Our Partners

Common Ground Food Coop is Urbana’s local sustainable food cooperative. They sell local produce and bakery goods as well as many other sustainably produced groceries, and provide educational programming to engage community members in their local food system. We partner with Common Ground to sell some of our crops and to produce educational programs about healthy eating. We also donate plants to benefit their Food for All program and have been a recipient of their Round Up For Good Grant.

Learn more about Common Ground Food Coop here.

We love partnering with local nursery and landscape supplier Country Arbors to provide beautiful flowers and other annual ornamental plants for our Plant Sale each year!

Learn more about Country Arbors here.

Cunningham Township Supervisor’s Office works to provide a safety net for housing-insecure and low-income households in Urbana by providing direct assistance to those in need and by financially supporting other local social service organizations. We’ve worked with them in numerous ways, including collaborating on events and supporting the Come and Eat! Garden at their office. Most recently, we’ve collaborated on the Solidarity Gardens collaborative, which supports gardeners in producing high-quality, fresh produce for themselves and others, increasing food security in our community one garden at a time.

Learn more about Cunningham Township’s work here.

The Champaign-Urbana Public Health District works wonders to support the communal health of the Champaign-Urbana population, and we’re proud to partner with them in their efforts. We have collaborated with CUPHD for the past 7 years on a Free Friday Market and more recently Free Wednesday Market(s), offering thousands of pounds of produce and hundreds of seed packets as well as hygiene supplies, basic homewares, and staple dry goods to over 100 local families. In past years, we’ve also worked with them to distribute produce to WIC recipients and seniors as part of our “Share Thanksgiving Program,” graciously supported by our CSA members. We also donate plant starts to their Give-Back Garden to support healthy, nutritious food for their participants, and in 2020 we partnered with them to launch an ongoing Farm to School project.ongoing Farm to School project.

Learn more about CUPHD here.

We are honored to be in community with DREAAM, a community impact organization that seeks to provide mentorship and support to young men and boys of color. Through several programs, they aim to give young men opportunities for transformative experiences and address the effects of gun violence on the community. We partner with DREAAM on educational and recreation activities when it is appropriate.

Learn more about DREAAM’s work here.

We donate thousands of pounds of produce each year to the Eastern Illinois Foodbank for distribution through their participant agencies all across East Central Illinois. Our partnership with this organization helps the food we grow go even farther, to households as far west as Fayette County and as far east as the Indiana border.

Learn more about Eastern Illinois Foodbank’s work here.

Sola Gratia Farm is included in Experience CU's Farm Passport - check it out!

Learn more about Experience CU here.

The First Followers Reentry Program works to support our community members who have recently been released from prison. We have partnered with First Followers to provide a garden space for their Top Soil program in our Community Classroom!

Learn more about First Followers’ work here.

Healthy Champaign County is a collaborative group of health and wellness professionals, community service providers, and other university and community groups dedicated to addressing the major health needs in Champaign County. As a member organization of this group, we have helped each year to organize the Feeding Champaign County Food Summit, now in its 4th year, which brings together a wide variety of members of our local food system to assess and explore solutions to barriers to healthy food access in Champaign County. 

Learn more about Healthy Champaign County here.

HeartStrong Food Pantry has fed thousands of families in our community through their food giveaways, especially their annual Thanksgiving Giveaway, The Big Give. We support HeartStrong with produce donations when it's appropriate, and also support leader Angela Bradley on other projects to improve food access in Urbana-Champaign, such as the HeartStrong Grocery to be developed in Urbana's Ward 3.

The Illinois Stewardship Alliance is a statewide group of growers and eaters that works to support a more just, regenerative, and locally-built food system in Illinois. We support and promote their advocacy and policy work and participate in the Local Food Farmer Caucus, an alliance focused on amplifying the political and personal voices of local, small-scale farmers. We have also received grant funding through their Illinois Farmer Resilience Fund to improve our infrastructure and year-round production capacity.

Learn more about the Illinois Stewardship Alliance here.

