Farmworkers in North Carolina: Roots of Poverty, Roots of Change

This course is based on experiential service-learning. Students partner with Student Action with Farmworkers, a non-profit that places students with migrant farmworkers in North Carolina. The focus is on those who bring food to our tables, particularly those who labor in the fields of North Carolina and the Southeast. Students will learn about farm work from the plantation system and slavery to sharecropping and up to the migrant and seasonal farmworker population today.  Students will have a chance to hear from the farmworkers who work in a different country than where their family is, and why they made that sacrifice.

"It's really powerful to break bread with somebody who is really in a different reality that the bubble that some students might find themselves in. It can be really transformative," says Professor Chris Sims, who taught the course in Fall of 2017.

Students will reflect on their experiences through readings, class discussion and writing.  "It's not a class where there will be a traditional research paper, but one that seeks to ask the students to think about this issue holistically," says Professor Sims. 

Read an article from DukeArts or watch this course overview video to learn more about this course: