Meet Professor Douglas Moody!
Doug is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Spanish and Portuguese and in the Latin American, Latino, and Caribbean Studies program at Dartmouth College in Hanover, NH.
I met Doug in November of 2018. We decided to meet in the cafe of King Arthur Flour in Norwich VT and that is where I learned that he started a program at Dartmouth three years prior with the goal to promote cultural exchange between Dartmouth College students and local dairy farm workers and to teach the farm workers English. Dartmouth students enroll in his class titled Migrant Lives and Labor in the Upper Valley.
Recently, Doug taught a course at Dartmouth, LATS 37, “Migrant Lives and Labor in the Upper Valley,” and the students in LATS 37 regularly interacted with the farm workers at several farms in the Upper Valley. Because of the current climate in VT and NH they have to be very aware of the sensitive nature of the migrant’s employment situation and the need for anonymity to protect their safety and insure that that are not targeted by agencies like ICE and Border Patrol.
According to Doug, there are no significant barriers between the participants and the students. The Dartmouth students speak fluent Spanish and all of them are very interested in working in solidarity with the farm workers.
Doug explains that the farm workers put in very long days of hard work under extenuating circumstances and rarely leave the farms so they often feel isolated. Most often the workers are men who have left their families in their country of origin and are trying hard to earn enough money to support their families. He said their goal is to someday move back home with their families but some of them have been here for up to 10 years.
Doug, his colleagues, and the students work is filling a critical need which is to support the local dairy farm owners and farm workers. They have co-hosted many social and educational events on the Dartmouth campus and at the local farms. Doug explains that It is highly beneficial for the Dartmouth students to have these interactions with the farm workers, and it is mutually beneficial for the farm workers to have these exchanges and to know that people in the community care about them, want to help them, and welcome them as valued members of our community.
Doug has been incredibly special to HYH as he was the first Connector for the non profit. He worked with me to try out ideas and templates which was critical as I was researching and developing this organization
Thank you, Doug!