College Students Dig Farm Internships

Liberal arts students are ditching traditional summer internships of office coffee-fetching for life on the land, reports the New York Times. As part of a generation well-versed in Michael Pollan's attack on industrial agriculture and interested in social change, these students see organic farm work as a political statement. "Everyone eats, and everyone has a vested interest in this," said one intern of his decision to spend summer down on a farm.

But the students may be in for a bit of a culture shock. The hard labor can be a strain, as can the clash between farmers and their politically correct interns. In one case, an intern in Florida threatened to report her boss for using antibiotics, a rather routine matter for the operation. For some farmers, the interns are just not worth the trouble. "They need structure. We need farmhands," said one.

(More organic farming stories.)