Hi everyone! My name is Christine Naessens and I am so excited to be a part of the 2025 Student Farm Internship cohort. As a second-year Environmental Systems Engineering student, I have always been interested in food systems that promote sustainability. It has been so transformative to learn about all of the love and hard work that goes into producing sustainable food! I grew up in Abington, Pennsylvania and uncovered my green thumb when my mom and I started a vegetable garden in our backyard in 3rd grade after reading a book in class about a girl who lived in the city and was able to provide vegetables to her family by growing plants on her windowsill. While my mom and I only intended to make a small garden, we began educating ourselves in how growing our own produce could reduce our carbon footprint, which led to my interest in sustainability in food systems. Since then, I have been dedicated to plant production, whether it is growing vegetables or propagating succulents. Since then, my family has grown a variety of fruits, vegetables, herbs, and wildflowers, enough to share with our friends and family.
As an engineering student, I could not be more excited to work hands-on in the field and gain meaningful experience working with the earth. Learning about keeping a food system sustainable on a larger scale and seeing how we can lower our impact on the environment through farming has helped me to see sustainable pathways I had never been introduced to before. Working in collaboration with the earth and nurturing her to grow healthy food had been a life-changing experience. So far, I have learned so much about keeping healthy soil, maintaining biodiversity, and how to improve the environment you are working in while treating it with respect. Everyone on the farm has been so open in sharing their knowledge, and I cannot wait to spread this knowledge with the Penn State community to further our impact in sustainable agriculture.
I am extremely excited to learn more with my peers throughout the summer and see where this role will take me! I love working with the Penn State community and I am eager to get to know all of the familiar, friendly faces around the farm. The Penn State Farm community is a welcoming, positive environment, and I cannot wait to contribute to that and learn from everyone around me to become a better sustainability teacher and leader in our community and beyond the farm. I can’t wait to see (and taste) the fruits of our hard work and love on the farm!
