 My name is Stuart O'Neill, I'm the Executive Director of Rogue Farm Corps and Rogue Farm Corps was founded here in the Rogue Valley in 2004, actually out in the Applegate Valley over the hills that way. Organization was started by a number of first generation organic farmers and their intent in creating the organization was to support the development of the next generation of farmers and we do that in a few ways. We educate and train young farmers through our internship and apprenticeship programs and we've recently added our farm preservation program which is looking upstream and trying to help identify the needs of retiring farmers so that they may be able to pass their farmland on to the next generation who's coming up. Part of what was happening in the farm internship world and this was around 2009 and 2010 is it was becoming aware that the way that farmers were operating their internship programs were running afoul of the labor laws of our state and the country and so Rogue Farm Corps really took it upon ourselves to develop a legal model so that we could have a system for on-farm training that met the spirit of mentorship and exchange of information and knowledge in a real and genuine way but also fit the rules and laws that have been established to protect workers and to protect labor in this country and so Rogue Farm Corps took it upon ourselves to try to develop a model a legal model and we've been successful in accomplishing that and so now our program really operates as a vocational school of sorts and so as a non-profit organization we help facilitate the education and training program we provide the curriculum the evaluation do many of the same functions that a that a school or a vocational institution would do and that way our farmers who are really interested in passing on their knowledge can do so in a way where they can be legally protected and operate their programs the way that that feel good to them and everybody and so you know we really do believe that you only can learn farming by farming and it's not something that one can learn in the classroom you have to actually be on the ground farming and living the life of a farmer is a really critically important component of that and so our internship and apprenticeship programs are really designed to give the intern and apprentice a real-world experience to show them day after day what it's like to be a farmer you know we all know that farming doesn't happen in the regular hours of nine to five and so many of the aspects of learning farming come after hours or in the middle of the night when a problem arises with an animal or an irrigation pump or something along those lines and so our program I think is really special that way where the folks that are coming to learn from our farmers are actually embodying the experience of being a farmer and learning hands-on what it means to be a farmer which if you're a young person or even not a super young person but you want to learn farming and you don't come up on a farm you don't grow up on a farm you don't have that as part of your family background it can be really challenging to find an avenue to get involved in farming. My name is Kylie Cassidy and I'm here at By George Farm growing a seed crop for the first time independently and selling it to seed companies. I ended up at By George because I was a part of a program called Rogue Farm Corps that connects beginning farmers to veteran farmers and provides internship opportunities in education and so I was here last season participating in the program and then this season the format is more of an incubator where they allowed me to lease an acre from them and and use their tools and water and materials in order to sort of launch my own project and so that's why I'm here and contracting with four different seed companies and growing 16 different seed crops and so it's just that it's my first time ever doing my own entrepreneurial endeavor and so I'm stepping out and sort of trying to see how I do on my own at farming and what sort of opportunities that I have in order to make a living at this. I get my hands dirty and I get my hands dirty because I think that small scale sustainable agriculture is incredibly important to I guess sort of a system that's not really functioning anymore and getting back to the land and being connected back to the earth is something that I find solace and importance in and so that that is why I do the work that I do here and we'd like to continue to be a part of that community. I don't really have an agricultural background. I did a couple seasons casually prior to moving down to Southern Oregon three years ago where I finally actually immersed myself but my dad had a little garden and when I was growing up and aside from that I grew up in the suburbs. So what do you think about the future of agriculture here in Southern Oregon? So I actually grew up in Washington DC about as far away from farms as one could imagine. Grew up in the suburbs of a big city and got involved in farming when I moved to Oregon and had a good friend who had an organic goat dairy farm out in the Applegate Valley Michael Moss he was actually one of the founding farmers in Rogue Farm Corps and he was looking for a business partner and someone to help him launch his commercial creamery and farmstead dairy and so we decided to partner up and I learned farming hands on much like our interns and apprentices do and spent about six and a half years working on this goat dairy in the Applegate where I learned the ins and outs of running a farm and running a farm business and I think my personal experience helps my motivation to train and equip young farmers because we actually were not successful. We made many mistakes that a lot of first-generation farmers make. We got into farming because we were altruistic and had an idea of how we wanted to run the farm and we had really good farm skills but what we lacked was a lot of the business knowledge and experience running a successful business which to be successful as a farmer obviously you need to be an excellent farmer and an excellent business person, a jack-and-gill of all trades if you will. I'm Megan Fairman. I'm the educational program director for the Rogue Farm Corps. We're based here in Southern Oregon but we work in four communities around the state. We run hands-on skill-based farm educational programming and training with commercial growers, a network of commercial growers and interested farm interns in the Rogue Valley in the South Willamette in Portland and in Central Oregon. We were the first that actually the organization was formed here in the Little Applegate Valley and this farm was one of the founding members so the previous caretaker and the neighbors next door and one up the road and one that way all got together and they were first-generation farmers who learned from on-farm internships and basically saw this as a necessary component. They learned from mentor farmers and felt the need to to pass that knowledge along when they got to a point where they had something to share but they also were concerned. The average age of farmers is approaching 60 not only in Oregon but across the country and we're seeing massive amounts of farmland turning over every day and so the concern is who are who are this next generation of farmers and how are we going to get them skilled up and trained and get them on the land and to save this farmland keep it in production and hopefully in a style of agriculture that is beneficial to the environment around it and feeding the community good healthy food. There's four of them and they started sort of a collective organization where they wrote a little bit of a curriculum and they passed the interns around so they offered them some extra classes and farm tours and things like that so they could see other farms and how they were doing it and different operations so if they were on a vegetable farm they could at least get a chance to go and see animal farming and interact with that a little bit and that was the birthplace of this organization back in 2003-2004. So we've had a number of successes in the Rogue Farm Corps program over the years and one in particular that I think I'm most proud of is the farmers at it by George Farm in the Applegate Valley. Johnny Steiger and Tyson Fairman both participated in Rogue Farm Corps many years ago as interns and Johnny actually grew up on a commercial dairy farm in Wisconsin. He was the youngest of 10 kids, grew up on a traditional dairy farm where they were milking a number of cows every day and Johnny always wanted to be a farmer but he didn't want to farm the way his family did and so when he came out to Oregon to participate in the Rogue Farm Corps program he was really looking to a different model a different scale and so he participated as an intern on a goat dairy operation out in the Applegate Valley where he learned farmstead creamery operation, small-scale production of cheese and gained a lot of skills and experience through that experience. They weren't quite ready to start a farm business at the time they finished their internship program so they moved back to Wisconsin, they got jobs in a restaurant that had a farm attached to it, they worked in the restaurant industry and also growing crops for the farm, built a little bit more skills and experience and when the time came to get on a piece of property here in the Applegate Valley they jumped on it and they've now launched what is a growing and successful small-scale cow dairy operation and farmstead creamery where they make their own cheeses and they are actually now training interns and apprentices through the Rogue Farm Corps program so they're really bringing the program full circle which is something that we're really excited of and proud of. Rogue Farm Corps has many opportunities for folks to get involved. We every year have a number of internship and apprenticeship positions available on our network of farms here in the Rogue Valley for folks that want to learn how to become farmers themselves and with our farm preservation work we're really also seeking more of the retirement age farmers who are looking to pass their land on to the next generation. Critically important that we help bridge the gap between the retiring farmers who have land and the younger generation who is seeking land to make connections so that we can keep our agriculture strong here in Oregon.