On Thursday, Oct. 30, The Cavalier Daily ran an overtly negative editorial (“How does your garden grow?”) concerning the Student Council’s unanimous support for an on-Grounds garden. The editorial raised the issue that the garden did not necessarily need to be on Grounds, and would be just as well partnering with a pre-existing farm on a peripheral location. They said, “working with an existing farm might be cheaper than building garden from scratch — possibly enough to make that option more effective.”
Not only does this critique represent a misguided understanding of the goals of the University’s sustainability trajectory, it also seems to misunderstand the University’s tie to the Charlottesville community as a whole. Though the community garden will seek to draw neighborly ties with other gardens in the Charlottesville area, it specifically seeks space on Grounds as both a means for accessible student participation as well as a sincere invitation to and instruction for the surrounding community at large.
Surely, too, it seeks to resurrect on Grounds a Jeffersonian notion of communal living that has been lost in years past. As Jefferson writes, “Cultivators of the earth are the most valuable citizens. They are the most vigorous, the most independent, the most virtuous, and they are tied to their country, and wedded to its liberty and interests by the most lasting bonds.” Sustainability is not a purely economic pursuit; it is about recapturing our connection to the soil, to the earth, to our neighbor and to our own humanity.
Colin Page
CLAS IV
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