What do you get when you bring three farmers, a nutritionist, a chef, a rural sociologist, an anthropologist and an urban development expert together? One energized class of 2003 class of FAS Policy Fellows!

In early September, the 2003 class started their fellowship experience in America's heartland, Des Moines, Iowa. The fellows convened for three days to meet one another and begin their communications work. In addition to interactive media training with Vanguard Communications, the group met with two of the state's leading agricultural policy experts, Neil Hamilton and Craig Cox, to discuss emerging trends in food policy. A tour at the Des Moines Register, gave the fellows an insider's perspective on news making at Iowa's award winning newspaper.

On the last day the group visited several of the people making positive changes in Iowa's food system. Dick Thompson of Boone, a twenty-five year advocate for low input agriculture and founder of Practical Farmers of Iowa, showed fellows his on-farm crop and livestock research projects. The group toured Larry Cleverly's vegetable garden and sampled heirloom tomatoes that he successfully direct markets, along with Niman Ranch meats, to upscale restaurant in Central Iowa. The fellows ended their tour at the Seventh Street Revitalization Project in downtown Des Moines, an example of a once tattered city block that restored its community and dignity. With the help from the not-for-profit, 1000 Friends of Iowa, the neighborhood has worked to refurbish several homes, relocate a grocery store, and rebuild an urban garden.

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