Latest / The Future Herd / 35: City Talent Needs to Flow Back Into Agriculture with Daniel Kunanec

Transcript

35: City Talent Needs to Flow Back Into Agriculture with Daniel Kunanec · The Future Herd

• 0:01
  Jesse Hirsh: Hi, I'm Jesse Hirsh.
• 0:03
  Welcome to the Future Herd.
• 0:13
  I know for many of us, high school was not the peak of our social existence.
• 0:18
  If anything, it's something that as soon as it was done,
• 0:21
  I was ready to have behind me.
• 0:24
  But I couldn't help imagine that if I had Dan as my high school teacher,
• 0:30
  everything would've been different.
• 0:33
  And today's episode not only gives us a glimpse at what could have been,
• 0:38
  but it actually gives us a tangible example that here in the present
• 0:43
  we're starting to see a reversal of the potential drain of talent from
• 0:48
  rural communities to urban centres.
• 0:51
  But instead, we could be seeing the tip of city talent flowing back into agriculture.
• 0:59
  'cause it's not enough for farmers to grow food.
• 1:03
  We need to be growing farmers.
• 1:06
  And that's exactly what Dan Kunanec is doing at Don Mills Collegiate in Toronto.
• 1:13
  He's developed an urban agriculture programme that allows high school
• 1:19
  students to engage almost all areas of contemporary agriculture, even future
• 1:25
  agriculture, so that they can find their place, their prosperity in an
• 1:31
  industry that quite frankly needs them.
• 1:34
  So this is one of those conversations that, like many future herd episodes
• 1:39
  I absolutely loved, but it was one that really made me think of what
• 1:45
  we could do if education really took agriculture seriously, if it really
• 1:51
  looked at food production and food consumption as a central pillar of
• 1:56
  what we need to be teaching kids.
• 1:59
  And in that regard, Dan is one of those leaders that I wish
• 2:04
  we had a whole lot more of.
• 2:05
  And if anything, that's the point of today's episode that we can all
• 2:09
  learn a lot from leaders like Dan.
• 2:12
  Alright, let's listen.
• 2:16
  Dan, welcome to the Future Herd.
• 2:18
  Dan Kunanec: Thank you very much, Jesse.
• 2:19
  I appreciate it.
• 2:21
  Jesse Hirsh: Now, uh, I start every episode with kind of the same question.
• 2:25
  It's meant to be a kind of icebreaker, a kind of abstract,
• 2:29
  uh, first thing that comes to mind.
• 2:32
  What does the future mean to you?
• 2:36
  Dan Kunanec: Seeing the possibility and, the perspectives of my young students.
• 2:40
  I, I am so excited about, I'm excited about the future because I, I'm surrounded
• 2:45
  by young people all the time, and I, I know what they're capable of and I don't
• 2:50
  know what they're capable of because, uh, they're gonna surprise all of us.
• 2:54
  So I'm, I'm excited.
• 2:56
  Jesse Hirsh: Right on.
• 2:57
  And you're right.
• 2:57
  Of all the guests we've had on the show, you've probably had the closest
• 3:02
  proximity to the future in terms of actually being, you know, on,
• 3:06
  on the front lines of, uh, uh, the future adults, the future responsible
• 3:11
  members of our society, you know.
• 3:14
  Dan Kunanec: uh, it's remarkable.
• 3:15
  It's such a privilege to be with, with this age group and just see
• 3:19
  that they're on the cusp of things.
• 3:22
  And also, you know, the decision makers, I remind them as they're about to graduate,
• 3:26
  that they're about to be voters, right?
• 3:28
  So we've gotta give them a lot of credit and, um, they're, they're
• 3:32
  amazing in their own regard, for sure.
• 3:34
  Jesse Hirsh: Right on.
• 3:35
  Well, certainly part of what I'd love to do today is get some of your
• 3:38
  perspective on kinda, you know, what's going on w with, uh, the younger
• 3:43
  generation, but in particular, I did want to talk today about agriculture
• 3:47
  and education in the urban settings.
• 3:50
  And I kind of wanted to start, you sort of alluded to this already, you know,
• 3:55
  the second question I'd like to ask people is kind of the origin story of the
• 3:59
  lore, and in your case, why education?
• 4:02
  Because, you know, as I was sort of researching you, it strikes me
• 4:05
  you're another one of these dynamic people who probably could have gone
• 4:09
  in a number of different directions.
• 4:12
  What is it about education, uh, that clearly is a source
• 4:15
  of passion and excitement.
• 4:18
  Dan Kunanec: It is, it is a source of passion, excitement for me at
• 4:21
  this point, but it wasn't always.
• 4:23
  Um, and I, I did do other things.
• 4:26
  Um, uh, in fact, teaching is a job that I literally said more than
• 4:32
  once occasions to many people.
• 4:35
  teaching is the last job I would ever do.
• 4:38
  Um, I was, uh, like a lot of kids that I, that I have in my classrooms,
• 4:43
  uh, not totally enamoured with school experience, not always enamoured
• 4:47
  with, with some of the adults that were, were the teachers in the room.
• 4:51
  Um, and it was a room.
• 4:52
  It was always a room and that situation, uh, now I did have some that were
• 4:56
  just absolutely incredible and they, they kind of stayed in my life.
• 5:00
  And, uh, I think we all have those stories where there's, there's a
• 5:03
  couple of caring adults that get you and kind of try to get you through.
• 5:08
  Um, but, um, no, I never wanted to be a teacher.
• 5:11
  Um, and so I was, uh, I was successful in the design and build world quite good.
• 5:17
  Um, it really was, uh, that moment in time where, uh, my wife and
• 5:22
  I were about to start a family.
• 5:24
  um, I realised that, um, I was, I was travelling a lot with my job
• 5:29
  and, and design and construction, um, and that if I wanted to be a,
• 5:32
  you know, the kind of father that I wanted to be, I need to be homework.
• 5:37
  and so, you know, we looked at, okay, uh, where can we make the switch?
• 5:41
  Um, and that's like a lot of people, you know, you make a
• 5:44
  switch in life, but for me it was a little more challenging because,
• 5:48
  because I was that type of student.
• 5:50
  Um, I, I dropped out of school, so I didn't have a degree.
• 5:54
  I started my business when I was 20, 21.
• 5:57
  very entrepreneurial.
• 5:58
  I just couldn't sit in a classroom.
• 6:00
  Um, wasn't quite for me.
• 6:03
  Um, I've taken lots of college, university courses, but, but I don't have a degree.
• 6:07
  So that was, that was limiting.
• 6:09
  Um, as far as, uh, doing a job that was a grownup job.
• 6:13
  Um, and so at that time in the, the mid nineties, uh, my options were, uh, police
• 6:19
  officer, firefighter, and, um, a be begrudgingly teacher, uh, but specifically
• 6:24
  a technological studies teacher.
• 6:26
  you think about, you know, if, if, uh, you're an Ontario kid or people
• 6:31
  across the country, you're your shop teachers, your drafting teachers, your
• 6:34
  auto shop teachers, all that stuff.
• 6:36
  So in Ontario specifically, especially, uh, in the nineties, the work experience
• 6:41
  you had in the field qualified you to be accepted to a teaching faculty.
• 6:47
  And then you still went back to university and spent that
• 6:49
  year, um, learning how to teach.
• 6:52
  Um, but the assumption was that you were considered an expert in your field.
• 6:57
  so, um, some of my great teachers, um, and my wife, uh, convinced me to go for it.
• 7:01
  And, uh, I, I went for it.
• 7:03
  Um, I didn't think I'd like it.
• 7:06
  Uh, but from day one, I was completely smitten with the possibilities, with
• 7:11
  the attitudes of, of the students, um, with their potential and the fact that
• 7:15
  I, I could build something from scratch allowed students to, um, show who they
• 7:23
  are and how brilliant they actually are.
• 7:25
  Maybe they're not successful in other classes, but do
• 7:28
  something awesome together.
• 7:29
  Um, and, and that, uh, once, once I, I got over myself, um, I, I
• 7:36
  realised that I was, you know, one of the luckiest people that I knew.
• 7:40
  So, yeah.
• 7:41
  Jesse Hirsh: Well, I, I'd love for you to unpack, uh, unpack some of that, you know,
• 7:45
  uh, especially the kind of applied stuff.
• 7:47
  'cause I, I'm similar.
• 7:48
  I mean, I, I, I think I, I, I got through high school, partly
• 7:53
  through extracurricular activities.
• 7:55
  Like it was the non-school stuff that kind of kept me engaged and I
• 7:59
  didn't get a bachelor's degree, partly 'cause I, I wanted to be in the world.
• 8:03
  I wanted to build stuff I would've loved at my high school for there to
• 8:08
  have been someone like you where it, it's about projects, it's about, you
• 8:13
  know, collaboration and team building and, and doing things with your hands.
• 8:17
  Obviously we're gonna talk about farming and the on school farm,
• 8:21
  but were there stuff before that?
• 8:23
  Can you gimme examples of some of the projects that you used to get
• 8:26
  kids rallying around, you know, in, in some of the earlier days of,
• 8:31
  in, in my view, changing education, changing the high school experience.
• 8:36
  Dan Kunanec: Um, yeah, I've been, I've been at this school for 26 years, so,
• 8:39
  um, you know, I went right from the design build world into this space, and
• 8:43
  I knew I wanted to stay here I was either fired or the, or, or I retire here.
• 8:48
  Um, um, but from day one it was about, about the doing,
• 8:52
  it was about the creation.
• 8:53
  So I got an old shop that was pretty beat up and, uh, was pretty messy,
• 8:58
  um, and, you know, refurbished that.
• 9:00
  Um, it was very, it was very hands-on.
• 9:03
  And I realised the projects that, that we wanted to do was really to, um, improve
• 9:09
  the, the nature of the site itself.
• 9:12
  So we call it the campus.
• 9:14
  So a guy that's not a university guy who likes to use the university world word.
• 9:18
  And, uh, the campus kind of implies that that learning is not just about the room.
• 9:24
  Um, the learning environments should be the property and it
• 9:28
  should feel like it's engaging.
• 9:30
  And when you have moments to sit and be, or walk and talk or loiter in a
• 9:35
  positive, engaging way that you're always learning, this is a place of learning.
• 9:41
  and so, uh, I work at Don Mill ci, but we're also attached physically,
• 9:45
  literally to our middle school.
• 9:47
  So it's, it's a special building.
• 9:50
  so we have grade sixes right through grade 12, but I teach in the high
• 9:54
  school side, even though I'm physically squatting in the middle school side.
• 9:58
  So we're very integrated.
