Author: Lesley Steinman
Reconnecting Food Roots (RFR) is a unique and place-based UW Study Away program on Lopez Island, located in the Pacific Northwest U.S. The island is the unceded territory of Straits Salish people and has historically served as a breadbasket for the surrounding islands. RFR uses systems thinking to explore the interconnections of food, human and ecological health through the themes of Land, Sea, and Air.
We are recruiting our Summer 2026 cohort and this program may be a great option for international students who may want to stay in Washington during the summer. Applications are due February 15. What better way to learn about the program than by hearing from two of our rad alumni, Marley Tullis-Monetta and Carilyn Brandt? This interview has been edited. Learn more about Reconnecting Food Roots Study Away program – visit our website, schedule a 1:1 or contact the program co-directors Kerry Reding and Lesley Steinman lesles@uw.edu.
Tell me about you and your UW program
Marley: I was a graduate student in the University of Washington’s Communication Leadership Program. I graduated last June, and now I focus on video storytelling and producing videos here in Seattle.
Carilyn: I am currently an undergraduate in my third year at UW, majoring in creative writing and with a minor in environmental studies.
How did you hear about the Lopez Study Away program and what made you decide to enroll?
Carilyn: I’m in the Interdisciplinary Honors Program at UW and received an email saying basically, here’s a cool program where you could do joint work with Honors. I was immediately enthralled, because growing up here, I spent time on the islands – my grandparents are on Whidbey, and I just love the whole Salish Sea area to death. I also had this budding interest in farming and thinking about more regenerative a
pproaches – I had already taken Environment 100 with Eli Wheat who is a farmer on Whidbey and I had done some environmental coursework in high school so I was curious about agriculture. When I saw the email I said, I absolutely have to take this, this is a culmination of things I love. I’m not usually someone that seeks out opportunities to expand my horizons and I’m kind of wary of things that are a little bit outside my comfort zone, but in this case, I felt I have to do this. It felt obvious to me.
Marley: I was walking through the HUB and saw a flyer that said, Reconnecting Food Roots, Hey, Are you interested in where food comes from? I forget the exact verbiage, but I read the flyer, and it sounded exactly like my passions and the things that I enjoy reading about in my free time. And I thought, ‘Whoa, that’s amazing that there can be a class based on this and what can I learn from that?’
Tell me about your most memorable experiences on Lopez Study Away.
Marley: I think one of the biggest things that sticks out to me was seeing something go from field to product, so spending time in the wheat fields, then taking all of that wheat out to see it milled, and then seeing it at the end of the day end up back in the bakery and something that we could eat. So, seeing that entire process and appreciating all of the different folks and their expertise throughout that life cycle really stuck with me and was really interesting, as well as all of the different relationships each of us had with food, and being able to talk about that at lunch and dinner and the things that these different meals brought up for all of us was really special.
Carilyn: The first thing I think about is the other people in the program. I have such fond memories of being with everybody there, and I feel like we got so close so quickly, and I have such cherished memories of our dinners out there. Especially our big crab dinners, when we had this huge table, and we were all eating together, and when we had the farmers and growers and harvesters and other people we met on field visits over for dinner, we had many interesting conversations. I distinctly remember the strong sense of community. Another good memory I have is when we went to the concert to support the library, and on the way home, we played songs from the concert and just spent time together. I remember we got out and danced in the field at sunset, and it was amazing becoming such close friends. It’s such a beautiful place out there, and it was so cool experiencing a close-knit community in a place like that.
How did the program impact you, as a UW student?
Marley: I think it impacted me not just as a UW student, and feeling more connected with programs and with people I otherwise never would have met, but me really getting a sense of place with Seattle and the Pacific Northwest. I’m not from this way originally, and so by seeing the types of food that come from this land, the history behind it, why people have been here, really made me feel like a Seattleite or like a UW student in a way that’s like, oh, this is the community that I’m a part of now.
Carilyn: As a student, it helped me confirm my trajectory for what I wanted to do in college. Coming back from the program, I felt like one of my academic goals was, okay, I want to continue learning about agriculture while I’m at the UW, and specifically how do we bring this back? On Lopez we saw these amazing examples of sustainable ways of living and growing food, and how do we continue that when we go back to the city? And so for me, I’m already involved in the Dirty Dozen and the UW farm. I want to become more involved, more intentional about that, and continue expanding my leadership in those ways which I’ve gone on to do by now being one of the club leaders. It also made me realize that while I was majoring in English, which may not seem related to the world of farming, the interdisciplinary zone mattered a lot to me. That was something I came to believe in even more strongly while I was there. I care about the intersection between literature and the environment, culture and community and food. These all connect to me, and being on Lopez, I realized that this is academically important to me, and that I do want to continue pursuing it even if I don’t see other people often bridging that gap. I declared my minor in environmental studies after I got back from the program.
And how about how the program impacted you as a person?
