Current Service Members

Demetrius Fassas
demetrius.fassas@foodcorps.org
Madison Farm 2 Fork
Ennis, MT

After pursuing a Doctor of Pharmacy degree at Butler University for two years, Demetrius realigned his studies so he could serve the health of others through a preventative, nutrition based approach.  

As a FoodCorps Service Member in Ennis, MT, he serves K-4th graders and coordinates the school garden committee, making efforts to communicate the valuable role that this position plays in the education of the students, so that the school can more easily incorporate these experiences into their permanent curriculum. He also leads monthly cafeteria taste tests of recipes that incorporate school garden produce and Montana-grown ingredients.




Maggie Harkins
maggie.harkins@foodcorps.org
Boys and Girls Club
Billings, MT

Born and raised in the "Garden State," Maggie became interested in cooking as a kid, but never had much of a green thumb despite her love of and appreciation for delicious veggies. After a few failed attempts in her very shaded backyard, she poured all her food knowledge into inventing new recipes and making a mess in the kitchen. Now, after spending some time working in the restaurant business as a pastry chef, many nights cooking for friends, and several wonderful summers as a camp counselor she is excited to teach kids all about the healthy cooking that she loves to do. 

Maggie serves in Billings, Montana, expanding the garden at the Lockwood Boys and Girls Club and having some awesome culinary adventures with the food that she and the students grow.




Andi Giddings
andi.giddings@foodcorps.org
National Center for Appropriate Technology
Butte, MT

Andi grew up in Maine and first fell in love with growing food after working harvest seasons at various farms. She picked strawberries as a teen, worked on a rutabaga farm, and volunteered through WOOFF on a family farm in Alaska. Andi studied Anthropology at Middlebury College, where she became interested in how people relate to their environments, in particular how we relate to food. After graduating, she spent summers working at a sleep away camp for girls and she spent two years working at a school with middle school students. She loved working with the kids, but wanted to integrate farming and nutrition into her teaching. She went on to spend a season working on a diverse vegetable farm to expand her knowledge about growing food. She is very excited to serve as a FoodCorps member so that she can combine her passions for teaching kids, farming/gardening, and issues of food access and sustainability. Andi serves in Butte, Montana, where she uses the three pillars of FoodCorps to help kids create healthy relationships with food.



Emily Howe
emily.howe@foodcorps.org
Red Lodge Area Community Foundation & Food Partnership Council
Red Lodge, MT

Emily grew up on a suburban mini-farm in Southeastern Pennsylvania where her food education started early. In college she studied industrial design and quickly fell in love with the creative problem solving required to connect the different facets of a design project. In school she focused on a combination of food, sustainability, and education, using design as a way to understand people and how to improve upon existing systems. She learned about FoodCorps while working for the Cottonwood Gulch Foundation, a wilderness education non profit based in northwestern New Mexico, where her work covered everything from lunch for 200, to backpacking across the Southwest with fifteen teenagers in tow. Emily serves in Red Lodge, Montana, bringing endless enthusiasm to serving in the youth garden and helping to get more local Montana produce into Red Lodge schools.


Jessica Manly
jessica.manly@foodcorps.org
Kalispell District 5
Kalispell, MT

Jessica has loved to cook, grow, and share good food her whole life, but she truly learned about the impact of nutrition by helping her mother through a serious illness. In college, she volunteered at a vegetarian co-op and began studying food systems and health. After college, she volunteered for the School Lunch Initiative in Berkeley, CA, and then took a job as the sourcing director for a local food distributor in Charlottesville, VA, working with farmers and producers and learning about the economic side of the local food system.  Throughout this time she wrote for small newspapers and magazines about farming and health. 

Jessica serves in the Kalispell Public Schools and the Flathead Farm to School program in Montana, expanding nutrition education programs and existing school gardens, and increasing procurement of healthy local foods for the school cafeterias. She will collaborates with other Western Montana schools and organizations to improve cooperative purchasing and processing through a USDA Farm to School Grant.



