Marion Nestle Says Prisoners' Garden is Democracy in Action

In the prisons of New York, an empowering program is changing the lives of inmates, one class—and plant—at a time. The Bard Prison Initiative is a college program taking place in five penal institutions, three long-term, maximum-security and two transitional, medium-security prisons. Two-hundred student-inmates participate in a rigorous, full-time liberal arts curriculum that garners them either associate's or bachelor's degrees.

Since Bard College started the program when the government slashed funding for prison education in the mid-1990s, not a single graduate has returned to prison after being paroled, according to Marion Nestle, who recently gave a commencement speech to incarcerated graduates at Woodbourne Correctional Facility.

Why was a nutritionist and food safety activist called on to give the address? Well, as part of the curriculum, students of the program grew a garden to provide fresh food to both the prison population and local food banks. Nestle, who was awarded the John Dewey Award for Distinguished Public Service by Bard College, emphasized to the students how gardening is an excellent expression of the values of liberal democracy they had learned in the classroom.

"The food revolution is about democracy," she said in her speech (PDF). "Everyone eats. Growing food is democracy in action—of the people, by the people, and for the people. Growing food is worth doing because it is an expression of democratic values. Besides that, you can eat it."

Not only is the movement democratizing because it concerns something that everyone must engage with, but anyone can easily take action in their own way, with as little effort as planting a seed.

Nestle told the students that their gardening and food-sharing efforts made them just as much a part of the sustainable food movement as Slow Food chefs and political activists working to change the Farm Bill. "You are participants in this food revolution and I salute you for what you have accomplished both in and out of the classroom," she said.

Her use of the word "revolution" was a conscious choice. "Growing food is about giving individuals and communities the power to control their own resources," she told the graduates. "I cannot think of anything more revolutionary."

Photo: OakleyOriginals via Flickr