Marley: I think it’s made me take larger accountability for the food that I eat. Not saying that I’ve held to all of my goals by any means, but things like where am I spending my dollars, and how are those dollars going further in certain environments compared to mass-produced food, and what role can I play in helping out local farmers, and what food can I be buying and eating to make sure that I’m staying healthy? So, I think it’s impacted the way that I see myself in the environment as well as that I need to nurture myself too and not always think super macro. I still hit the farmers market every weekend, which has been a great tradition to keep. And so many of the lessons are smaller, right? Like, not making judgments about where people are coming from, what their ideas might be, and just sitting and being really eager to listen is one of the bigger lessons I took away from this program. This definitely helps me throughout all of my work, even though my work is all not necessarily connected to food.
Carilyn: It’s so hard to put into words, but I think visiting and touring and getting to know all those people in Lopez, both the farmers and the people we met along the way, was reaffirming for who I wanted to become. All the people there were making lives for themselves on Lopez for very deep reasons. I was constantly inspired by these really gritty, down-to-earth people that although it was often a financial sacrifice to be living there, were so driven by passion to be more reciprocal with their relationship to land, how to live most sustainably, and how to live in community really intentionally. There was this real sense of “we support each other and we support the land we live on”. That was so reaffirming and inspiring to me to see a tangible example of the kind of person that I wanted to be. It was made real by seeing it in people that I could meet and talk to, rather than just an idea, or something in a book. I already had those seeds of ideas in my head, that I wanted to grow my own food, and be intentional about cooking and being in community with others around food. Being on Lopez helped me realize those visions. I just loved how everyone was living out their passions in a real way that was so inspiring to me.
What would you recommend about the program to other UW students?
Marley: I would highly encourage everyone to step into this program, and more specifically, anyone who is really curious about or enjoys food and wants to really dive in deep to understanding the web from an economic, health, and scientific standpoint. I also think it’s a good program for anyone who’s just curious about life and who is willing to lean in and have conversations that may not always feel like it fits into what you’re studying, but it’s all good advice and experiences, nevertheless. It’s a very liberal arts, old school experience.
Carilyn: If students have any interest in sustainability, food systems, and the intersection between the environment, culture, people and community, they should absolutely take this program to see a tangible example of what that looks like. Things like, how do we grow food in a better way that doesn’t hurt the environment? One of the most valuable parts of the program was living with the other people in the program, and this small, close-knit, month-long thing, where you’re only together for a fairly short time, but you’re also grappling with these big ideas, you’re living together, you’re making your meals together. It taught me a lot of important lessons about how I wanted to be as a community member, operating with generosity and humility and talking big ideas out together in genuine ways. I learned a lot about farming and environmental issues (really tangible academic things), but I also learned a lot about living in a community. Especially living in a city there can be a sense of all being in our own little worlds, getting our tasks done with a focus on individuality. If you want to break out of that and think about community in a different way and not just a buzzword, I’d absolutely recommend this program for you.
What would you recommend about the program to UW students from outside the U.S.?
Carilyn: The immediate thing that comes to my mind is the natural landscape of Lopez, being really unique and specific. It’s an amazing example of the beauty of this state, and a way to explore this state in more deep ways with the natural landscape than you would get just being a student in Seattle. Often times students go to places like Italy or somewhere else thinking everything is so much better there, thinking it could never be this way in the U.S. where our systems are so extractive and entrenched and industrial agriculture and capitalism. It may feel like there is no way we are going to break out of this. For me, Lopez was an example of ways we could be less extractive at home in the United States, which can be inspiring and break out of the box you may have about what the United States is or could be. It would also be good to get a taste of rural life in the U.S. – which is what most of the U.S. is!
Marley: Lopez being in Seattle’s backyard doesn’t mean it’s not a completely different world. I remember taking the ferry up to Lopez for the first time, and feeling like this is entirely removed from anything that I would have expected or have seen before. So it is… it’s really wild, it is a totally different experience, and I think it leans into Yeah, just, like, a different… Really, really local…Really, really trusting environment that you don’t otherwise see anymore, and that being its own study away, study abroad.
Anything else you might share?
Marley: This program will always be such a special place in my heart because of how much I learned to trust and rely on other people throughout this program, from having conversations at lunch, to having a roommate, to seeing the island interact, you can hitchhike, you can leave your keys in the car. I think it really renewed a sense of trust in humanity for me, and was a great time of just reflection and stillness that gave me enough energy to get through the second year of grad school.
Carilyn: In the cohort we had, we were all coming from such different places, in terms of what we were studying, our ages, and our backgrounds of where we grew up and what we brought to the program. That’s what made it so exciting to me, especially living in community with those people – we all kind of had something to bring to the table and teach each other, and were able to support each other and learn together in beautiful ways. I think there should be no expectation that you’re from the Pacific Northwest, or into environmental health already.