Meet OGC Mission Fund Grant Recipient: Corvallis Environmental Center
Growing Community Through Food and Education
It’s Earth Month, so we’re featuring Corvallis Environmental Center (CEC). They’re on a mission to educate, engage and inspire people to create healthy, sustainable communities through food and agriculture education and nature and play-based learning.
CEC’s programs include:
Starker Arts Garden for Education (SAGE): a one-acre production garden that puts nutritious, fresh, locally grown produce on the plates of community members who need it most.
Farm-to-school activities: nutrition, cooking and gardening in nearly 90 classes a month, for elementary students primarily in Title I schools.
NaturePlay: a preschool that runs five days a week out of Avery Park in Corvallis.
After-school programs: enriching activities that include science education.
Summer camps: held in the SAGE garden and local parks.
Food for Families: a gardening program that grows for food-insecure individuals, with a goal of producing 8,000 pounds of fresh produce (including 60 unique crops) distributed through social service agencies.
Agricultural internships: about 16 interns every year. Most are college-age students who are looking for work experience or exploring what it’s like to work in the fields.
“I spend a lot of my time and energy mentoring our food systems interns who learn sustainable agriculture practices,” shared Liz. “Teaching young people how to get involved in our community and build resilience is one of the things that really drives me. They get to work as a team and problem-solve pest management solutions and growing practices.”
In 2025, OGC gave CEC a Mission Fund grant. Liz shared that “We spent those funds on the Food for Families program. It helped supply soil amendments and provided maintenance and repairs for some of our equipment. Support like this helps us run our many programs and get kids’ hands in the dirt and boots in the mud. Our goal is to keep growing for the community and teaching people as we go.”
“We do our best to meet nutritional needs and be responsive to cultural requests. The last couple of years, we’ve started growing epazote, grape leaves, serrano peppers and tomatillos,” shared CEC’s Community Food Systems Manager Liz Habley.
OGC’s Mission Fund Grant Program promotes equity in the food system, supports youth education and more. CEC is just one of the many organizations the Mission Fund supported in 2025. Find a list of all our 2025 grant recipients here.
