Cultivating Repair on Historic Landscapes: Co-Creating an Environmental Justice Learning Model

Faculty Mentors

Dr. Sara Bon Harper and Dr. Lisa Armstrong

Student Researchers

Sophia (Sage) Carmen Futrell '26, Major: Anthropology; Minor: Biology
Eliana Rougle '28, Majors: Environmental Science and Biology (Undeclared)

Project Description

Initiated by and in collaboration with the Council of Descendant Advisors, W&M students designed and piloted middle school summer program at Highland centered on introspective relations to land and food justice.

Historic plantations have been painful places for generations of enslaved and free African Americans and Indigenous people. Racial injustices continue well beyond the end of legal slavery and contribute to multi-generational alienation from rural and agricultural landscapes that otherwise might enhance wellbeing and community belonging.  

Framed and led by James Monroe’s Highland’s Council of Descendant Advisors, this project addresses this disconnection by co-designing a middle school program at Highland focused on Black Foodways and Environmental Justice.  This learning model will bridge disciplines, communities, and knowledge forms to demonstrate how histories, cultures, and ecology are interrelated. The learning model outcomes include ameliorating participants’ relationships with historically painful landscapes and providing some repair of generational harm.  

In 2025, W&M students will work with the Council to develop and host a middle school summer program at Highland centered on introspective relations to land and food justice from the critical lens of plantation legacies and food systems and led by Black farmers and/or growers of color. This program serves as a foundation for Highland and the Council to continue to engage youth at Highland through meaningful education programming. 

Project ID - Format

25-006-25 - CRP Year