Food and Agriculture Courses

The Agroecology Summer Field Quarter is a full-time, 7-week residential and traveling field study course hosted by UC Santa Cruz that offers hands-on experiential learning on multiple campus farms, including our Oxford Tract farm, and with community-based organizations at the forefront of agroecology research, extension assistance and farming operations. Enrollment is open to all students, including those not enrolled in the UC system. UC students have the option to transfer course credits to their UC institution. UC Berkeley Food Systems Minor students can apply three credits from the field quarter towards the minor. More information about the summer Agroecology Field Quarters are announced each spring before the summer program. See this summer 2026 syllabus as a course example.

The DeCal Program is an aggregate of student-run courses at UC Berkeley in which students create and facilitate their own classes on a variety of subjects, many of which are not addressed in the traditional curriculum. DeCal explores agroecology as a decolonial praxis. It is structured in two parts: 

1. Guided grounding in social and political critical theory, and
2. Hands-on agroecological farming practices through workshops and labs at Oxford Tract farm on campus.

Edible Education 101 was a hybrid public lecture series and for-credit class in partnership with the Edible Schoolyard Project and UC Berkeley Haas School of Business and Berkeley Food Institute. The course explored the future of food, its diverse systems and movements. Lecture topics included organic agriculture, food safety, hunger, Farm Bill reform, farm-to-school initiatives, agroecology, labor in the food system, urban agriculture, food sovereignty and local food economies. It was offered to undergraduate students and free to members of the public. 

BFI sponsored this course from pilot to implementation for two years, in Fall 2024 as an upper division undergraduate course to Fall 2025 as a dual enrollment for upper division undergraduates and graduate students in UGBA 192T.6, in partnership with the Haas School of Business. The course explored how supply chain interventions are important levers for improving critical issues in our food systems. The class showcased the many professional roles and career paths that can contribute to a healthier, more sustainable and just food system. 

In 2018 and 2023, BFI offered a seminar at UC Berkeley, which brought experts on the Farm Bill to campus with the goals of understanding the general framework of this important legislation and identifying areas of particular interest for further study. Students critically analyzed the Farm Bill’s history, structure and implementation, contributed to real-time discussions, and built skills in policy analysis, debate, communications and coalition-building.