• 10:00
  but we realised that every project we wanted to do was to make
• 10:02
  things better for our community.
• 10:05
  really became an important, uh, catchphrase for everything we did.
• 10:08
  Um, community would just either expand or contract, it would be more
• 10:13
  specific or more, uh, wide ranging.
• 10:16
  And then we also really wanted to look at legacy.
• 10:19
  How do you make things better for the next people that, that come up?
• 10:23
  So my dad always taught me major, major influence in my life.
• 10:27
  Um, leave it better than you found it, right?
• 10:29
  So if you, if you do that, if that's your goal, then you
• 10:33
  know, how, how can you go wrong?
• 10:35
  Uh, even if it's an inch forward.
• 10:38
  but over 26 years we've really tried to take.
• 10:41
  That leave it better than you found it.
• 10:42
  And the legacy piece and the community building also, um, a sense of wellness,
• 10:47
  um, um, which is maybe overused as a word.
• 10:51
  Um, and then the other overused word is, is, is greening.
• 10:54
  So do we improve the environment and get people outside more
• 10:59
  and make things better?
• 11:00
  So all of the projects that we've done have, have been that way.
• 11:04
  We started with, uh, an interior, uh, courtyard pond and a landscaping area.
• 11:10
  Uh, learned a lot from that.
• 11:12
  Went into things like aquaponics in the building, um, looked at
• 11:16
  where we could start raising food.
• 11:19
  when I was first teaching, it was technological design then the green
• 11:23
  industry's curriculum was introduced and we jumped on that 'cause we
• 11:26
  were kind of doing it anyway.
• 11:28
  Um, and then eventually hospitality, a forestry.
• 11:30
  We, we've planted so many trees, like 175 trees this site.
• 11:35
  It was already a well tree site before, improving the biodiversity pathways,
• 11:40
  shade, outdoor seating areas, you name it.
• 11:44
  Not just for the students, but also the community at large.
• 11:46
  We kind of treat it like it's a park people will come and bring
• 11:50
  their dogs and walk and And we
• 11:53
  Jesse Hirsh: Right on.
• 11:54
  Dan Kunanec: it.
• 11:55
  Jesse Hirsh: Well, you know, on the one hand, this is a key insight, I think, for
• 11:58
  school boards anywhere that to hire people who were previously in the trades or in
• 12:03
  the building industry as teachers, gives you the bonus side effect of upgrading
• 12:08
  your infrastructure from the inside out.
• 12:10
  I mean, that in and of itself sounds fantastic.
• 12:14
  Let, let me ask you a, as a digression, a kind of technical question.
• 12:17
  And, and I say this because I, I grew up in Toronto.
• 12:21
  I went to high school in Toronto, and when I was in high school,
• 12:24
  Dan Kunanec: Excellent.
• 12:25
  Jesse Hirsh: institutes were kind of streamed away from shops.
• 12:30
  Like I regret that I went to a collegiate institute and didn't have access to
• 12:35
  shops, didn't get access to going into a, a, a trade or an apprentice stream.
• 12:40
  That's changed.
• 12:41
  Can you give me a sense in the time that you've been there, how, or if John
• 12:47
  Mills Collegiate kind of shifted from a kind of academic focus to, to your
• 12:52
  point, more well-rounded and, and more rooted in the community as a whole?
• 12:57
  Dan Kunanec: Um, such a good question.
• 12:59
  And, um, the shift has been more about, um, the, the hands-on
• 13:07
  becoming part of academics, um, understood that it's not exclusive.
• 13:13
  Understood that students that maybe have an academic focus can
• 13:17
  benefit from these experiences.
• 13:19
  so experiencing history from a hands-on, actual point of view, but at the
• 13:25
  same time, you know, the traditional, um, technological courses also
• 13:30
  expanding them into an academic area.
• 13:32
  So our hospitality and tourism students obviously focusing on food,
• 13:36
  but now it's, um, you know, cultures of the world, historical breads.
• 13:41
  Um, where did that all come from?
• 13:42
  So one of, one of the things that I always talk about that my programme, if anything,
• 13:49
  is inspired by a loaf of bread, right?
• 13:51
  So, um, how a loaf of bread, this is so good.
• 13:56
  How, how do we make a loaf of bread?
• 13:59
  Okay, ev every step of how do we make a loaf of bread, right?
• 14:04
  So getting the recipe, but also learning that we have to
• 14:07
  have a certain type of grain.
• 14:09
  Where do we get the seed collecting the seed?
• 14:12
  Um, can we, can we get it from last year's crops?
• 14:15
  Uh, do we know elders in the community that know how to do that?
• 14:18
  Uh, who are the farmers that can help us?
• 14:20
  How do we grow our own?
• 14:21
  How do we, how do we cultivate the lands?
• 14:23
  How do we, how do we irrigate?
• 14:25
  Uh, what are all the skills necessary for that?
• 14:27
  Um, understanding weather patterns, understanding climate, climate
• 14:31
  change, climate change, mitigation, growing zones, biodiversity, all
• 14:36
  those sciences that come into play.
• 14:38
  And then, you know, raising it and doing well with it, and then harvesting it.
• 14:42
  And then what do we do now?
• 14:44
  How do we dry it?
• 14:45
  Well, how do we mill the weed?
• 14:46
  We have to make a mill.
• 14:47
  You know, like, how do we, how do we mill that?
• 14:49
  Um, okay, how do we store it?
• 14:51
  What are all the storage containers and, and the pottery and the, and
• 14:54
  the glass needs and the, the storage, and how do we do a cold cellar?
• 14:58
  And, and so on and so forth.
• 15:00
  But, oh, we're going to make the loaf of bread.
• 15:02
  Now, okay, the recipe.
• 15:02
  Let's get, oh, we need an oven.
• 15:04
  Well, how do we make an oven?
• 15:05
  What are the steps involved in making an a, a wood-fired oven?
• 15:09
  What cultures have used wood-fired ovens in history?
• 15:11
  Is it important?
• 15:12
  Um, how do they store their stuff?
• 15:14
  Um, what did your cultures do?
• 15:16
  Uh, we have the most multicultural school, I think, in the city.
• 15:20
  Uh, maybe, maybe in Canada.
• 15:22
  What does that put us in the world?
• 15:23
  I don't know.
• 15:23
  But all these, these students have stories about, you know, where
• 15:28
  they come from and the breads and the doughs and the dumplings.
• 15:30
  And, and so, so you, you make it.
• 15:33
  Um, what are we gonna have with it?
• 15:34
  What are the preserves, the fruit trees, the orchard, um, you know,
• 15:38
  the, the, the, is it a pancake, the maple syrup that we make?
• 15:41
  What are the traditions there?
• 15:42
  Where are the indigenous traditions?
• 15:45
  Um, on and on goes.
• 15:46
  And then the whole point is to, we have to share it.
• 15:49
  Well then let's, let's build a space.
• 15:52
  Um, let's make our, our benches.
• 15:53
  Let's make our tables, let's make it comfortable and let's the loaf
• 15:58
  so that when we're sharing the loaf, someone says, this is good.
• 16:02
  How do you make a loaf for bread?
• 16:05
  And on it goes, right?
• 16:06
  So that's a long-winded, all my, all my descriptions are long-winded.
• 16:11
  That's, I guess that's why I'm a teacher.
• 16:13
  Jesse Hirsh: But, but that was fantastic and it was fantastic because you were
• 16:17
  on the one hand hitting the questions you'd expect, but you were also
• 16:22
  inserting like a really good teacher.
• 16:25
  Some of the questions that make you think, some of the questions that make
• 16:28
  you take for think about what you take for granted, think about what you don't know.
• 16:33
  I, I'm, I'm fascinated on a curriculum level.
• 16:37
  How did you get to where you are today?
• 16:39
  And, and I say this 'cause what you just described was very
• 16:42
  well thought out, very smooth.
• 16:45
  There is a, a kind of cliche, certainly within the agricultural industry
• 16:50
  that people who live in cities don't know where their food comes from.
• 16:53
  You're obviously proven that wrong.
• 16:55
  Your students are proven that wrong.
• 16:58
  What has it been like to develop this kind of curriculum?
• 17:01
  Has it been all support?
• 17:03
  Have you had naysayers?
• 17:05
  Uh, give me a sense of what the journey has been to kind of where
• 17:10
  now you seem to be really running, all running on all cylinders.
• 17:14
  Dan Kunanec: Well, uh, to be fair, the, the curriculum exists.
• 17:18
  So curriculum like the Green Industries is a course.
• 17:22
  It was released 2009.
• 17:24
  Um, we knew it was coming 2008.
• 17:27
  but curriculum like curriculum's actually as dry as it is to read and to follow.
• 17:33
  It's very generous and it's very open.
• 17:37
  So like, um, you know, how are plants affected by biotic and abiotic factors?
• 17:44
  You know, that's, that's pretty wide ranging.
• 17:46
  Um, you can do a lot with that, or it could be very boring the way you do it.
• 17:51
  Um, and so how I approach things is come up with a cool idea that I hope is cool.
• 17:57
  I, I think is cool.
• 17:59
  Um, and then I look at the curriculum and see what we're checking off.
• 18:04
  To do it in a reverse fashion is just mind boggling and
• 18:07
  there's nothing exciting there.
• 18:09
  Um, and then there's bound to be some steps in the curriculum that I'm like,
• 18:12
  Ooh, this one doesn't cover that.
• 18:13
  Oh, I know what I can do.
• 18:15
  And so you expand it out to cover that, and then it goes down another tangent.
• 18:20
  and then, you know, I talk about it with the students.
• 18:23
  Um, does this sound like something cool?
• 18:25
  Um, or often the idea comes from the students, you know, the, oh,
• 18:30
  wouldn't it be great if we could?
• 18:32
  like, that sounds amazing.
• 18:34
  Um, you know, the invariably the question would be the students would
• 18:37
  be like, well, how do we do that?
• 18:38
  And I have no idea.
• 18:40
  Let's figure it out.
• 18:41
  Let's figure it out together.
• 18:43
  that's a really important part of my teaching.
• 18:45
  My kids know that.
• 18:46
  I don't know.
• 18:47
  Um, and it's important that I share that out front.
• 18:50
  And there's some things that I might know a little bit about.
• 18:52
  I can, I can bring that in or I'm gonna bring the experts in, and
• 18:56
  that's a big part of, of what I do.
• 18:58
  So I'm not the sage on the stage by any means.
• 19:01
  Um, I'm learning with them.
• 19:03
  Um, and as long as we're all excited together, then I, you
• 19:07
  know, good things are gonna happen.
• 19:08
  So, um, but the curriculum is, exists.
