Call it a labor of love.
When Kate Bolen traded in her career as an insurance company fraud and abuse investigator for a hands-on education digging in dirt, planting vegetables and caring for grow pods filled with seeds, she unearthed a fulfilling new career.
The SUNY Morrisville horticulture business management bachelor’s degree student is putting her green thumb to work this summer as an intern at SUNY Morrisville, running its Four Seasons Organic Farm, as well as assisting with a Controlled Environment Agriculture (CEA) seed regeneration project with the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) Agriculture Research Service (ARS).
The college’s Four Seasons Organic Farm is a certified organic farm which provides students with a hands-on educational experience through year-round crop production.
“This is my first time running a farm,” Bolen, a Solvay resident, said. “I am learning more than I ever would have imagined — from seed to sale.”
The farm produces dozens of varieties of vegetables and fruits year-round. Spring brings leafy greens and lettuce, all planted in a high tunnel in the chill of winter. Summer brings warm-weather crops followed by pumpkins and other winter vegetables in the fall.
Inside one of the college’s high tunnels, a summer crop will deliver cucumbers, herbs, radishes, beets, beans, bok choy, chard and more, all grown by students in horticulture labs. Growing outside are potatoes, onions, celery and eggplant.
Bolen’s sowing another dimension of skills with flowers, keeping a watchful eye on a dahlia greenhouse, too. The colorful blossoms will be used in the college’s floral design class.
Working alongside Bolen is Ella Williams, a horticulture business management bachelor’s degree student, hired for the summer, and Lucy Dixon ’24, an instructional support associate in the college’s Horticulture Department.
A mid-July harvest of German white garlic, notorious for its large heads and cloves, brought them all together for an early morning start to avoid the afternoon heat.
After they pulled all of the garlic, they transported it to the college’s Four Seasons Farm Dairy and Specialty Crops Incubator where it will be cured and later cut up for use and sale. In past years, annual crops have been utilized in the dining facility and Copper Turret, college-run restaurant, while others were sold in the community.
A lot goes into keeping the farm going, but the fruits of Bolen’s labor, evident in a radiant smile, are well worth it.
“We did it all by hand this year with a hoe, shovel and elbow grease,” Bolen said. “I really love this work and what I am doing.”
For Bolen, the summer internship is solidifying her career choice and giving her invaluable experience and confidence. “Every class I’ve taken so far has prepared me in a multitude of ways, all of which ensure I have both the capability and the confidence to run a farm.”
The work isn’t all about growing crops. Bolen’s also learning about handling pests — insects and animal that threaten their growth, as well as putting in irrigations systems. And she’s learning how to solve problems.
“You really have to learn how to engineer things too,” Bolen said. “It’s also problem solving on the fly. I realize that I am a very proficient problem solver.”
The non-traditional student was looking for something new when she left her career and chose to go with a green one.
“I had friends who spoke highly of the horticulture program. I knew I wanted to do something hands-on with plants and this was the place,” she said about SUNY Morrisville. “It’s the most hands-on, satisfying job. I love turning what we have grown into a meal.”
Bolen got her start in the college’s specialty crops & cannabis production certificate program. The certificate is stackable and allows students to seamlessly transfer into other degree programs, including the A.A.S. horticulture and B.Tech. horticulture business management degrees, making it possible to earn multiple credentials.
“I started in the cannabis certificate track and found myself far too invested in learning everything, so I decided to switch to the four-year program,” Bolen said. “We have something unique here at Morrisville. Everyone is so generous with their time and their knowledge and it’s given freely to those with the enthusiasm to learn.”
Bolen’s eagerness to learn more has her hands in a new project with the USDA ARS.
In the spring semester, students were given the opportunity to run three different seed regeneration trials congruently, growing hemp seed, micro tomato seeds and cabbage seeds, in the CEA grow pod at the specialty crops kitchen.
“These seeds may find themselves dispensed all over the world,” Bolen said. “We’ve been hand-pollinating cabbage flowers every other day since mid-June.”
CEA is an advanced and intensive form of hydroponically agriculture where plants grow in a controlled environment to optimize horticultural practices. It takes a wide range of skills like knowledge of chemistry, horticulture and more to operate a successful CEA production.
“I hope we can continue working with the USDA,” Bolen said. “I believe it provides a wonderful opportunity to connect students to potential job opportunities in science and horticulture. It’s important work to be involved with.”
Bolen is mastering a variety of skills which have been helpful in planting a small farm at home, where she specializes in herbs for hot sauces and kitchen spices. She also hopes to build a small greenhouse and implement four-season farming there.
“This internship has been the best experience I’ve had thus far in my education at Morrisville,” Bolen said. “The horticulture program has provided an array of different classes, each touching upon different aspects of the industry.”
Classes like Integrated Pest Management, have been especially important as she routinely has to make pest assessments and decisions to ensure crop survival. A Specialty Crops class has also been integral in the daily functioning of the farm.
Many of SUNY Morrisville’s academic programs culminate in an internship, an integral part of students’ educational experiences.
Dixon completed hers at the Little York Plantation, in Homer, a full-service retail garden and landscape company, before planting her roots back at her alma mater to work.
The Virginia native visited numerous schools for horticulture before deciding on SUNY Morrisville.
Four Seasons Farm and Dairy Specialty Crops incubator
A new Four Seasons Farm Dairy and Specialty Crops incubator, a collaboration among the departments of agriculture, dairy horticulture and agricultural business, is a state-of-the-art facility with a custom Cannabox growth pod for year-round specialty crops production.
The facility features a commercial kitchen outfitted with stoves, coolers and freezers. There, students and faculty can take on “value-added” projects that capitalize on the growing season, such as packaging salad greens, freezing and canning vegetables and developing new products. Soon, it will offer dairy processing equipment where various agricultural and dairy programs will experience sustainable farm-to-market concepts aligning with their programs.
