Whittier College is home to an experimental research coffee orchard where students and professors investigate coffee as a new crop in the California agricultural landscape.
The coffee orchard is also a space where industry representatives and the community come together through gatherings, speaker series, and career events. Students are also given the opportunity to gain experience through internships and fellowships pertaining to coffee, including environmental and social justice, market research, and climate change research.
Read more about Andrea Wainwraight (Class of 2024) and her environmental science experiments in the orchard.
SUrF is where ideas, action, and community meet to rethink the landscapes we inhabit. The micro-farm – composed of raised beds and fruit trees in the “front yard” of Wanberg Residence Hall (aka “Greenberg) – is grounded in an emphasis on rehabilitating the soil, with the side benefit that students get to grow and eat great food.
SUrF is not a traditional community garden. Students are not assigned specific plots. Instead, the gardening collective works the entire micro-farm and shares the fruits of their labor (a portion of produce is also donated to a food bank). Participants that complete the garden education curriculum are eligible for internship placements in community organizations.
Located on the first floor of the Science & Learning Center, the Environmental Science Laboratory offers a space for undergraduate students and professors to conduct their research. The laboratory is equipped with ideal instruments for research in earth science disciplines, including a Precision incubator, a muffle furnace, scales and microbalances, a fume hood, a pH meter, a -80 degree F freezer, and much more. The laboratory is also used as teaching space for the Environmental Science department.
