager, local foods educator and farm direct-marketing consultant in the Hudson Valley, NY. I've been leading NESARE professional development projects in NY since 2009.