Additional Speakers:

Farm to (Data) Table: Increasing Indigenous-led Information Management in Agriculture and Food Systems

Erin Parker, Director of the Indigenous Food & Agriculture Initiative, University of Arkansas

The Indigenous Food and Agriculture Initiative (IFAI) at the University of Arkansas School of Law is the singular national legal research and policy analysis center focused on supporting tribal governments exercising their sovereignty in the space of food and agriculture law and policy. Erin previously served as the Initiative’s Research Director, and has worked in Indian Country for all of her career as a food and agricultural lawyer. She holds both her J.D. and her LL.M. in Agricultural and Food Law from the University of Arkansas School of Law, where she also teaches various classes in food and agriculture policy as part of the University of Arkansas’s Masters in Agricultural & Food Law (LL.M.) program.

A History of Innovations in Fruit Breeding at the University of Arkansas

John Clark, Distinguished Professor of Horticulture, University of Arkansas

Dr. John Clark has worked in the fruit breeding program since joining the University of Arkansas in 1980. Crops he has worked with include blackberries, table grapes, wine and muscadine grapes, blueberries, and peaches/nectarines. He has developed more than 60 varieties of various fruits. He has been recognized for his efforts, including induction in the Arkansas Agriculture Hall of Fame, the Impact Award by the National Association of Plant Breeders, named a Fellow of the American Society for Horticultural Science, and Distinguished Service Award, North American Raspberry and Blackberry Association.

Rice from Asia to Arkansas: Challenges, Progress and Needs

Paul Counce, Professor of Crop, Soil and Environmental Sciences, University of Arkansas

Dr. Paul Counce is a professor of rice physiology at the Rice Research and Extension Center in Stuttgart, Arkansas. His work addresses physiological limitations on rice yield and quality. He presently leads a project for understanding and addressing yield and quality limitations from high nighttime air temperatures. His work has included a wide range of research topics related to rice production, development, and physiology.

Collaborating with Strangers at USAIN

Bess de Farber, President, ASK Associates

Bess de Farber has had four careers: as a musician and arts and culture administrator; as a program officer managing grant awards for arts & cultural, social services, and human and race relations programs; as a consultant for nonprofit organizations seeking grant funding; and as an academic research development professional at the University of Arizona and the University of Florida. She has provided grantseeking instruction and collaboration workshops to thousands of library staff, nonprofit and academic professionals, artists, and university students in the past 32 years, and has led efforts to secure millions in grant funding for nonprofits and academic libraries. Bess is the author of two books on grantseeking, Collaborative Grant-Seeking: A practicial guide for librarians, and Creating Fundable Grant Proposals: Profiles of innovative partnerships, and coauthor of a third book, Collaborating with Strangers: Facilitating workshops in libraries, classes and nonprofits. She holds a bachelor of music from the University of Southern California, and a master of nonprofit management from Florida Atlantic University.

Suzanne Stapleton, Associate Librarian, University of Florida

As an Agricultural Sciences and Digital Scholarship Librarian, Suzanne offers expertise in agricultural literature searches, open access publishing, and digitization of historic print materials. She has co-facilitated and participated in previous CoLABs and is excited to share this experience with USAIN. Suzanne earned her M. S. from Cornell University, B. A. from Carleton College, and conducted agricultural research in the U. S., Mexico, and Central America. She is President-Elect of the U.S. Agriculture Information Network, UF representative to AgNIC, and a member of the American Library Association, Association of College and Research Libraries, and the Library Publishing Coalition.