• 19:12
  So any, any school, any high school in Ontario, um, access to the curriculum.
• 19:18
  So whether or not they have a champion in their building that has the skill sets
• 19:23
  and the interest, and if those champions have the champions in the admin that say,
• 19:28
  yeah, this is cool, we could do this.
• 19:29
  Um, and then of course the kids have to, uh, select it because
• 19:34
  all of my courses are elective.
• 19:36
  So, that means I need to excite other people that haven't taken it yet, um,
• 19:43
  and, and get them to want to take it.
• 19:45
  And so obviously all the stuff we have around helps with that.
• 19:49
  Um, but at the same time, I know that when a kid takes a
• 19:51
  course, they want to be there.
• 19:54
  And so now it's my job to make sure they, they made a good choice.
• 19:57
  Um, and then there occasionally there's some kids that are, are,
• 20:00
  are put in because of scheduling conflicts or needs somewhere to
• 20:04
  make sure their schedule's full.
• 20:06
  And those are the kids that I really wanna make sure that sure that
• 20:09
  they now enjoy where they landed.
• 20:12
  Um, and so, you know, all of that matters.
• 20:16
  Um, but to your original point, yeah, it's true.
• 20:20
  A lot of it's not It's like people don't know where the food comes from.
• 20:25
  Um, and it's not just an urban scenario, but it is more urban for sure.
• 20:30
  So understanding where food comes from, food literacy, understanding
• 20:35
  food security, um, uh, what are the issues in the community around food?
• 20:40
  Uh, what are the cultural issues, but also seasonality.
• 20:43
  Um, why are you trying to buy that product you know, the winter when
• 20:49
  it's not really a fresh product?
• 20:51
  And what are the implications of buying that product that comes from 2000 miles
• 20:55
  away is shipped over and all the pollution And when that product arrives, it's
• 21:00
  not really good anyway, nutritionally, flavour wise, what are the other options?
• 21:05
  Can we do preserves from the year before?
• 21:07
  Or what can we grow indoors?
• 21:09
  Um, and so we're doing traditional growing techniques, but also a lot
• 21:12
  of newer age, uh, indoor techniques that are influenced by those as well.
• 21:17
  So yeah, that food literacy and where your food comes from,
• 21:20
  that's, that's a big part of it.
• 21:23
  Jesse Hirsh: Well, and, and I'd love for you to elaborate on that
• 21:25
  literacy piece and, and maybe loop it back to your point about excitement.
• 21:29
  'cause 'cause I was gonna ask about whether these were electives or,
• 21:32
  or whether we're seeing sort of greater integration in terms of the
• 21:36
  core of what people are expected.
• 21:38
  But I I, from the sounds of it, I'm guessing that you, you don't have any
• 21:42
  issues with signups that, you know, part of your engagement with the community,
• 21:47
  your engagement with the campus is its own kind of engine of excitement.
• 21:52
  But a again, I'd love for you to unpack, 'cause the other angle to this is it feels
• 21:57
  as if there's an cumulative literacy.
• 22:00
  'cause even if you're in grade six or in grade nine and they haven't
• 22:04
  taken one of your courses yet, I'm assuming they're seeing the activity,
• 22:08
  they're seeing the facilities, their curiosity is being peaked.
• 22:12
  Dan Kunanec: Right, right, right.
• 22:14
  Yeah.
• 22:15
  We're very, um, we're very obvious.
• 22:18
  Um, having said that, I've had a few colleagues that will come to this
• 22:22
  end of the building, um, because the high school's at the other end of the
• 22:25
  building, and, uh, they'll have been in the building for 6, 7, 8 years and
• 22:29
  they'll go, I didn't know we had a farm.
• 22:32
  but the kids know, they're very aware of it.
• 22:35
  So yeah, we're doing more and more with signage.
• 22:37
  Um, we, we have a lot of the middle school kids, their teachers will kind of do like
• 22:42
  an in school field trip, um, or they're doing a unit and they can come visit
• 22:46
  the aquaponic system or the greenhouse.
• 22:48
  And it starts with that.
• 22:49
  It's like the, what classes do you teach?
• 22:52
  You know, like, what course is this?
• 22:54
  When can I take it?
• 22:55
  Um, I have a lot of, like, we just went through commencement and, know, it's
• 22:59
  one of my, my favourite yet saddest days of the year because you see the
• 23:04
  grade twelves walking across the stage and they're off to do amazing things,
• 23:10
  and you know, they are, and they're excited um, but you also remember
• 23:15
  them when you met them in grade six.
• 23:16
  So that's the other advantage, right.
• 23:18
  So because I'm, I am in the middle school side, I'm back and forth
• 23:22
  between the play area all the time, um, going to the farm and sometimes
• 23:26
  they'll like, can I go see the farm?
• 23:28
  It's like, yeah, it's your lunchtime.
• 23:30
  Let's go in there.
• 23:30
  It's fine.
• 23:31
  Or the ball gets kicked in and like, well, you're in there.
• 23:33
  Look around, you know?
• 23:34
  Um, so the conversations start in grade six and, and whether they take my class
• 23:40
  or not, they're learning from the space.
• 23:43
  And that's just as important to me as if they're in my class, because not everyone
• 23:48
  can take everything they want to take it.
• 23:50
  It, there's, it's limited time.
• 23:52
  So when a kid is able to manage, um, all the things they must take and find room
• 23:59
  to take something that they want to take with me, man, I better live up to that.
• 24:05
  Um, because, you know, it, it, it, it really takes a lot.
• 24:08
  And I know, you know, their caregivers at home are part of that decision.
• 24:11
  It's like, yeah, let's shuffle things around.
• 24:13
  Let's figure it out.
• 24:13
  And they may not go into farming, but whatever job they go into, they have
• 24:18
  an appreciation for what we've done.
• 24:23
  Um, know, if they become a CEO of a major corporation, they have an eye
• 24:27
  towards what community needs are.
• 24:30
  Um, if they are a plumber, um, they understand that what they do can affect
• 24:35
  how somebody eats healthy food or not.
• 24:40
  so all those things matter.
• 24:41
  The sociologists, the, you know, the environmental gurus, uh, going off
• 24:45
  and doing great things, the people in hospitality, the architects, the
• 24:49
  urban designers and urban planners, the business people, the marketers, and
• 24:53
  all of my students go through all that.
• 24:55
  They're in all the trades.
• 24:56
  They're police officers, they're, they're lawyers, they're
• 25:00
  doctors, they're engineers.
• 25:02
  And um, but some of them are getting into farming and some of them are, are
• 25:07
  getting into those hospitality pieces and.
• 25:09
  know, for them to have experienced that as a grade 6, 7, 8, and then
• 25:13
  actually dive in as a 9, 10, 11, 12.
• 25:16
  then I'm in the space when I see the kid go, oh, I know what I want to do.
• 25:21
  Like literally that happens more often than people realise.
• 25:25
  Like it's, it's like ding, you know, cartoon sound and, um, you
• 25:30
  could just see it and they're like, oh, I know what I want to do.
• 25:34
  Like, and
• 25:35
  Jesse Hirsh: Well.
• 25:35
  Dan Kunanec: niche, which is really cool.
• 25:38
  Jesse Hirsh: Well, and let me, let me ask you to elaborate on that, because
• 25:41
  you know, on the one hand, I, I, I wanted to ask you about alumni and
• 25:44
  you're, you're sort of getting into that and the extent to which are,
• 25:47
  do these kids keep keep in touch?
• 25:49
  Do they come back and visit?
• 25:50
  Dan Kunanec: segue guy, Jesse.
• 25:52
  I'm, I'm
• 25:52
  Jesse Hirsh: Totally.
• 25:53
  Dan Kunanec: that's
• 25:53
  Jesse Hirsh: Absolutely.
• 25:54
  But, but you raised a really crucial point that, that I wanna elevate and,
• 25:59
  and have you unpack further, which is historically, we've all talked about
• 26:03
  the migration of talent from rural communities to cities, but agriculture
• 26:09
  is becoming high tech, and greenhouses, for example, and Leamington, Ontario.
• 26:14
  I mean, these are really high tech, advanced industries.
• 26:18
  There needs to be the opposite.
• 26:21
  There needs to be people in cities going into agricultural communities and bringing
• 26:26
  their expertise, bringing their culture.
• 26:28
  Are you seeing that?
• 26:29
  Are, are you in the, the, the front lines of facilitating that?
• 26:34
  Dan Kunanec: Yeah, I mean, listen, I can't bring my, all of my
• 26:38
  students on field trips all the time, but I, I can get out there.
• 26:42
  Um, and, um, you know, we do a lot of grant writing, uh, grant proposals.
• 26:47
  Uh, a lot of it's for the students involved, but sometimes it, it can't
• 26:51
  be with all the students, but I will dedicate some time every year
• 26:55
  and get some grant money to do so, and coverage and things like that.
• 26:58
  Um, and go, and I've, I've, I've spent days in Leamington and Ley Island.
• 27:04
  I've spent days out in, uh, LAN Ark and, um, Wolf Island.
• 27:09
  Um, I've spent days, uh, in, in Grey County.
• 27:12
  Um, I've spent days in Niagara region and I bring that back to the classroom.
• 27:17
  Not only do I bring that back, but the connections that I make, the
• 27:20
  people that I meet, um, you know, the restaurant tours of, you know, Michelin
• 27:25
  recognised or starred restaurants and then their suppliers, uh, be it
• 27:30
  farmers, but also people like iron workers and potters and glass makers.
• 27:36
  So all these different trades that kids can get into as well, and crafts.
• 27:40
  Um, but I bring that back into the classroom and sometimes people come
• 27:44
  to visit, there are, you know, it's professional development for me.
• 27:49
  I can see where it is.
• 27:50
  They learn about the stuff that we're currently installing a kitchen, and
• 27:54
  it's taken only eight years to complete.
• 27:57
  Um, and, you know, uh, that's, no, that's not a shot at the school board.
• 28:01
  Um, anyway, but, but we do it.
• 28:04
  And so I can bring that in and they're real world people.
• 28:07
  And meanwhile, my students are doing research on these people.
• 28:11
  So we're not doing textbook work, right?
• 28:14
  So when I'm away, they're researching the people that I'm visiting.
• 28:17
  These are real people.
• 28:19
  And so I come back and the kids have questions for the real people that
• 28:23
  I can then ask the real people, they email me while I'm there and I'm
• 28:28
  like, oh, I just got this cool email.
• 28:30
  Uh, one of my students wants to know about the, the kiln, know, and how,
• 28:34
  you know, did you get into this?
• 28:37
  it's real people across the province who are amazing and the network that
• 28:42
  you build and, um, you learn things.
