Editor’s note: Michigan State University faculty and students are working on an hour-long documentary tentatively titled Farmers, filming and Flint. It will extend the half-hour film The Kings of Flint by adding the stories of several other urban farmers. This summer Great Lakes Echo is previewing some of the material that will be used in the extended version.
This week: Brian Johns is a farmer and an educator at his own Happy Family Farm.
He teaches students as part of The Youth Farm Stand program at Holmes Foundation Academy in Flint to grow vegetables using traditional and cutting-edge technologies such as hydroponics and aquaponics.
As he mentions in this clip, Brian teaches students everything from “seed to sale,” from growing to becoming an entrepreneur farmer:
Week 2: Farmers, filming and Flint: Solar panels and a rain cistern