In the spring of 2024, students taking a course relating to food and agricultural systems with environmental studies associate professor Liz Carlisle were assigned to create a project related to course content that impacted the community. A group of students decided to create a student-run farmers market, which has now operated for a year and hopes to expand. 

I.V. Farmers Market is a student-run farmers market, which has now operated for a year and hopes to expand. Shengyu Zhang / Daily Nexus

Fourth-year environmental studies major Jack Phillips, fifth-year environmental studies and sociology double major Trinity Patron, fourth-year environmental studies major Toby Still and recent alum Valeria Estrada brainstormed on issues they learned about in class. They decided to address Isla Vista’s lack of accessibility to fresh produce, dubbing their organization “I.V. Farmers Market.”

“There’s more than 25,000 students in less than a half square mile which makes it one of the most densely populated residential areas in California,” Phillips said. “The only place you can get fresh produce in I.V. is at the [Isla Vista Food Cooperative] which is currently facing difficulties and could go out of business. And so the I.V. Farmers Market was a way that we hope to bring fresh produce to the students and permanent residents in I.V.”

The students began the planning process by reaching out to local organizations, including the Isla Vista Community Services District (IVCSD) and Isla Vista Recreation and Park District. IVCSD provided them a space to hold the market at the I.V. Community Center. 

“The community organizations that we worked with were actually super on board,” Phillips said. “They were super excited about bringing healthy food to Isla Vista.”

The students found it challenging to find vendors and began by recruiting local farmers at the Santa Barbara Farmers Market, which is held every Saturday on State Street. They were eventually successful in finding interested farmers.

“Our biggest struggle — because we were a new group — was pitching our idea to the farmers at the market,” Estrada said. “A lot of them didn’t want to participate because they didn’t know how successful the market would be, so it’s amazing how [there were] very few farmers that did have hope in us.”

The group held their first market on April 24, 2024 and a second market on Nov. 8. They later brought additional students to join the I.V. Farmers Market team, including Cy Coldiron, a third-year statistics and data science and economics double major, and Gibson Lopez de Huehls, a first-year environmental studies major.

Coldiron independently came up with a similar idea of a farmers market while taking a social entrepreneurship seminar, for which he had to conceptualize an idea that would address a social or environmental issue.

“I think with a lot of our current food systems, there’s a big disconnect between consumers and farmers. I started talking with different administrators and eventually I connected with [Phillips] and [Patron] and we started working from there,” Coldiron said.

The team began to plan their next farmers market event, which took about four months. Their efforts culminated in the most recent I.V. Farmers Market held on May 23, which brought two fresh produce stands run by local farmers, Tutti Frutti Farms and Rodriguez Family Farms, as well as a stand from the I.V. Food Co-op. 

The team had originally planned for additional vendors to be present, but they didn’t show up, which Coldiron said is an issue he hopes to tackle for future markets.

“That was kind of disappointing,” Coldiron said. “But I think it kind of goes to show that you really need to build a foundation because a lot of these farmers are coming out for the entire day. It’s like a lot of time and money for them to commit to something.”

The team plans to make various improvements for future markets, including implementing Market Match, a state program which, according to their website, “matches customers’ CalFresh nutrition assistance benefits at farmers’ markets.” 

“Students in I.V. and college kids [in general] don’t have all the money in the world. Farmers markets are expensive,” Phillips said. “We’re trying to solve that problem by getting EBT at the market and bringing more people here, making it more accessible.”

The team has completed the first step of this process by securing 501(c)(3) non-profit organization status for I.V. Farmers Market. They hope to make the market a monthly event while recruiting additional vendors and will post about future markets on their Instagram page.

“Our goal is to try to hold a market every month going toward next year in the fall,” Coldiron said. “Going forward, we just want to try to build a larger coalition of farmers in the market and just try to build that consistency. We also want to have days of the week where we do the farmers market. So students can think, ‘I know that on this day, this is when the farmers market is going to be,’ which would kind of build that broader customer base.” 

Several members of the team, including Phillips and Patron, will be graduating soon. They expressed hope for the future of I.V. Farmers Market and hope to recruit more students to join.

“We want to bring along anybody that’s interested,” Patron said. “We were thinking about either making it a club or having some sort of outreach where people can help us and volunteer with us and become part of the team.”

A version of this article appeared on p. 6 of the May 29, 2025 print edition of the Daily Nexus.