WNCStrong Youth Service Corps

The WNCStrong Youth Service Corps is helping to build resilient food and agricultural systems in Western North Carolina communities that were severely impacted by Hurricane Helene. High school-age youth in Buncombe, Mitchell, and Yancey Counties learn about food systems, careers in agriculture, and gain invaluable hands-on experience through paid internships on storm-impacted farms. The Corps both supports disaster recovery and builds job skills and socioemotional resilience of impacted youth as they rebuild and restore critical food and farming infrastructure in their hometowns.

For more information, please contact Eric Klein at eaklein2@ncsu.edu

Featured Farm & Interns

Hayden and Aiden at Burley Stick Farm, Barnardsville, NC

Since May, two Service Corps members from North Buncombe High School, Hayden and Aiden, have been working at Burley Stick. For over 100 years, the Metcalf family at Burley Stick has been raising beef cattle on their farm along Ivy Creek in Buncombe County. Hurricane Helene’s deluge caused the creek to swell and the flooding filled the Metcalf’s lower hay fields with debris, silt and weeds. The two teenagers have had ample opportunity to learn to mend fences, work on bailing equipment and assist with the next generation of Metcalf beef. Aiden reflects: “I didn’t really have any experience with it, so it was cool to learn how to wean calves.”

The WNCStrong Youth Service Corps is funded by a grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture and a generous contribution from the North Carolina Alliance for Health. The Center for Environmental Farming Systems is grateful to partner with the school districts of Buncombe, Mitchell and Yancey Counties to make the Service Corps a reality.