our farmily

“no one is special, and everyone is needed.”
― adrienne maree brown

core team

she/her
newfane, vt
amber arnold (she/her) is the co-founder and collaborative director of SUSU commUNITY farm, located in N’dakinna, the occupied ancestral homelands of the Elnu Abenaki people in so-called southern vermont. amber is a Black multiracial momma and child of radical Black, queer, radically regular people who have inspired her to vision and co-create impossible possible futures that center the wisdom, teachings, and traditions of Black, queer, womanist people. amber has a background in gardening, revolutionary mothering as inspired by the work of alexis pauline gumbs, and as an embodied somatic, sound, and plant kin commUNITY earthworker. she is an artist who looks to her ancestors, elders, and the 7 generations to come in guiding her towards co creating afrofuturistic portals of Black love, home, liberation, and a radical reclamation of our ability to dream, vision, and create beyond our current circumstances.

they/she
newfane, vt
naomi (they/she) is a co-founder and collaborative director of SUSU commUNITY farm in occupied Abenaki land on so-called southern vermont. naomi’s experience as a Black multiracial, afroatlantic non-binary queer femme, descendant of mississippi sharecroppers, informs why they consider themselves a legacy farmer whose work is to reconnect to the wisdom and knowledge present in their ancestral heritage as a way to heal themselves and their lineage and to continue the reparative work needed to be in right relationship with the lands they occupy.

khalif (he/him) works as a consultant, educator, and leadership coach in addition to deep engagement in seasonal landscape gardening and ecosystem rebalancing efforts where he makes his home in coastal Maine.
Khalif has spent over 25 years at the nexus of organizational leadership and social change spanning education, nonprofit and philanthropy sectors and supported many leaders in dynamic institutional and cultural contexts during pivotal times of change.
He has created partnerships for racial equity in higher education, consulted for nonprofits and community groups on strategy and organizational development, served nine years as the Executive Director of the Institute for Humane Education, served as the Director of a local independent elementary school, and as Program Director in charge of strategy development and implementation for both the Bay and Paul Foundation's PreK-12 Transformative Learning Practices and Indigenous Leadership in Climate Education programs.
He believes in collaborative, relational leadership that’s grounded in a liberatory mindset and spirited self-awareness as the key to unlocking the transformative capacity in our communities. His work has long been deeply informed by his contemplative practice and sense of play as a musician, poet, and artist. khalif is a mixed African American, cis-gender man born in the Allegheny Mountains.

he/him
youth, belonging, and place director
jarmal was born and raised on the west side of baltimore, maryland, with a single mother and sister as his main core family and focus. as a youth he experienced traumas in the form of violence in any way it could show up. he reflects that “alongside the beauty that comes with the culture I grew up in came a lot of pain and confusion as to why life looked how it did for me in those years. these things are what shaped me and molded my trajectory to what it is today.” youth is jarmal’s primary focus, as well as building/facilities and coordinating activities and events for youth and community alike. his skills involve working with other people in the community and using his heart and hands to intuitively connect to all. jarmal has experience in behavioral assistance with youth in schools, also physical or mental challenges with people in the community through a non-profit organization for 11 years.

she/they
amy is a queer farmer, gleaner and wildcrafting witch born in so called guilford, vermont. their ancestors hail, almost entirely from Ireland. the beauty, tenacity and the struggles and priviledges of their people are deeply rooted in the justice work they are called on to do. amy was raised by parents who moved to vermont to garden, do social work, and befriend the old timer farmers of their neighborhood. raised up in the 80s and 90s, they connected with anarcho socialist punk culture and are fiercely dedicated to collective liberation. they have been growing vegetables, herbs and sometimes flowers on family land since the birth of their child in 2004. amy is motivated and inspired by mutual aid projects that strengthen frontline resilience, collaborative solidarity work, joy and survival/thrival. they have always worked alongside lovingly supportive and powerfully vulnerable comrades at the farm, gleaning on other farms and gathering from wild spaces.

he/him
Brattleboro, VT
Steffen Gillom is a practitioner of Conflict Resolution, an activist, an educator and an AmeriCorps VISTA service alum. Steffen is passionate about increasing awareness concerning disability rights and providing mental health services to communities of color and other marginalized individuals. Most recently, the bulk of his activism work is through the NAACP, where he currently serves as President and Founder of the Windham County Vermont Branch of the NAACP.

she/her
newfane, vt
amber arnold (she/her) is the co-founder and collaborative director of SUSU commUNITY farm, located in N’dakinna, the occupied ancestral homelands of the Elnu Abenaki people in so-called southern vermont. amber is a Black multiracial momma and child of radical Black, queer, radically regular people who have inspired her to vision and co-create impossible possible futures that center the wisdom, teachings, and traditions of Black, queer, womanist people. amber has a background in gardening, revolutionary mothering as inspired by the work of alexis pauline gumbs, and as an embodied somatic, sound, and plant kin commUNITY earthworker. she is an artist who looks to her ancestors, elders, and the 7 generations to come in guiding her towards co creating afrofuturistic portals of Black love, home, liberation, and a radical reclamation of our ability to dream, vision, and create beyond our current circumstances.

they/she
newfane, vt
naomi (they/she) is a co-founder and collaborative director of SUSU commUNITY farm in occupied Abenaki land on so-called southern vermont. naomi’s experience as a Black multiracial, afroatlantic non-binary queer femme, descendant of mississippi sharecroppers, informs why they consider themselves a legacy farmer whose work is to reconnect to the wisdom and knowledge present in their ancestral heritage as a way to heal themselves and their lineage and to continue the reparative work needed to be in right relationship with the lands they occupy.

— audre lorde