Our friends at UVM Extension in Middlebury recently hired two new staff members, and we’re thrilled to introduce them to you! Both of them will work closely with the farming community and our coalition.
Abigail (Abby) Augarten has joined as an agronomy specialist and is working with farmers in the Champlain Valley to provide agronomy outreach and technical assistance to improve farm viability and water quality. She is excited to get to know CVFC members and develop outreach and research programming that meets their agronomic and natural resources conservation goals.
Abby received a bachelor’s degree in International Agriculture from Cornell University and a master’s degree in Agroecology from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She was a Research and Outreach Specialist with University of Wisconsin- Extension’s Discovery Farms Program, performing on-farm agriculture, water quality and soil health research and outreach. She also served two years in the Peace Corps in Senegal as a sustainable agriculture extension agent. Abby is excited to be in Vermont and loves trail running, hiking, gardening, reading, and knitting.
Anna Elewski is excited to join UVM Extension as their new Soil Health and Water Quality Outreach specialist. Her work will focus on natural resource conservation and agronomy outreach to support farmers in the Lake Champlain Basin.
Anna recently moved to Vermont for the second time after working on a small organic farm near Mount Hood, Oregon. Before farming, she worked for the USGS doing salmon conservation research on the Columbia River. She earned a bachelor’s degree in biology, with a concentration in conservation ecology, from Vassar College in 2021. After graduating, she moved to Burlington to work a seasonal forestry position and quickly came to love Vermont. She is passionate about building sustainable food systems and community-centered responses to the climate crisis. In her free time, she enjoys hiking, knitting, and making pickles.
