Fort Bend ISD

Student Bio

Emma has competed as a member of the Clements FFA quiz and floriculture teams since her freshman year and served as an officer for 2 years. She has also founded a crochet club at her school to share her hobby with her peers. Emma plans on majoring in Food Science and is deciding between Texas A&M, Louisiana State University, and California Polytechnic State University. She hopes to create innovative food products in the future, incorporating flavors from around the world to satiate her never-ending hunger.

During her time in the GT Mentorship Program, she visited each of her sites once a week. While she was there, she interacted with members of the surrounding community, planted seeds, and learned how to run a local farm. Emma learned to consider the preferences of certain demographics based on their familiarity with an endless variety of produce, as well as decided the optimal time to plant each product based on the season. Her favorite part about her experience was watching the growth in her plants, her peers, and herself. Although the changes were incremental and often unnoticeable, they amounted to something worth the time and energy it took to ripen.

Mentor Businesses

Agmenity and Lettuce Live

Mentors

Bonnie Harroff

Karena Poke 

Harvest Green is an “agri-hood” which provides residents with the amenity of a neighborhood farm. Agmenity designs, develops and manages agricultural amenities for institutions, businesses, developers and homeowners' associations.

Lettuce Live is an Urban Farm Project created by Karena Poke that began in 2012. Their mission is to create more opportunities for people to grow their own food while ensuring under-served communities have access to fresh produce.

Agmenity/Harvest Green  

Lettuce Live

Project Abstract

In today’s society, work seems to take over people’s lives, leaving them with less time to do other things such as cooking. With the implementation of social distancing and quarantine measures, people are forced to spend their time at home. This has proven to be a double-edged sword in regard to people’s diets, according to the collected data for this research presentation. In one regard, quarantine has discouraged habits such as going out to eat, forcing people to cook their own meals at home. The practice of cooking meals at home often leads to healthier diets, which can be perceived as a positive result. People are also more conscious of boosting their immunity in order to prevent getting sick. On the other hand, staying at home has caused many individuals to eat more frequently, especially during this situation filled with stress, boredom, and uncertainty. However, the biggest deciding factor as to whether people cook on their own has been their access to ingredients. People are more likely to purchase items with which they are already familiar, and with item shortages and hoarding, it can be difficult to find the exact product necessary. Perhaps after the pandemic is over, people will retain their habit of cooking on a regular basis, which will ultimately lead to healthier diets.