• 28:46
  It's, it's almost like I feel like I'm on a, on a kid's television show a lot
• 28:50
  where I'm just like, this is so cool.
• 28:52
  could do this for a job.
• 28:53
  It's so cool.
• 28:55
  And then the kids get that too, and they're like, well, how do I do that?
• 28:58
  know?
• 29:00
  and it's like, can, do you want the email?
• 29:03
  I can set you up, you know, and then there's a real adult and a real place
• 29:07
  who's saying, yeah, you can do this.
• 29:08
  It's pretty cool.
• 29:09
  So,
• 29:10
  Jesse Hirsh: Well, and,
• 29:11
  Dan Kunanec: and,
• 29:11
  Jesse Hirsh: and you've touched upon,
• 29:12
  Dan Kunanec: smart.
• 29:13
  Jesse Hirsh: well, and I think you've touched upon a, a really interesting
• 29:17
  self-evident, but often overlooked kind of truth of the AgriFood industry, which
• 29:23
  it's the, the doors are wide open, like it is a remarkably accessible industry.
• 29:27
  There, there is a real need for talent, for labour, for ideas.
• 29:32
  And that's why part of what we do on this podcast is try to get people in
• 29:36
  cities to kind of realise, hey, there's an exciting industry here, but I'm not
• 29:40
  gonna lie, I, I'm pretty jealous of you and, and the experiences you get to have.
• 29:45
  I, I think I'm more jealous of your students, that this sounds to me like,
• 29:50
  uh, the ideal high school experience.
• 29:53
  Uh, you mentioned the kitchen.
• 29:55
  I, I would love for you both to elaborate on kind of what you want to
• 29:59
  do with the kitchen, but to even go further, one of the things that comes
• 30:03
  up in our conversations is this idea of the circular food economy, right?
• 30:08
  That you alluded to it.
• 30:09
  There's the growing the stuff, there's the eating, the stuff, but then there's
• 30:13
  the waste and maybe the compost.
• 30:16
  To what extent are you able to engage in, in different aspects of that cycle,
• 30:21
  uh, given that you have the campus and the given that you have, you know,
• 30:25
  young, curious, engaged, young, uh, young, curious, and engaged people.
• 30:30
  Dan Kunanec: Yeah, absolutely.
• 30:31
  And, uh, just your, to your first point, um, of the things I love about, um,
• 30:37
  the agri industry is that people share.
• 30:42
  Right.
• 30:42
  Like there's other industries, other pursuits where people kind
• 30:46
  of hide their stuff and keep it in.
• 30:48
  Um, but the networking that we're talking about and, and, and then also hospitality,
• 30:52
  especially at, at the higher level as far as like the ones that are really crushing
• 30:57
  it, people share and they're excited to share, and everyone wants everyone else
• 31:01
  to be better because we recognise if we're all better, we're all better, right?
• 31:04
  So, um, so that's, that's where that works.
• 31:08
  And, and, and this podcast and what you do is an example of that.
• 31:12
  You, you ask someone, they're like, yeah, that's great.
• 31:15
  Let's do that.
• 31:17
  so, uh, back to the, to the, the circular situation.
• 31:20
  So, so we we're, we've got this kitchen, right?
• 31:23
  Like to grow the food on its own isn't, know, enough.
• 31:28
  So the kids need to experience the food and the produce in a different way.
• 31:33
  in the summer, um, we, we sell our produce to a Michelin recognised restaurant, and
• 31:39
  that money comes back to our programme.
• 31:40
  It allows us to do things like the purchase and instal
• 31:44
  the, the wood-fired oven.
• 31:46
  So that itself is, is circular.
• 31:48
  But, um, and, and then, and then September to June, the students in the hospitality
• 31:54
  classes use the produce, right?
• 31:57
  So, um, but what's really interesting is, you know, we've, we've got the tech design
• 32:00
  kids designing the space, um, writing the grant proposals, getting the money,
• 32:05
  um, building the space, and we're ready.
• 32:09
  The green industry's kids understand what the space is gonna be.
• 32:13
  They're planning for the space, what's gonna be planted seasonally, rotating
• 32:18
  crops, um, they plant it, and then they manage it, and then they harvest it.
• 32:24
  Or the hospitality kids are out there looking at what's coming in, what
• 32:27
  seasonality they're planning for the use.
• 32:30
  They may be harvesting it and they're preparing it to, to
• 32:35
  present and share, or they eat it themselves, et cetera, et cetera.
• 32:37
  Or they make preserves and it goes on.
• 32:40
  But, but the green industries kids in the trimming and the pruning are
• 32:47
  composting, um, the hospitality kids with any waste stems, roots leaves
• 32:55
  that aren't being used, although we're, we're pretty good at using to
• 32:58
  stem, um, that goes in the compost.
• 33:01
  so, and the green industries kids, or the hospitality kids now are being,
• 33:07
  they're like, oh, look at this tomato.
• 33:10
  is of all the varieties, I like this one the most.
• 33:13
  And this tomato on the vine is the best one.
• 33:17
  I'm going to collect the seed, put it aside, label it for the green
• 33:21
  industries kids to store so that next year they can grow a better tomato.
• 33:25
  Jesse Hirsh: Wow.
• 33:26
  Dan Kunanec: 72 varieties of tomatoes this year, you know, and so the
• 33:29
  hospitalities are tasting them, they're understanding what the difference is.
• 33:32
  The greens are tasting them too.
• 33:33
  The tech designs are tasting them too.
• 33:35
  Like everyone has their little piece.
• 33:36
  And, and some of those same students will take more than one of those courses.
• 33:41
  And so they're doing a deeper dive into different parts.
• 33:45
  we all understand we're composting.
• 33:47
  Nothing goes to waste.
• 33:48
  Uh, we all understand we're looking for the best product.
• 33:51
  We all understand.
• 33:52
  We're trying to make it better for next year.
• 33:54
  We all understand it's soil regeneration.
• 33:57
  We all understand the use of worm castings.
• 33:59
  We we're like, our soil gets better every year.
• 34:03
  And you've mentioned that you've gotta farm.
• 34:05
  You know what that means?
• 34:06
  Not all farming practise does that and hasn't for a long time.
• 34:11
  Really good Traditional farming practises do, um, local indigenous farming practises
• 34:16
  do, not everything's regenerative.
• 34:19
  Um, and speaking of that, about your farm.
• 34:24
  Jesse Hirsh: I mean, I.
• 34:25
  Dan Kunanec: like what are you, what are you.
• 34:27
  Jesse Hirsh: Uh, let me say thank you 'cause you are the first guest
• 34:30
  on the podcast to flip it around and ask me, even though I've
• 34:33
  invited everyone to do the same.
• 34:35
  Uh, you asked that you, you are the segue man.
• 34:39
  'cause you asked that question at exactly the right point to throw the mic over.
• 34:43
  I'm fascinated by the regenerative side.
• 34:46
  I mean, I, you know, part of my story is I, I was, I grew up in Toronto,
• 34:50
  spent most of my life in Toronto.
• 34:52
  Uh, about 10 years ago.
• 34:54
  I, I felt I was being priced outta the city that for the price of a one
• 34:59
  condo, uh, one bedroom condo downtown, I could get a farm in Eastern Ontario.
• 35:05
  So I thought, okay, great, I'm getting the farm, but the whole
• 35:09
  reason I could get the farm exactly.
• 35:12
  We, we flip it the other way around.
• 35:14
  You know, the whole reason I was able to afford the farm was 'cause it's
• 35:17
  been abandoned for decades, right.
• 35:19
  And here on the edge of the Canadian Shield, people thought they could
• 35:24
  farm in the conventional sense, but all they found were rocks.
• 35:28
  So there's piles and piles of rocks where, you know, they couldn't do
• 35:32
  the ploughing and the, you know, uh, uh, a large scale industrial.
• 35:37
  So our approach was to start with animals, to start with poop,
• 35:40
  to look at soil regeneration.
• 35:42
  You know, we started with goats who could clear and get the brush back.
• 35:46
  Then we moved, uh, to pigs and, uh, we had a cow for a couple of years.
• 35:51
  So we're, now, we have an orchard and we have a, a kind of market
• 35:55
  garden space that we're expanding.
• 35:58
  But I kind of argue it's a knowledge farm in that really, like you, I love
• 36:03
  to learn and I love to build this stuff.
• 36:06
  You know, we, we are creating now products and certainly our pigs and our
• 36:10
  pork are starting to get to the point that, you know, maybe a year from now
• 36:13
  we'll be bringing them to the abattoir.
• 36:15
  Um, but it is fundamentally about soil and making soil and creating a environment
• 36:23
  that allows food to grow while me as a city kid, am learning this stuff and,
• 36:28
  and creating an environment where I can learn as much as possible so that
• 36:33
  at first I can get really tasty food.
• 36:36
  And then we've been sharing that food with our friends and family.
• 36:39
  And then eventually, I, I don't even think we'll sell commodities.
• 36:42
  I think to your point of the kitchen, we'll process food,
• 36:45
  we'll make sandwiches, we'll make pickles, we'll make fermented foods.
• 36:49
  'cause that's not just where the fun is.
• 36:51
  But I think where, where, where the value is.
• 36:54
  Dan Kunanec: Yeah.
• 36:55
  And that's, and, and that's what you are about.
• 36:57
  Like, that's like, so, and I think that's the students in my classes will figure
• 37:01
  out they're more interested in this part or this part, or they see value
• 37:04
  in this, or they're excited about this.
• 37:06
  And that's, that's the moment, right?
• 37:08
  It's like we're all experiencing all of this.
• 37:10
  Like we're all in the orchard, we're all in the vineyard, we're
• 37:13
  all in the indigenous mound gardens.
• 37:15
  We've got mushrooms growing outside, mushrooms inside, greenhouse, aquaponics,
• 37:20
  kitchen, outdoor kitchen, indoor kitchen.
• 37:23
  What excites you?
• 37:24
  Which part?
• 37:24
  Is it all of it?
• 37:25
  Or is it, is it the general?
• 37:27
  Um, are you hospitality?
• 37:29
  Are you farming?
• 37:31
  Are you urban planning?
• 37:33
  Are you forestry?
• 37:35
  Um, are you about the food?
• 37:36
  Are you about the front of the house, the back of the house?
• 37:39
  Are you behind the back of the house?
• 37:41
  Right?
• 37:41
  Like, who, who are you?
• 37:43
  What gets you excited?
• 37:44
  Or is it a combination of the above?
• 37:46
  And so
• 37:46
  Jesse Hirsh: And, and.
• 37:47
  Dan Kunanec: through that process, that that's very much
• 37:49
  what my students go through.
