Students and staff alike came to the Reid Greenhouse and Carver Hall to enjoy the annual Earth Day Plant Sale and free salad bar, featuring a wide selection of plants grown by CAES students in Specialty Crops and Plant Propagation classes, and raises funds for the Student Farm. In addition to the sale, free pick-your-own salads, grown in the nearby raised beds, were available with dressing and croutons provided. Professor Odile Huchette, who leads the project, said the free salad day has been going on for eight years, and the plant sale was added during the COVID pandemic. As the students grow and share the various plants, Huchette says, it creates the opportunity to tie together education and community service.

Diamond Mangrum ’20 is used to standing out. As a biological engineering and applied mathematics double major, she stands out as a woman in a STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) field in which 60 percent of graduates are male.