ALEI and the Hughes Center Welcome 2023 Brinsfield Interns
Published in the ALEI Quarterly Update on June 5, 2023
Together with the Harry R. Hughes Center for Agro-Ecology, ALEI is pleased to welcome three interns for the upcoming Russell Brinsfield Internship Program. Founded in 2017, the Brinsfield Internship Program engages law students from the Francis King Carey School of Law at the University of Maryland, Baltimore (UMB) and the University of Maryland, College Park (UMCP).
Named in honor of Dr. Russell Brinsfield, who was a leader in agricultural science at the University of Maryland and co-founder of the Hughes Center, the program invites students to work together to develop viable solutions to a variety of complex environmental, agricultural and forestry-related issues. The 2023 interns are Marisa Koontz, Beverly Bolster and Olivia Scuderi.
Marisa Koontz is a rising second year law student at the Carey School of Law at UMB, where she is pursuing her law degree alongside a Master of Public Health from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School. Her interests lie in the areas of food, agriculture and environmental law, and their implications for public health. Prior to entering law school, Koontz served as a Peace Corps volunteer in Kosovo and worked as the Home Delivery Coordinator for a local food pantry in her home state of Iowa. In her free time, she enjoys cooking and roller skating. Her goals as a Brinsfield Intern include learning more about the wide variety of legal issues in food and agriculture law, and expanding her research skills within the context of the food and agricultural system. An additional goal, says Koontz, is to “connect with others in the food system to learn more about expanding food access and increasing food security.”
Beverly Bolster is an undergraduate student studying Geospatial Data Science and Sociology at UMCP. She is passionate about understanding how people interact with their environment, and promoting environmental health and food security. Outside of classes and student organizations, Bolster enjoys reading, baking, running and hiking. She looks forward to working with other Brinsfield Interns, mentors and partner organizations to further her knowledge on promoting sustainable agricultural practices in Maryland. In particular, Bolster hopes to “work on projects related to urban agriculture and food security.”
Olivia Scuderi is a junior at UMCP, studying Animal Science with a minor in Science, Technology, Ethics, and Policy. She aspires to be involved with the growing field of agricultural research policy and hopes to one day take over her family’s farm in Montgomery County, Maryland. Olivia was the winner of the 2022 Maryland Farm Bureau Collegiate Discussion Meet and is the School of Agriculture and National Resources Student Council President. As a Brinsfield Intern, Scuderi is looking forward to engaging with Maryland’s agricultural stakeholders in conversations around agriculture and the environment. She would like to “expand her knowledge about the issues facing farmers throughout the State and take that knowledge to her local policy makers.”
The Brinsfield Internship Program is supported with funding from the University of Maryland Strategic Partnership: MPowering the State (MPower). A collaboration between the State of Maryland’s two most powerful public research institutions: UMB and UMCP, MPower seeks to strengthen and serve the State of Maryland and its citizens.