• 37:51
  Jesse Hirsh: And, and let me go back to something you said earlier, which, which
• 37:54
  you just reminded me of, because obviously one of the things I miss about Toronto
• 37:59
  is the incredible diversity of cultures, especially when it comes to food, right?
• 38:04
  I've, I've had the best meals of my life in Toronto, even though I have
• 38:08
  travelled, uh, uh, many places elsewhere.
• 38:11
  Obviously the benefit of of Don Mills, uh, collegiate is, as you mentioned,
• 38:16
  you have a very diverse student body.
• 38:18
  To what extent are your students bringing their own cultures?
• 38:22
  They bringing their own approaches to food or to growing food that helps even
• 38:27
  further kind of diversify and expand, uh, what you're doing on the campus.
• 38:33
  Dan Kunanec: Well, I, I think conversations around food are some of
• 38:36
  the easiest, most open conversations to have, for adults and for students.
• 38:41
  Um, you know, especially when it, it ties into, you know, I'll tell a story about
• 38:46
  this is how my mom, you know, makes, uh, sauerkraut or kaputo, I'm Ukrainian.
• 38:52
  Um, this is, you know, and how important it was for their survival on the farm.
• 38:56
  And, and, you know, in those harsh Manitoba winters or, you know, stories
• 39:01
  my dad had about, um, in Saskatchewan, again, Ukrainian farming family.
• 39:07
  And, uh, you know, it dawned on me at one point, uh, dad,
• 39:10
  you were born in 1932, right?
• 39:12
  And he's like, yeah.
• 39:12
  I'm like, that was the dust bowl in the prairies followed by the depression.
• 39:18
  Yep.
• 39:20
  I'm like, how come we haven't talked about that?
• 39:22
  He's like, uh, we were happy.
• 39:24
  Like what?
• 39:26
  he, he tell these stories and it's like, the struggles, and then the kids in, in
• 39:30
  the space are like, well, my grandfather told me a story about my grandmother.
• 39:36
  But like the, start to appreciate like peasant foods, the foods
• 39:41
  that were the most necessary to survive are the favourites.
• 39:47
  And then it turns into, oh, we make something similar to
• 39:50
  that, but we don't use that.
• 39:51
  We use this.
• 39:52
  what's that flavour?
• 39:53
  Oh, I love that.
• 39:54
  Have you been to this restaurant?
• 39:56
  Like, I'm a Scarborough kid.
• 39:57
  So like, oh my God, the food we can eat.
• 40:00
  but then they really just start to open up and they starting to talk about it.
• 40:03
  And then it's like, my mom grows this.
• 40:06
  Uh, would you like some seeds?
• 40:09
  And all of a sudden these kids are bringing seeds in and so we'll create,
• 40:12
  you know, a, a place to grow that stuff.
• 40:15
  And then mom comes in, or like, we're in the vineyards and it's
• 40:20
  just the most ridiculous thing for a high school teacher to say.
• 40:22
  But anyway, um, you know, we're in the vineyard and it's like,
• 40:25
  oh, my, my grandfather, um, used to, uh, you know, back home.
• 40:30
  Um, and I'm like, what, what kind of grapes did they grow?
• 40:34
  I don't know.
• 40:35
  I should ask.
• 40:35
  I'm like, call 'em.
• 40:37
  You know, we're not supposed to have phones in class.
• 40:40
  I'm like, call 'em now.
• 40:42
  Call 'em FaceTime 'em, show 'em you're in the vineyard ask, your teacher wants to
• 40:48
  know what varieties of grapes you grew.
• 40:51
  Like those are those connections.
• 40:54
  you know, and talk to your grandparents.
• 40:56
  Talk to your aunts and your uncles.
• 40:59
  your mom, mom's gonna call her mom.
• 41:02
  You know, all that stuff.
• 41:04
  So the favourite foods, the ways of doing, everyone has a farmer in
• 41:09
  their background, or multiple, or builders or growers or cooks or chefs.
• 41:17
  And everyone's grandmother makes the best whatever better than yours.
• 41:20
  Okay.
• 41:21
  Right.
• 41:22
  And it's just, it's, it's so easy.
• 41:25
  Like it's not, that doesn't make me smart.
• 41:29
  like, what's the easiest thing to talk about?
• 41:31
  Let's do that, you know?
• 41:34
  Jesse Hirsh: Well, it certainly makes you wealthy in, in the food and culture sense
• 41:38
  though, and it, it, it kind of leads to a, a, a question back to the literacy piece.
• 41:44
  Does I have to assume, and, and, and I'd love for you to, to, to either validate
• 41:49
  or even elaborate on this, that the other effect of the literacy building
• 41:54
  for the students and, and ostensibly for their families is it becomes easier
• 41:59
  for them to navigate the grocery store.
• 42:01
  It becomes easier for them to navigate the food choices that a
• 42:06
  city offers, both good and bad in terms of healthy food and junk food.
• 42:10
  I, I'd love for you to elaborate on or expand on that because again, that that's
• 42:15
  something we kind of take for granted as a life skill, but it's often not
• 42:19
  taught and yet you're not just teaching it, you're kind of spreading it as a
• 42:24
  virus amongst these kids as a passion.
• 42:29
  Dan Kunanec: Yeah, I think, I mean, you know, it's okay, let's, we have
• 42:33
  snack programmes in schools, right?
• 42:35
  Um, uh, you know, there's this one little cracker that everyone seems to be loving.
• 42:41
  I love it too.
• 42:43
  And, um, you know, I keep hearing about the kids going home and saying,
• 42:47
  oh, I really like this cracker, right?
• 42:49
  So they're gonna look for it in the store.
• 42:52
  if my students are tasting a cherry tomato right off the vine, um, and
• 42:57
  it's an experience they haven't had before, and it's way better than
• 43:01
  the one they got from Mexico or California, they're understanding why.
• 43:07
  And so, you know, that's creating a scenario where they're not only
• 43:15
  shopping with, you know, a caregiver, but maybe they're reading the labels.
• 43:21
  You know, oh, this one's, this one's from Kingsville, this one's from
• 43:25
  Lemington, this one's from Quebec.
• 43:28
  Okay.
• 43:30
  but now they're starting to understand that, um, and then they're understanding
• 43:34
  the value, the price of things.
• 43:35
  And that's sometimes it's a misconception that healthier food is more expensive.
• 43:41
  it's not necessarily so, I mean, sometimes it is, yeah, for sure.
• 43:45
  Things that are labelled organic, you know, because they are certified organic,
• 43:49
  it doesn't mean that something that's not certified organic isn't organic.
• 43:53
  As we know as growers, there's hoops to jump through.
• 43:56
  mean, all of our stuff is organic, but we can't it organic because
• 44:00
  we don't have the certification.
• 44:03
  but they start to understand options and choices, but also seasonality.
• 44:07
  It's like, well of course that's more expensive because we have
• 44:10
  to get it from somewhere else.
• 44:12
  Or now they're understanding the benefits of green housing our
• 44:16
  Ontario Green housing is just getting better and better and better.
• 44:20
  And you can get a non-seasonal tomato.
• 44:23
  It's like, this is actually a good tomato.
• 44:25
  Like, all those things matter, right?
• 44:28
  So I'll give you an example.
• 44:30
  during COVID, we all remember that.
• 44:33
  Um, obviously it's going to affect a lot of things in the school.
• 44:38
  For me, it's like, okay, I don't have support in the farm.
• 44:42
  I need to get permission to run the farm.
• 44:43
  We've got stuff in the greenhouse, it's ready to go.
• 44:46
  'cause March, remember March 12th, 13th, everything shuts down all of
• 44:51
  our seedlings in the gran greenhouse.
• 44:52
  Um, destined to be sold as produce to the restaurants that are all closing down.
• 44:58
  And within two, three days, got the chef saying, we're not buying.
• 45:03
  Everything's shut down.
• 45:04
  And I've got, I need to get in there 'cause I need to grow
• 45:07
  the food for what purpose?
• 45:08
  I don't know yet, but we're going to do that.
• 45:11
  and getting all those permissions and, and then farmers being declared,
• 45:14
  you know, essential services and that got expanded to urban farmers.
• 45:17
  So that's how I got through.
• 45:19
  Um, and then you think about all the people that lost their jobs
• 45:24
  overnight because they just.
• 45:27
  Because the business are closing down and they don't have a job.
• 45:30
  So we have a, you know, a lot of students whose, whose parents
• 45:33
  caregivers lost their jobs overnight.
• 45:35
  And so now they're suddenly in dire straits.
• 45:37
  They're, you know, they're already living paycheck to paycheck now like, that's it.
• 45:41
  Three days.
• 45:42
  Their cupboards are bare.
• 45:44
  And so, you know, our guidance people are men knows these families.
• 45:48
  And I get the call my principal's like, can you the farm and get food out to
• 45:55
  some of our families that really need it?
• 45:57
  I'm like, done.
• 45:59
  my purpose.
• 45:59
  Like, that's, that's a no-brainer.
• 46:01
  And so I call up chef friends and the people we sell to and
• 46:06
  let them know the scenario.
• 46:07
  Like, we've got stuff in the pantry we're not gonna use.
• 46:09
  We've got fresh food that has no purpose right now.
• 46:12
  We're going to cook it down, we're gonna make casserole, we're gonna
• 46:15
  make soups, we're gonna freeze it.
• 46:16
  Do you have freezer storage?
• 46:18
  Uh, yes I do.
• 46:19
  We've got freezers in the building.
• 46:20
  I'll pull 'em all into the cafeteria.
• 46:22
  So I'm back at the school, like on and on and on.
• 46:25
  So we have families that were getting the food weekly.
• 46:28
  Our hall monitor came in and helped.
• 46:29
  He's dropping off the food exchanges in the parking lot.
• 46:33
  I'm labelling stuff.
• 46:34
  It's going out there.
• 46:35
  I start putting recipes in things you can make with what we goal is to have,
• 46:40
  so the goal is, uh, 27 items every time.
• 46:43
  So that every meal, if you did have a breakfast, lunch, dinner,
• 46:46
  if you did, there was one thing that could have come from the farm
• 46:49
  to affect it, or a meal was ready.
• 46:51
  That was my goal.
• 46:52
  And it could be herbs, it could be fruit, it could be whatever it was or something
• 46:56
  from the chefs that was already made.
• 46:58
  A year and a half after COVID was done and we kind of got back to normal
• 47:02
  and the kids were back in the class I didn't know who, I didn't know
• 47:05
  who the families were by the way.
• 47:07
  Right.
• 47:07
  So, complete privacy.