Zoe Tucker
zoe.tucker@foodcorps.org
North Shore Compact
Lake County, MT

Zoe grew up in various parts of the East Coast, ending up in a suburban town in Massachusetts. She finally grew interested in food (after many years of being a picky vegetarian child) during a gap year before college, and upon arriving at college, she joined and later co-managed the newly founded Harvard Community Garden, lived in a co-operative residential house, and led outdoor orientation trips for incoming freshman. In these various groups she experienced how sharing food and challenges makes for really strong and meaningful communities. Since graduating, she has gotten to combine her interests in food and experiential education by working as an instructor at the Farm Camp at Stone Barns Center for Food and Agriculture. With FoodCorps, Zoe has joined the Northshore Compact in Flathead Valley, Montana, to work with three area middle schools. Among the three, she serves in nutrition classes, school gardens, a hydroponic greenhouse, and assists in farm to school procurement.


Camille McGoven
camille.mcgoven@foodcorps.org
21st Century Community Learning Center
Boulder, MT

Camille graduated with a BA in Food, Nutrition, and Dietetics and went on to complete a dietetic internship to become a Registered Dietitian.  She worked as a clinical dietitian, traveled abroad, and volunteered on an organic farm, which all helped mold her desire to work towards a healthier food system. In addition to working on the clinical realm of nutrition, she also stepped into a wellness coordinator position at a library where she helped others make positive health changes, and initiated a garden and children's garden club. She is serving a second term in Boulder, MT with the 21st Century Community Learning Center where she teaches garden enhanced nutrition education both during the school day as well as during the after school program and summer program. She also collaborates closely with the Food Service Manager to make healthy menu changes to include more local, fresh, and delicious foods.




Erin Jackson
erin.jackson@foodcorps.org
Hyalite Elementary School
Bozeman, MT

From a young age, Erin was exposed to the importance of green living. The hands-on experience of building a home and planting an organic garden with her family instilled a passion for healthy communities and diets. At the University of Vermont she studied Biological Sciences and Nutrition and went on to work with Friends of Burlington Gardens where she had the opportunity to participate in every step of the farm to school process. 

She is thrilled to be returning to Hyalite Elementary School for a second year with FoodCorps. Having witnessed first-hand both the challenges and possibilities for establishing a gardening and nutrition program at her elementary school, Erin will continue leading hands-on activities in the seven raised beds and teaching nutrition and food education while working closely with teachers to align her lessons to the state standards. The exciting new addition of a cooking cart will allow Erin to expand the opportunities for cooking in the classroom and she will again lead her successful Junior Master Gardener summer program that allows kids to be involved in garden learning and cooking activities when school is not in session. Erin will continue to define the relationships she made with the teachers, parents, students, farmers, volunteers, and non-profits in the community, all of whom are necessary partners in creating a sustainable program at Hyalite. Lastly, Erin will be working closely with food service this year to promote nutrition and farm to school efforts around the Bozeman School District.


Nicki Jimenez
nicki.jimenez@foodcorps.org
LCCDC’s Mission Mountain Food Enterprise Center
Ronan, MT

Nicki was a 2010 Morris K. Udall Scholar and a 2012 Denison University President’s Medalist, as well as the co-founder and previous president of Denison's People Endorsing Agricultural Sustainability (PEAS). She was very active on public campaigns: writing action alerts, managing volunteers, and raising funds. Nicki prides herself on her passion and initiative, and credits picking fresh produce on a local farm with her mom as the origin of her love for food and farming. 

She returns to Lake County, Montana, for a second year of service, collaborating with teachers to integrate food and nutrition education into their classrooms, with school and community members to start school gardens and garden-based education programs, and with food service directors and producers to get more local, healthy foods into schools.



Pete Kerns
peter.kerns@foodcorps.org
Missoula County Public Schools
Missoula, MT

Peter was born and raised in the northwest suburbs of Chicago, He became interested in cooking early on and started cooking family meals throughout middle and high school.  He worked for a caterer in high school, learning a lot about food but didn't dig into issues with our food system until he got to college.  He quickly involved himself in his school's just and sustainable food advocacy group; the student farm,growing thousands of pounds of tomatoes for dining services; and the national nonprofit student network Real Food Challenge.  RFC helped him learn a way to change our food system, by working with large food purchasers to buy more local and healthy foods.  Peter is serving his second term with Missoula's Central Kitchen, where he has helped to build a production garden, source locally-produced products like beef and lentils for food and nutrition services, and teach cooking classes to elementary students.