From the South Side of Chicago, Kayland Jones spent her early summers working at church's farmers market closing books which is where her love of food and Black farmers come from. At Spelman, she enjoyed the Food Studies classes that homed in her education around food spaces and the community it builds. Kayland completed numerous research papers with topics like the movement of food during Covid-19 and the farming choices of Afro Colombian farmers paying homage to her first international trip to Colombia where she learned firsthand about Afro-Colombian cultures in 2015.
Her favorite memory about the Food Studies Program is the trip to Sapelo Island where she and the cohort spent time on the island learning about land rights, farming and green initiatives to preserve the Gullah Geechee history.
She currently back home in Chicago and works as a Treasury Advisor at BMO Bank. Kayland is now the Co-Manager of her church's farmers market where she plans to take the market to new heights by engaging youth and social media. She hopes to be involved with more local food initiatives and help strengthen her community's relationship with food regardless of their income situation.
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“Spelman College's Food Studies Program, the first interdisciplinary food studies program at an Historically Black College and University, engages students in an innovative exploration of food interdisciplinarity and centers its connectivity to the African Diaspora, intersectionality, and food science. It is our hope that our food scholars will find the needed community, scholarship, and professional opportunities through the program to approach some of these pressing global and local food challenges. "