ABOUT US
The California State University Bakersfield Edible Garden is a broad public/private partnership involving a number of student groups and members of Bakersfield and Kern County. Our mission is to provide all guests with a peaceful environment, enabling each individual to relax with a book, socialize and talk with friends, and enjoy delicious produce grown in our beautiful garden. We hope to offer a garden that feeds our students, staff, and communities, showing how inexpensive, fun & easy eating healthy can really be. Our Edible Garden will cater to the community in may ways; providing activities, services as well as hosting an array of events. We will be growing a large amount of produce and herbs. Classes and workshops will be available for the public. For more information on classes, events or workshops fill free to contact us.
Jennifer Sanchez
Dr. Evelyn Young Spath
Jennifer Sanchez earned her B.A. in Psychology from CSUB, where she held multiple executive positions in Associated Students, Inc. (ASI), the University’s student government. Jennifer has been involved in multiple collaborative campus projects, such as the Runner Ride Bike Share and Recyclemania. In 2015, her ASI committee worked on the first version of the student-written Edible Garden project, resurrecting a long-time university initiative. The following year, Jennifer joined the efforts of Professor Jeremy Woods’ Small Business Development course as they revamped the Edible Garden project.
In Winter of 2016, Jennifer and ASI Director of Sustainability Oscar Alvarez, collaborated on the Greenovation Grant which provided $3,000 of initial funding to the Edible Garden. At the end of the 2015-16 academic year, Jennifer Sanchez and (former ASI President) Derek Stotler presented the CSUB Edible Garden resolution, which provided $42,000 of Edible Garden funding from ASI.
Most recently, Jennifer was hired as California State University Bakersfield’s first Sustainability Coordinator. A portion of her job duties are to support the success of the Edible Garden.
Dr. Evelyn Young Spath serves as the Executive Assistant to the President. The youngest of 15 children, she is a first-generation college student and the proud daughter of farm laborers (“field workers” as they were once called) who modeled and instilled a strong work ethic. As a member of the President’s Cabinet, the university’s executive leadership team, she collaborates on a broad range of institutional initiatives, extending the Office of the President to the campus and community.
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In her role as the President’s liaison for environmental sustainability, she champions sustainability initiatives, including recycling, alternate, active, and multi-modal transportation, especially public transit, bicycling, and ride share. She co-wrote a $68,000 grant to help fund the extension of the east-west bike path on campus. She successfully advocated with Kern Council of Governments (Kern COG) and Golden Empire Transit (GET) to extend public transit schedules for the campus and create an express route between CSUB and Bakersfield College. The resulting Express Routes 21 and 22 run every 15 minutes and carry more than one-third of GET’s ridership. With a $1.2 million Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality (CMAQ) federal grant, she is working to further improve service by enhancing the existing GET transit stop on campus.
Dr. Young Spath collaborated with Associated Students, Inc. (ASI), the Student Recreation Center (SRC), Business and Administrative Services (BAS) and community partners to establish ‘Runner Ride, CSUB’s bike share program. She guided CSUB’s designation as a Bicycle-Friendly University (bronze) by the League of American Bicyclists, and facilitated ASI’s participation in the 2016 This Way to Sustainability Conference at Chico State where they won 1st place and brought home the 2016 Greenie Award for our bike share program. She also initiated students’ participation in the annual student-led Recylemania competition held each February among colleges and universities across the country.
The edible garden, along with a campus food pantry, is a passion project for Dr. Young Spath. She sees the garden as central to helping alleviate food security among our students. The garden will serve as a living laboratory for hands-on eco-, wellness, and food justice education and experiential learning; cutting-edge agricultural and environmental research; and a destination for K-12 field trips and community gatherings. She is engaging CSUB faculty and students from diverse disciplines, staff across multiple departments, and our agricultural community partners in the garden initiative.
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Dr. Young Spath earned a doctorate in educational leadership from Fresno State University, a master’s in public administration from CSUB, and a bachelor of arts in Spanish from UC Irvine. She is fluent in Spanish.
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