Tuesday, May 31, 2011
The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com
13
Farmers Market caters to the A2 community FrM Page1
Kerrytown strives
to attract more
undergraduates to
local goods
By HALEY GOLDBERG
For theDaily
Every Wednesday and Sat-
urday morning in Kerrytown,
local vendors set up stands in
preparation to greet the com-
munity and sell goods ranging
from freshly laid eggs to hand-
crafted jewelry at one of Ann
Arbor's best-kept secret - the
Ann Arbor Farmers Market.
Located on Detroit Street, the
market - which runs from7 a.m.
to 3 p.m. - allows customers to
buy an array of goods directly
from the people who create or
cultivate the products, creating
a distinct relationship between
local producers and consumers.
Market manager Molly Notari-
anni said the farmers market is
notoriously an unknown part of
the city for many University stu-
dents, especially undergraduates.
"I think that older students -
graduate students and doctoral
students - tend to know about it
more, but I think that it is defi-
nitely an undiscovered aspect of
Ann Arbor for a lot of University
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students," Notarianni said.
Notarianni, a University
alum, said there is a separation
between University students
and the Ann Arbor community,
citing her own lack of knowl-
edge about the market when she
was a student. She added that
she hopes current University
students will make an effort to
learn more about Ann Arbor
culture through exploring the
farmers market.
"I think it is a really unique.
way to be connected with the
greater community of Ann
Arbor," Notarianni said. "It is a
great community event."
Engineering junior Joe Altiz-
er said he chooses to shop at
the farmers market to develop
a stronger relationship with his
community.
"I feel like it's more local,"
Altizer said. "You get that feel-
ing of Ann Arbor people making
and selling the food to you, and
that's definitely an advantage to
going there."
He added he thinks if more
students knew about the mar-
ket, they would choose to shop
there as well.
"If they advertised it more, I
know students would go there
and they would probably fall in
love with it," Altizer said.
Not only is the connection
to Ann Arbor a motivation for
Altizer to shop at the farmers
market, it is also an incentive for
businesses to sell their products
there.
David Klingenberger, founder
and chief fermenting officer at
The Brinery - an Ann Arbor
based fermenting company, said
he started his business by sell-
ing local, fermented vegetables
at the farmers market a year ago.
"There is no other way I
could have built my business as
quickly if it wasn't for the farm-
ers market," Klingenberger said.
"It's a way for me to directly
communicate and sell my prod-
ucts to people and really form
relationships and build my busi-
ness."
Richard Carpenter, a partner
of Carpenter's Greenhouse &
Organic Produce - a business
that sells produce at the market
- said he values the relationship
the market establishes between
producers and consumers, add-
ing that he offers a 10-percent
discount to University students
who present their Mcards.
This discount may offset the
slight increase in prices stu-
dents may encounter when pur-
chasing goods at the farmers
market in comparison to a chain
grocery store. Carpenter said
he recognizes the additional
expense, but believes it is a valid
tradeoff for the quality of food.
"Some items we have I think
prices might be more than say
Trader Joe's or Whole Foods,
but they are guaranteed fresh,"
Carpenter said.
Cynthia Olcott, founder of
the jewelry company Cynthet-
ics, said the eco-friendly nature
of the market also adds incen-
tive for customers to shop there.
"The goods here are trans-
ported short distances, so we
aren't burning up a lot of fossil
fuel," Olcott said. "Environmen-
tally, I think the farmers market
is definitely the way to go."
Many University students
who know about the farmers
market, however, said they still
choose to buy their food from
other grocery stores.
LSA sophomore Aerial Row-
land said she often shops at
Strickland's Market or takes the
bus to Meijer in order to save
time and money on food..
"(The farmers market) is not
the closest, and I just don't think
I have the money to go buy fresh
food," Rowland said.
According to Notarianni,
the market is beginning to col-
laborate with student groups to
help wth promotion, and addi-
tionally they have developed a
new, evening market that will
be held on Wednesday evenings
starting June 1in an attempt to
attract more students.
nization plays an important role in
recommending methods for imple-
menting top-quality education
programs in Michigan to the state
legislature, adding that ultimately
they have little power in determin-
ing the end result of state budget
reforms.
"One of the primary things we
don't have authority over is the bud-
get ... but we do have constitutional
responsibility that we take very seri-
ously to advocate on behalf of educa-
tion to the legislature and tell them
what we think investment needs to
look like in order to have the system
that's goingto be the most productive,
efficient and effective," Ulbrich said.
During the discussion forum,
Deborah Loewenberg Ball, dean of
the School of Education, said prob-
lems arise due to the lack of both an
established national training system
for teachers and guidelines of what
constitutes an effective educator.
"The problem that I can't over-
emphasize to you is that we have no
system in this country for producing
skillful teachers," Ball said. "But we
have no agreement on what it is that
people have to know to be teachers."
Many other education quality
advocates took turns addressing the
SBE about funding various aspects
of the teaching field, including a per-
sonal finance class, project-based
learning, innovative technology and
tenure.
Brit Satchwell, president of the
Ann Arbor Education Association
teacher's union, argued that educa-
tion reform has taken on the impli-
cation of budget cuts rather than
initiatives to improve the quality of
education.
"For many years now, we've
started with the assumption that we
have to take money we've gotten, cut
back from there rather than starting
with the needs of students and fund-
ing forward from there on," he said.
Chuck Fellows, a former Demo-
cratic candidate for Michigan state
Senate, said modern education poli-
cy is straying away from the goal of
allowing children to effectively learn
by instead focusing more on stan-
dardized testing and funding.
"Current educational positions
are about ranking and reading,
winning and losing, command and
control, policy and procedure, and
money," Fellow said. "Nowhere can
we find in there the true purpose
of education, which is learning. All
children know how to do that, and
somehow we beat that ability out of
them."
BEATING THE HEAT
ERINKIRKLAND/Daily
Rackham student Jae-Young Schim spends Memorial Day cooling off in the fountain near the Union. "With nothing
to do on Memorial Day my wife and I decided totake a tour of the campus," Schim said.