We have collaborated with classes in the Biology and Horticulture departments at our local community college to offer educational farm tours to their classes. We love inviting local students to our farm!

Randolph Street Community Garden is a neighborhood garden in the Randolph and Neil neighborhood of Champaign. The Garden, run by the inimitable Dawn Blackman and other stewards, provides growing space to gardeners of many cultures from the local neighborhood. We partner with Randolph Street Garden to supply them with starts in the early season and support and promote their events.

Learn more about Randolph Street Community Garden here.

We are grateful to our local Rotaries including Sunrise Rotary, Urbana Rotary, Champaign Rotary, and CU at the Rotary for their enduring support over the years.

The Savanna Institute runs demonstration farms, educational events, research projects, technical support services, and farmer partnerships throughout the Midwest to support farmers in introducing agroforestry methods to their farms for increased resilience and biodiversity. We’ve worked with the Savanna Institute to design and plan our expanded alley-cropping operation at our new production site, as well as our edible widbreak, which will improve our farm’s sustainability and climate resilience while allowing us to produce a wider range of crops.

Learn more about the Savanna Institute here.

The Land Connection is an Illinois nonprofit organization that works to preserve and protect farmland and ensure that healthy, local food is made available to everyone within the community. We participate in the indoor Winter Farmers’ Market that they manage, and have  presented sessions as part of their Farm Beginnings trainings to train new farmers. We have also partnered in the past on food access and equity projects and continue to support and promote their advocacy work.

Learn more about The Land Connection here.

We're fortunate to have the flagship campus of the University of Illinois situated in our community and to benefit from their long history of agricultural research. We partner with UIUC in many ways, including with:

- University of Illinois Extension to collaborate on Food and Nutrition Education Program Initiatives, including coordinating the annual Feeding Champaign County Food Summit;

- College of ACES Crop Sciences department on research and best practices for specialty crop production;

- College of ACES Food Science and Human Nutrition department on student experiences in community nutrition and food security;

- School of Social Work on community reasearch, outreach, and volunteering;

- Humanities Research Insitute to develop and support a research assistantship around the Urbana Farm to School program;

- numerous and varied individual faculty and students on research projects and field trip opportunities;

- and Gies College of Business and many other groups, professional organizations, Greek organizations, and RSOs as volunteer partners.

We are proud to partner with Urbana Market at the Square as a vendor at every market! Find us May-October in the parking lot outside of Lincoln Square Mall every Saturday from 7-12! Since 1979, Urbana’s Market at the Square has been a mainstay for Urbana and the surrounding area by connecting the community with local growers and artisans. Saturday morning at Urbana’s Market at the Square is one of our city’s signature institutions.

Learn more about Urbana market at the Square here.

Urbana Neighborhood Connections Center is a hub of the Urbana community, supporting young people in building academic and social-emotional skills through their afterschool and summer programs. We’ve supported Mrs. Mitchell’s Garden at UNCC with plant starts and care help, and provide field trip and educational programming opportunities for their participants.

Learn more about Urbana Neighborhood Connections Center here.

Urbana Park District operates parks all over Urbana and hosts hundreds of community events, fitness and wellness programs, environmental education programs, and kids’ activities each year. They also operate rentable community garden plots at Victory Park and Meadowbrook Park. We’ve collaborated with Urbana Park District to provide plants for some of their activities, as well as educational field trips for their summer camps, and we also work with them on the Steering Committee of the Solidarity Gardens initiative.

Learn more about Urbana Park District here.

Urbana School District #116 is the public school district of Urbana and currently operates 10 schools for children in the community, including 6 elementary schools, a middle school, a high school, an Early Childhood Education Center, and a special education school that serves youth residing in Cunningham Children’s Home. We have collaborated with numerous teachers, administrators, school food service staff, family liaisons, project coordinators, and others at USD116 to provide field trips and educational opportunities for their students, provide our local produce to be used in their cafeterias, and support the development of a comprehensive Farm to School program and wellness activities in the district.

Learn more about Urbana School District #116 here.