• 47:09
  My home monitor did, 'cause he's dropping stuff off.
• 47:12
  All we knew is like, family of five has allergies to this or,
• 47:16
  you know, no pork or whatever.
• 47:18
  Um, one of the students is in my class and lets me know that this was one of the
• 47:25
  students and parent teacher interview.
• 47:30
  Her mom comes in with her she said that experienced changed how we eat.
• 47:37
  We ate better during that time than we normally did.
• 47:41
  And once we can get shopping, we realised it was actually
• 47:45
  in many ways more affordable.
• 47:47
  it's, it's affected the way we do things.
• 47:50
  And that student, became a social worker with a focus on food security the city,
• 47:57
  Jesse Hirsh: Far out.
• 47:58
  Dan Kunanec: from tragedy comes that,
• 48:01
  Jesse Hirsh: Yeah.
• 48:01
  Dan Kunanec: the, the experience of healthy food and, and the
• 48:04
  joy it can bring to your life.
• 48:06
  I'm not saying everyone can afford it, I'm not saying that at all.
• 48:09
  I'm not saying it, but if you can and if, if, if, if you can figure it out,
• 48:16
  it does make a distinct difference and it will for a very long time.
• 48:21
  So now we're talking legacy piece with that student who is positively
• 48:24
  affecting other families because of that experience that they had that
• 48:28
  could have been more tragic than it was.
• 48:32
  Jesse Hirsh: Well, and it, and an absolutely fantastic story.
• 48:36
  And, and to your point, reinforces the potential of the kind of each one
• 48:40
  teach one that if you really reach somebody, they then become the teacher,
• 48:45
  the, the mobilizer of that knowledge.
• 48:48
  I, I, I wanna double down on something you said there and, and you said
• 48:52
  it earlier, which is seasonality.
• 48:54
  And, you know, seasonality is, is one of those things that
• 48:58
  for farmers it's self-evident.
• 49:00
  We live by it.
• 49:01
  We, we, our lives literally go with, with the growing season.
• 49:05
  But to your point, a lot of eaters, right?
• 49:08
  A lot of people who eat food, you know, maybe don't understand seasonality.
• 49:14
  And granted if you're rich, who cares?
• 49:16
  But most people are not.
• 49:18
  And, and they do struggle with increasing food prices.
• 49:22
  How do you frame seasonality in terms of your students' experience?
• 49:27
  And I mean that both on the production side and granted greenhouses are
• 49:32
  popular for exactly that reason.
• 49:35
  But I also mean on the food making side, 'cause you've
• 49:38
  talked about preserves, right?
• 49:40
  We've brought up pickles there, there's, there's opportunities once you
• 49:44
  have that literacy to align yourself with that seasonality, eat good food
• 49:50
  when you want to eat good food and not break the bank at the same time.
• 49:55
  I, I'd love to hear as an educator, kind of how you tackle that and,
• 50:00
  and how you kind of foster the, the value that seasonality can provide.
• 50:06
  Dan Kunanec: First, the easiest part is we experience it.
• 50:08
  I mean, you know, we're, we're outside, um, and, um, you know,
• 50:12
  we dress for the outdoors.
• 50:14
  Math class is not affected by the weather.
• 50:16
  Um, but, but we are, um, and, uh, sometimes the weather is not
• 50:21
  cooperative and too, too bad.
• 50:24
  Um, we, you know, you need to be ready for that.
• 50:26
  So that can kind of separate some of my students a little bit pretty quickly too.
• 50:30
  So, um, but also it's like, what's, what's on the vine?
• 50:33
  You know, what looks ready?
• 50:34
  Um, um, what is sprouting?
• 50:37
  Um, can we, can we eat a sprout of that?
• 50:40
  What does that taste like?
• 50:43
  what are the things that we could do with this?
• 50:45
  So the hospitality's experiencing like horse radish leaves sprouting
• 50:51
  out of the ground and tasting that.
• 50:56
  Does that remind you of, like, then the willingness to do it?
• 50:58
  They don't do it right away in grade 11 or 10, but by grade 12, they're,
• 51:02
  they're pretty, pretty brave.
• 51:05
  and so like what, what else do you notice is growing at this time?
• 51:09
  look, there's chives coming through the snow, right?
• 51:12
  One of the first things that we have, um, we have a poly tunnels,
• 51:16
  uh, the, like a hoop house.
• 51:18
  So we can, we can extend our growing season so we can get some stuff in
• 51:21
  there before we can get it out there.
• 51:23
  But it also means, you know, we've gotta get the compost layered.
• 51:27
  We've, we've gotta get the worm castings layered in there first.
• 51:30
  And so it's like, we've got two weeks to prepare this.
• 51:32
  We've got one week here.
• 51:33
  I know the weather's bad, we gotta gotta get that done.
• 51:37
  the, the orchard, when, when it's dormant.
• 51:42
  So everyone's like, oh, you can only really work when it's
• 51:45
  nice out or spring or summer.
• 51:46
  It's like, we got so much winter work, it's not even funny.
• 51:49
  Right?
• 51:50
  Pruning the vineyard, watching the first leaves come out.
• 51:55
  it's all those things.
• 51:55
  It's, it, it's a, it's a, it's completely experiential learning.
• 51:59
  And once you learn it, once you, you know it, right?
• 52:02
  Um, maple syrup is one of our best things that we do.
• 52:07
  And, and it starts and we're preparing for it when it's the deepest,
• 52:11
  darkest throws of winter and the kids are excited about it, right?
• 52:15
  And so it's like they're watching the weather patterns.
• 52:18
  They're, they're understanding the ebbs and flows quite
• 52:21
  literally of how SAP runs or not.
• 52:25
  Um, and they're identifying when we should tap the trees, um, and all the
• 52:29
  equipment and all the stuff and, and the older stories about, you know, especially
• 52:34
  connections to, in indigenous practises.
• 52:37
  You know, here's, here's one of the great gifts that local indigenous peoples,
• 52:41
  you know, gave to, to settlers and, and, and this is liquid gold, like literally
• 52:48
  one of the best flavours that exists.
• 52:51
  So all of those little details, but it's tasting the seasonality.
• 52:55
  what that does is it puts you in a place, in a time with a mood and a
• 52:59
  feeling and a smell of the outside and a temperature and some drizzle on your
• 53:03
  hair, or, you know, some cold on your neck or the sun's on your neck and it's
• 53:07
  bright and you remember that moment.
• 53:09
  It's sensory memories, right?
• 53:12
  You're smelling that herb for the first time.
• 53:15
  Oh, my mom cooks with this.
• 53:17
  What is this?
• 53:18
  And they, you know, the kids are deciding and trying to
• 53:21
  explain, oh, I know what that is.
• 53:23
  Um, they remember it 'cause they experienced in grade 11 and then grade 12.
• 53:27
  They're like, I, I think the, uh, I think the chives gonna be coming out pretty
• 53:31
  soon, sir. can I go look for the chives?
• 53:35
  Yeah, you can go look for the chives.
• 53:37
  Let me know.
• 53:39
  Jesse Hirsh: Right on.
• 53:40
  Now to your point, I, I, you're probably the first, while I've known a lot of
• 53:47
  Toronto Gardeners, you, you're certainly the first Toronto farmer, uh, uh, that
• 53:51
  I've had the privilege to speak with.
• 53:53
  And by the sounds of it, you've certainly been at it for a number of years.
• 53:57
  You've mentioned climate a number of times, and, and granted, you know,
• 54:02
  cities kind of have their own unique climates, and the Dawn Valley, of course,
• 54:07
  has its own kind of neat microclimate.
• 54:11
  How have you noticed things change?
• 54:14
  How have you, you know, as you're pointing out, in connecting to the seasonality
• 54:19
  of, of your plot, of land, of your kind of spot in, in Southern Ontario, are you
• 54:25
  starting to notice the climate change?
• 54:27
  Are you starting to find more challenges in terms of the volatility, uh, of the
• 54:32
  weather events that you're engaging?
• 54:34
  Dan Kunanec: I am for sure.
• 54:36
  Um, and, you know, I also experience other micro climates.
• 54:41
  so I live down by the Bluffs.
• 54:43
  It's different than, than Don Mills.
• 54:45
  It's different than the Don Valley.
• 54:47
  Um, my mom still lives in the house that my dad built, um, in,
• 54:53
  in Highland Creek, which is between Highland Creek and the Rouge.
• 54:56
  And that's a different weather pattern altogether.
• 55:00
  Um, and the microclimates.
• 55:02
  And then at a school, you know, an urban point of view, with architecture,
• 55:08
  we create micro climates as well.
• 55:12
  our vineyard exists on the south facing hill because the brick
• 55:18
  heats up in the sun and it radiates back when the nights get cool.
• 55:23
  So we're actually in, in many ways, we're actually further ahead, sometimes Niagara
• 55:28
  with the same varieties, but there's days we can't work up on that hill.
• 55:32
  It's just too hot.
• 55:33
  Like you just can't.
• 55:35
  Um, and, and the little farm area is an three side enclosed,
• 55:42
  you know, open at one end.
• 55:44
  so the wind patterns are different.
• 55:45
  Um, between the tonne on the wall, we can now grow certain herbs survive the
• 55:51
  winter that normally wouldn't, that wouldn't at my house in the front yard
• 55:55
  it's, it's a warm enough microclimate.
• 55:58
  we can experience all those things, but, but maple syrup is a great example.
• 56:02
  You know, it runs earlier, um, it finishes earlier.
• 56:06
  Um, what we did 10, 12, 15 years ago is not what's going on now.
• 56:11
  And then you speak to people in the maple syrup community.
• 56:14
  I mean, you're in Lan Ark, that is the, the maple syrup capital of Ontario.
• 56:19
  Right.
• 56:19
  So, you know, that's a discussion.
• 56:21
  Um, the amount of snow uh, is on the ground that becomes groundwater
• 56:26
  affects the amount of sap.
• 56:27
  People don't think about that.
• 56:29
  Um, so it is noticeable.
• 56:33
  but at the same time, we're trying to work with it as much as possible.
• 56:38
  Um, climate change is a, is a big topic of discussion students, but I don't
• 56:43
  start with climate change because, you know, teenagers are angsty enough.
• 56:47
  You don't, Hey, hey kids, the world's dying.
• 56:51
  Let's go have some fun.
• 56:54
  No.
• 56:56
  it's, Hey, look at this cool stuff.
• 56:58
  Look at what we can do.
• 57:00
  Um, hey, some of this stuff can be done in the city, by the way.
• 57:03
  Hey, by the way, some of this stuff can be done in the city better than in a, in a
• 57:08
  rural area because of these microclimates.
