Mike Miller was raised in Birmingham, AL, where an enormously biodiverse environment and a culture revolving around the many cuisines of the Deep South encouraged a strong relationship with food and its production.
He enjoys reading speculative fiction and practicing film photography in his free time. He also intends to both cultivate and make use of native plants in the local food culture with the knowledge gained in the Future Farmer Program and beyond.
Alicia Miyares is a budding farmer from Los Angeles, California. Passionate about healing through land practice and re-connecting folks with whole and healthy foods, Alicia seeks to farm at the intersection of people (community) and land (including creatures).
The context of Indigenous land practice and the legacies of farming in this country are crucial to Alicia’s approach to farming and developing as a farmer. She carries herself with care, respect (for all), and a lifelong commitment to learning and growing.
Moriah Hunter is currently traveling full time and working on farms across the US with the intention of gaining more skills in farming and sustainable agriculture. In the future, she plans on starting a CSA that will provide healthy, affordable produce to her local community.
Moriah likes to spend her free time out in nature as a way to learn more about the environment through immersion.
Braxton Tanner is a professional landscape designer working currently for a landscape architecture firm in Boston, Massachusetts. With an educational background in ecology and landscape architecture, Braxton utilizes art, design, and ecological science in his professional practice both independently and collaboratively.
Having a rich family history in farming, Braxton’s goal is to bring the discipline of design and community building into a future of regenerative agriculture and land management practices.
Rosa Maria Soriano Ynfante is a master’s student at New Mexico Highlands University. Rosa is originally from the Dominican Republic and acquired a Bachelor’s in Agricultural Sciences from Zamorano University in Honduras. After graduation, she worked for a year in the Application Technologies program at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Rosa worked for two years as a Research and Development Manager for a cocoa agroforestry project in the Dominican Republic. This experience triggered her interest to work in sustainable projects that support people and their livelihoods, inspiring her to apply for a master’s degree program with a focus on Environmental Science and Conservation at NMHU where she started in the spring of 2022.
Currently pursuing a bachelor’s degree in Architecture and Ethnobotany, Dounya Bilal’s deep love of plants works into everything they do from design & horticulture to working out on the farm. They are coming to the Future Farmer Program after the past year learning about food systems WWOOFing in Maui and working in the greenhouse of a botanical garden.
Dounya knows that stewardship means caring for our environment and community are one and the same, and understanding plants through a decolonized, indigenous lens is so important. Cultivating our personal connection to the land by regaining control of what we consume and how we grow it, in regaining the health of our most vulnerable communities is what they aim to work towards in their career.
