Travel to Wild Hope Farm with Kate Johnston ’26!

Embarking on a transformative journey this summer, I’ve had the privilege of cultivating both crops and personal growth at an organic farm nestled in rural Chester, SC. I’m Kate Johnston and this summer I have worked as a Shi Fellow at Wild Hope Farm.

An average day for me begins with an early rise to beat the heat, a morning of harvesting vegetables (and sometimes melons and blueberries) in three different fields, and in the afternoons either weeding, trellising, transplanting, washing/packing produce or making wholesale deliveries. Once a week, I take the responsibility of doing one of our CSA drops in Rock Hill. This involves packing our CSA shares into a van and dropping a portion off at a location outside of Chester, then handing out the rest of the shares to our CSA members in Rock Hill. I have especially loved this part of my job, not only for the variety, but also to see how community members enjoy the product of our hard work. I have cherished hearing how they have enjoyed eating the produce with their families, cooking with it, and simply seeing their excitement when they see the assortment of produce in their carefully packaged share.

Since joining the team of 15 farmers at Wild Hope, I have grown in ways that I did not expect. I knew that working on a 12-acre farm would pose some physical challenges that I have navigated during my 10 weeks here (100 degree heat, doing manual labor for 40 hours a week, regularly carrying/lifting heavy bins of produce, etc). What I did not expect is the pace that farming requires. Adaptability is a skill that I gained over this past summer. Although crops grow slowly, operations move quickly and being able to understand and follow along with how things run and are organized early on is crucial for success.

Overall, I have loved working at Wild Hope this summer and am sad to see it come to an end. I do, however, take this experience to continue on my path in sustainable agriculture. Let us all embrace the challenge of nurturing our land and communities sustainably. Whether through supporting local farms, advocating for policy change or simply making informed consumer choices, we each have a role to play in building a more sustainable food system. Visit Wild Hope Farm here!