• 57:11
  Um, why would we, you know, grow mushrooms indoors in a rural area?
• 57:17
  Let's grow it in a, in an urban area where there's more population
• 57:21
  and we get it into the sooner.
• 57:22
  Um, during COVID all the, all the underground passageway, you know, and
• 57:28
  the pathways are shutting down, what can we grow underground, hydroponics,
• 57:34
  mushrooms, et cetera, et cetera, greenhouse systems without sunlight,
• 57:40
  and then bring it upstairs to the ground level and have a farmer's market
• 57:45
  all grown within one kilometre, you know, in this or an abandoned building
• 57:50
  in a, in a food desert in the city.
• 57:53
  so yeah, climate change is a thing, but we, we then will, will kind of hit it
• 57:58
  after a little bit, say, by the way, all these things we've been doing, help.
• 58:05
  This, like, grow things locally within not just a hundred kilometres.
• 58:12
  Like we always talk about when we're cooking in the outdoor kitchen, it's
• 58:14
  like this is our a hundred foot diet.
• 58:18
  you know, the more local, the less transportation, the less pollution, the
• 58:22
  fresher, the better, the more nutrition.
• 58:24
  It's a healthier planet.
• 58:27
  It's cheaper.
• 58:28
  Every, everything's, everything's better, right?
• 58:30
  So, um, very much hope based education, but it's not like
• 58:35
  ridiculous over the top, not real.
• 58:38
  It's actual steps that you can do that things better.
• 58:43
  Like it literally does, you know, on a macro level, micro
• 58:47
  level, it doesn't matter.
• 58:48
  Like, again, how do we help our community?
• 58:51
  So one of the phrases we'll use in our programme is we're building the great
• 58:55
  city builders of the future, right?
• 58:58
  it is an urban focus.
• 58:59
  We're not farming, it's urban farming.
• 59:02
  We're not doing forestry, it's urban forestry.
• 59:05
  There's a, there is, there is a difference and there is an appreciation,
• 59:11
  about those differences and there's a respect about those differences.
• 59:15
  at the same time, it's not the, oh, poor me, I'm in a city.
• 59:18
  I can't grow as well as you.
• 59:20
  No, I, I can't.
• 59:21
  I can grow differently.
• 59:23
  I can grow, in a, in a different space.
• 59:26
  Um, but there's things that I can do well in a city environment that you can
• 59:30
  struggle with in a rural environment.
• 59:32
  I'll give you an example.
• 59:32
  Because of our, our campus, it's 19 acres.
• 59:36
  We've got architecture.
• 59:38
  Um, like you, I'm an experiential experimental guy.
• 59:42
  We can do that 'cause it's not a business.
• 59:44
  Even though we, we do make some money from it, it comes back.
• 59:48
  so like corn varieties, really old heirloom, you know, maybe important
• 59:54
  to the local indigenous community seed given to me from, you know, local
• 59:58
  elders saying, you're doing good things.
• 1:00:00
  Here's some seat.
• 1:00:01
  And I'll get like six kernels.
• 1:00:03
  I'm like, oh my god, like six kernels.
• 1:00:05
  Like, I'm so nervous about that.
• 1:00:07
  You know, I worry about the squirrels, you worry about the
• 1:00:09
  water, you worry about everything.
• 1:00:11
  But I can like grow some way over in the corner and the indigenous mounds.
• 1:00:17
  I can grow some behind the wall in the building in one of the boxes and
• 1:00:23
  I can grow some over by the vineyard.
• 1:00:26
  And they're not gonna cross pollinate because it's not
• 1:00:30
  just across an open field.
• 1:00:31
  It's not one farmer's monoculture corn crop, GMO across a dirt
• 1:00:38
  road beside another farmer's.
• 1:00:41
  We can protect our crops because of smaller scale
• 1:00:46
  architecture, distance, et cetera.
• 1:00:50
  Like that's an advantage.
• 1:00:51
  And if this particular variety needs more heat, grow it closer to the brick.
• 1:00:56
  That's okay.
• 1:00:58
  I'll bring it up.
• 1:00:59
  Right.
• 1:01:00
  So there, there are good things that we can do, for sure.
• 1:01:04
  Jesse Hirsh: And fascinating things.
• 1:01:05
  'cause again, what I've loved throughout this conversation is
• 1:01:10
  not just your curiosity, but the infectious curiosity that you are
• 1:01:16
  clearly getting from your students.
• 1:01:18
  Your students are clearly getting from you, and it seems anyone who engages you.
• 1:01:22
  I mean, as an aside, I assume that the restaurant that you sell
• 1:01:26
  some of the produce to brags about where the produce comes from.
• 1:01:31
  Because if I was a diner at that restaurant, I would think
• 1:01:34
  it was pretty cool, uh uh, where the food was coming from.
• 1:01:37
  Dan Kunanec: that they, they say this is some of the, you know,
• 1:01:39
  the, the, best press that they get.
• 1:01:41
  So I'm, I'm happy about that.
• 1:01:43
  Yeah.
• 1:01:43
  Jesse Hirsh: A Absolutely.
• 1:01:45
  And and to that point, you know, you've been at this for a while and it, it
• 1:01:49
  certainly shows in terms of the momentum.
• 1:01:52
  You have the enthusiasm, the, the knowledge and the wisdom.
• 1:01:56
  Are there other folks doing this?
• 1:01:58
  Are there other, specifically urban, within Canada, are there other urban
• 1:02:04
  schools that are practising urban agriculture and, and engaging food in, in
• 1:02:10
  the manner that you guys are in Don Mills?
• 1:02:13
  Dan Kunanec: I, I'd say more and more, and that's been a real part of my
• 1:02:16
  focus for the last sort of 10 years.
• 1:02:18
  Um, I, I do a lot of work now with, um, uh, OI students, uh, Ontario Institute
• 1:02:24
  of Studies in Education at U of T. Um, so the irony is, you know, with the non
• 1:02:29
  university guy is spending more time working with the university, um, to
• 1:02:34
  get them to, to engage and, uh, from different, um, different teachables.
• 1:02:39
  And so in the summer, um, I don't work with high school students.
• 1:02:43
  In the summer I'm working with student teachers and they're coming in and
• 1:02:46
  they're volunteering their time and they're engaging in the firm.
• 1:02:49
  Um, now I, I would like to see more technological studies teachers like
• 1:02:52
  myself do it because the capacity to build it is different, the
• 1:02:56
  safety aspects, all those things.
• 1:02:58
  But I'll, I'll, I'll take what I can get.
• 1:03:00
  Uh, really, it's really important that we get out there and even
• 1:03:03
  a lot of elementary schools are starting to do more and more growing.
• 1:03:06
  We'll help them build some, raise beds.
• 1:03:08
  Um, and, and, but there are more high schools around the province some of this.
• 1:03:15
  Some are, are further ahead than others, but that's fine.
• 1:03:18
  So whenever I do a presentation, I'm always like, okay, just recognise
• 1:03:22
  I've been doing this for 26 years.
• 1:03:23
  Um, so, you know, don't be overwhelmed by the amount of stuff that you see.
• 1:03:30
  Um, it's the scalability that matters.
• 1:03:32
  You don't, you know, we got 40 raised beds that are four by eight to do two.
• 1:03:37
  we've got 40 orchard, you know, 40 trees in the orchard of, of different varieties.
• 1:03:43
  13 varieties do four.
• 1:03:45
  Um, yes, we have 160 vines in the vineyard.
• 1:03:50
  You probably don't need a vineyard.
• 1:03:51
  Right?
• 1:03:52
  So it's that, you know, do what what makes sense?
• 1:03:56
  Now, I am able and willing to spend portions of my summer here because
• 1:04:02
  it's important for my programme.
• 1:04:03
  It allows us to do what we need.
• 1:04:06
  Um, I, I get excited by the people that I work with.
• 1:04:09
  Like, I'm, I'm, I'm a weird teacher that way, right?
• 1:04:13
  if, if so and so's not prepared to do that, let me help you select
• 1:04:17
  varieties of fruit that you can grow that won't be ready until September.
• 1:04:21
  Um, have you considered potatoes?
• 1:04:23
  'cause they're really, you know, plant and walk away.
• 1:04:26
  It's gonna be okay.
• 1:04:28
  Um, like all that stuff.
• 1:04:29
  So how do we engage in those conversations?
• 1:04:31
  Again, it goes around the seasonality, It's a really important conversation.
• 1:04:34
  So, and also what I share with growing programmes, um, is
• 1:04:41
  the mistakes that I've made.
• 1:04:44
  So, you know, the mistakes that I've made with the students are plentiful.
• 1:04:51
  And that's where the best learning comes from because the innovation
• 1:04:55
  that comes out of it, we recover, how we react, that matters the most.
• 1:05:00
  That is active resiliency.
• 1:05:01
  The kids see the resiliency.
• 1:05:03
  They feel the resiliency.
• 1:05:04
  Now, sometimes it takes a whole year for them to see it, but it's tangible.
• 1:05:08
  It's not like studying a math question and now I memorise the
• 1:05:11
  formula, so I got the answer right.
• 1:05:13
  No, you almost need to wait a whole year to see if it, if it works.
• 1:05:16
  Um, but I share those mistakes and how we got over it so that anyone starting
• 1:05:21
  starts on a better foothold than I did.
• 1:05:24
  Jesse Hirsh: Right on.
• 1:05:24
  Dan Kunanec: kicked down a lot of doors.
• 1:05:26
  can imagine the resistance that we, we often will get internally in our
• 1:05:30
  building or from the school board.
• 1:05:33
  Um, I hear no more than I hear.
• 1:05:35
  Yes.
• 1:05:36
  It's, it's like a marriage that way.
• 1:05:39
  Uh, my wife's gonna hear that.
• 1:05:41
  Um, but it's like, okay, so tell me why.
• 1:05:45
  If you're gonna say no, tell me why.
• 1:05:47
  I will go back to my students, tell 'em what you said, and we
• 1:05:50
  will figure out the answer because we need to work within the rules.
• 1:05:54
  I understand that.
• 1:05:55
  I appreciate that.
• 1:05:56
  But we will come back to you again and we will propose solution.
• 1:06:02
  And if you say no again, we're gonna come back.
• 1:06:05
  We're going to come back and we do, and we progressively kick doors down.
• 1:06:09
  Now the next person doesn't have to kick that door down.
• 1:06:13
  And so, you know, maybe I'm evangelising at this point, like how, here's how to,
• 1:06:19
  how to, here's how, here we've done it.
• 1:06:23
  I want to do this, but my principal's like, I don't know.
• 1:06:26
  And they just want to know if someone else has done it.
• 1:06:28
  I'm like, I've done this video.
• 1:06:30
  Here you go.
• 1:06:31
  Show your principal.
• 1:06:33
  It can't.
• 1:06:33
  In fact, I'm personally inviting your principal to come for a tour and bring
• 1:06:38
  your class and, um, all make some pizza.
• 1:06:43
  Yay.
• 1:06:45
  Right.
• 1:06:45
  Jesse Hirsh: on.
• 1:06:46
  Yeah.
• 1:06:46
  Dan Kunanec: do what you gotta do.
• 1:06:47
  Jesse Hirsh: Well, and, and it has to be done.
• 1:06:49
  'cause you know, on the one hand there's the agricultural elements of the
• 1:06:53
  literacy that we've been talking about, but to bring it back full circle, it's
• 1:06:58
  for students like you and I, it it's for students who want that hands-on
• 1:07:01
  experience, who need experiential learning and food literacy is the foundation
• 1:07:08
  of health, of success, of prosperity.
• 1:07:11
  Now, uh, this has been a, a really inspiring, a, a really
• 1:07:15
  insightful, brilliant conversation.
• 1:07:18
  I, I, I'm grateful for that.
• 1:07:20
  Our last question that we end every episode on is, is kind
• 1:07:25
  of the shout out section.
• 1:07:26
  It's the, who are the leaders that you've looked up to or, or currently look up to?
• 1:07:31
  You know, who, who are the people that, that you think we should be paying
• 1:07:35
  attention to in terms of learning more and zoning into where you are learning from?
• 1:07:41
  'cause you are clearly a very passionate and enthusiastic learner, in addition
• 1:07:46
  to being a very inspiring teacher.
• 1:07:48
  Dan Kunanec: Well, um, my first inspiration is my father who
• 1:07:51
  passed away, uh, five years ago.
• 1:07:53
  So you can't tap into that knowledge, but, uh, I certainly can.
• 1:07:58
  And my mother as well, of course.
• 1:07:59
  Um, amazing.
• 1:08:00
  But, um, I would say recently some of the people I've met, um, and,
• 1:08:06
  and talking about these experiences in both the farming fields and,
• 1:08:11
  and the ho um, hospitality.
• 1:08:14
  so, um, the, the chefs at, uh, restaurant at Pearl Morrisette, one ranked in Canada.
• 1:08:24
  Um, Eric Robertson has, has let me come and visit and, and, and poke
• 1:08:28
  around and, um, visit, uh, his, his farm, uh, space that they've set up.
• 1:08:33
  Him and, and Daniel.
• 1:08:35
  Um, the restaurant's incredible because it is like farm to table and that's
• 1:08:39
  why they have, you know, two Michelin stars and a green Michelin star
• 1:08:42
  because they're doing great things.
• 1:08:43
  And then, you know, Shane, his farmer that I've worked with as well, and we share
• 1:08:47
  experiences and he helped me get some, some bars for the, uh, for the vineyard.
• 1:08:52
  'cause our stuff broke.
• 1:08:54
  saws, Nikki Organic Farm, that's someone you should reach out to.
• 1:08:58
  Amazing.
• 1:08:58
  So one of the suppliers, uh, to restaurant set, um, down home restaurant in Markdale
• 1:09:05
  just cracked the top 100 in Canada.
• 1:09:07
  Um, farm to table restaurant, their suppliers.
• 1:09:10
  Um, good family farms, Mitchell.
• 1:09:12
  Good.
• 1:09:13
  You wanna talk about, um, regenerative soil techniques?
• 1:09:16
  reach out to Mitchell, good at good family farms.
• 1:09:19
  Um, unbelievable from a health point of view.
• 1:09:22
  Um, RJ Taylor at, um, uh, spring Hills Fish and Cedar as a cedar crest.
• 1:09:29
  Um, amazing.
• 1:09:30
  That's that The farming there is unbelievable.
• 1:09:33
  Like, like these are, and there's so many people.
• 1:09:36
  Um, uh.
• 1:09:37
  People on Wolf Island, people on Peli Island, Leamington, all overnight.
• 1:09:43
  Like, just because they share, right?
• 1:09:45
  They share and they make it better for you town.
• 1:09:50
  Tyler Ganon, who lives on the Toronto Islands, he's taught me more about
• 1:09:53
  fruit trees and trees and mushrooms and his brother Julian, like, just
• 1:09:58
  like, again, urban people, right?
• 1:10:00
  All of our indigenous partners that we work with.
• 1:10:03
  Um, and coming from so many different parts of Ontario, not just, you know,
• 1:10:08
  um, this area, but, but from the north and, and from this, the south east.
• 1:10:15
  And it's just people that we know everyone shares.
• 1:10:19
  And what's really cool is when I introduce some of them to each other,
• 1:10:22
  suddenly I find out that they're doing a project together that I
• 1:10:26
  had no idea that was happening.
• 1:10:29
  I find out later, I'm like, okay, that's cool.
• 1:10:32
  you introduce friends at a party and suddenly they're, they're
• 1:10:35
  going to Brazil together and you're like, what's going on there?
• 1:10:38
  Okay,
• 1:10:39
  Jesse Hirsh: Right on.
• 1:10:40
  Well, and if anything, I think you.
• 1:10:43
  Dan Kunanec: you in this list now, Jesse, now you're one of those
• 1:10:45
  people you are no, but you are, are, are collector of, of, of people.
• 1:10:50
  You're, you're bringing people together that are, are strangely
• 1:10:54
  like-minded, but are also like ding ding, ding, ding and all these tangents.
• 1:10:59
  And now if we can pull everyone's tangents into the same orbit, it's
• 1:11:04
  pretty ridiculously cool, right?
• 1:11:05
  So, um, these are the moments where I'm just like, I just met
• 1:11:09
  another cool, awesome person, right?
• 1:11:12
  Jesse Hirsh: Well, it's, it's kind of like that saying, you know, there,
• 1:11:14
  there's something in the water, but in this case, there's something in the food.
• 1:11:19
  There's something in the maple syrup here in Ontario that encourages us to share.
• 1:11:24
  Dan Kunanec: Fall.
• 1:11:26
  Yes,
• 1:11:26
  Jesse Hirsh: Yes, exactly.
• 1:11:28
  Dan Kunanec: Yeah, I was, I was, I was at my, one of my last meetings
• 1:11:31
  where, you know, 'cause I'm the old guy in the room and um, you know, just
• 1:11:35
  was surrounded by a whole bunch of younger teachers that are just like,
• 1:11:38
  I'm like, we're safe, we're good.
• 1:11:39
  These are great people.
• 1:11:41
  I already know the students are good, but, but now they can go
• 1:11:43
  and meet these people as well.
• 1:11:45
  And I, I kind of finished with like, you know, I, I used,
• 1:11:47
  I used to think, let I go.
• 1:11:48
  I was like an island, like just, I was like the only crazy person in this stream.
• 1:11:56
  And now I realise there's a whole bunch of islands in the same street and we're
• 1:12:00
  all those crazy people, but we're all still standing in the same stream.
• 1:12:05
  And as long as we can find each other, we're gonna be okay.
• 1:12:09
  Jesse Hirsh: Right on.
• 1:12:10
  That is a brilliant note to end on.
• 1:12:12
  Dan.
• 1:12:13
  This has been a tour de divorce.
• 1:12:15
  I am actually thinking fondly of high school again.
• 1:12:18
  You have accomplished the impossible.
• 1:12:21
  Dan Kunanec: wow, crazy.
• 1:12:24
  Jesse Hirsh: if anything, I am gonna reach out to some of my friends in Toronto who
• 1:12:28
  have kids who have not yet reached middle school to let them know they should start
• 1:12:34
  thinking about Don Mills Collegiate as a potential, uh, secondary education.
• 1:12:40
  Dan Kunanec: ad. That's all.
• 1:12:40
  I'm here for just
• 1:12:42
  Jesse Hirsh: Well, e
• 1:12:42
  Dan Kunanec: so.
• 1:12:43
  Jesse Hirsh: except that's kind of part of what it is, to your point about
• 1:12:46
  spreading the excitement, the excitement of urban agricultural education.
• 1:12:51
  Dan, thank you so much.
• 1:12:53
  Dan Kunanec: Thank you, Jesse.
• 1:12:54
  Much appreciated.
• 1:12:55
  I love talking to you.
• 1:12:57
  Jesse Hirsh: And boy did I love talking to Dan.
• 1:13:00
  And I say that not just because I clearly worked out some of my therapy, some
• 1:13:05
  of my anxiety and trauma associated with high school, but I do feel he
• 1:13:10
  gives us a very clear and viable path to not only addressing the widespread
• 1:13:17
  succession crisis that faces Canadian agriculture, but quite frankly the
• 1:13:23
  need to embrace the opportunity to be a global AgriFood superpower.
• 1:13:29
  And we're not gonna be able to do that using the existing capacity.
• 1:13:34
  We need to scale up, we need to be thinking larger, and we need to be
• 1:13:38
  thinking about the talent, expertise, and diversity that exists in Canadian cities.
• 1:13:44
  You know, to repeat something that I said in the intro, it's not
• 1:13:49
  just a matter of us growing food.
• 1:13:51
  We need to be growing farmers.
• 1:13:54
  And the earlier, the younger, we get people interested in the idea of
• 1:13:59
  agriculture, AgriFood and growing food.
• 1:14:03
  Whether at an industrial scale or whether at a personal scale, the stronger our
• 1:14:08
  society, the stronger our country will be.
• 1:14:12
  Uh, if, if anything, I don't think today's conversation
• 1:14:16
  was an aberration or atypical.
• 1:14:19
  I think like most of the conversations we have here on the Future Herd, we
• 1:14:24
  are finding examples of the future that are alive and thriving in the present.
• 1:14:30
  It's just a matter of recognising and then replicating, allowing other
• 1:14:35
  peoples to learn from the wisdom that people like Dan bring to the sector
• 1:14:40
  and bring to us as people who wanna learn, who want to implement, who
• 1:14:44
  want to embrace the opportunity that Canada can play feeding the world.
• 1:14:50
  So if you've enjoyed this episode as I certainly have, then do us a favour.
• 1:14:55
  Rate us on your favourite podcast platform.
• 1:14:59
  Uh, share this episode.
• 1:15:01
  Check us out on YouTube on, uh, the future herd.ca.
• 1:15:06
  And, uh, we'll be back, uh, with a couple of panel episodes and
• 1:15:10
  some other interesting stuff that we've got in the work.
• 1:15:13
  So thanks again.
• 1:15:15
  Uh, we'll see you soon here on the Future Herd.