When Janice Setser, Pacific’s Robb Garden coordinator, brought the idea of hosting a garden event to her student interns last fall, she said they immediately got excited and went into planning mode.

In the spirit of the Thanksgiving season, they invited students, faculty and local community members to celebrate “Gardensgiving,” in the Robb Garden on November 17, where they shared dishes featuring fresh produce from the garden.  

“It’s basically their brainchild,” she said. “They’re the ones that named it ‘Gardensgiving.’”

This year, her team of six interns decided to share not only fresh produce, but their culture as well. They used the produce grown in the garden—carrots, beans, onions, garlic and more—to cook dishes from their home countries and family heritages.

“I have students from India, Inner Mongolia, Hawaii and Chicago. I also have students with Mexican American and Puerto Rican heritage,” said Setser. “So it was their ideas to take whatever we grow and showcase their own heritage, foods that they grew up with.”  

For Simran Nirajkumar Shah ’24, a computer science major and Robb Garden intern, sharing cultural experiences is what motivated her to get involved with the garden in the first place.

“Walking from class to class, I was always looking at this garden, at the people there. They were from different cultures…and they were doing this agriculture thing together,” Shah said. “I also wanted to join in because me and my grandfather used to [garden] together. [Through Robb Garden] I got to know different people and they taught me a lot of things about the U.S.”

Gardensgiving was also an opportunity for the Robb Garden team to showcase the work they are doing in the garden and educate the community about sustainable farming.

“It’s also cool seeing all the food being grown around me and then also eating it at the same time, so you could see the whole life cycle that it goes through and all the work,” said pharmacy major Joy Nash ’24, who attended the event.

For Setser, Gardensgiving represents the mission of the garden, which has been providing organic produce, experiential learning opportunities and connection since it was established in 2012.

“One of the most important aspects of an event like this is to celebrate community, and the Robb Garden is a hub of community,” she said. “It’s a real outpouring of support for the garden and a gratitude for the larger community that supports us as well.”

Learn more about the garden program and how Pacific is creating a sustainable future.

As a graduate student in Pacific’s Eberhardt School of Business, Vinny Johl ’11 received her first opportunity to make a lasting difference thanks to her family’s farming background, a Pacific connection and President Bill Clinton’s foundation, the Clinton Global Initiative. A dozen years later, Johl’s impact continues to grow as she influences young people worldwide on sustainability and youth empowerment issues.

In April, she moderated the Student Townhall Q&A with former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and Clinton Foundation Vice Chair Chelsea Clinton. The townhall was a highlight of the annual meeting for CGI University (CGI U), the foundation’s youth program.

“I couldn’t be where I am without Pacific, without my MBA, and especially without CGI U,” she said. “CGI U couldn’t have come into place if I wasn’t at Pacific.” 

Johl, who earned a bachelor’s degree in marketing and a master’s degree in business administration at Pacific, is senior commitments adviser for CGI U, a position the foundation created specifically for her.

Farming background

Johl’s passion for sustainability is rooted in her family’s farm near Yuba City in the northern Sacramento Valley. Four generations have been farming peaches, prunes and almonds. She credits her grandfather for teaching her to garden and instilling a passion for growing food.

That passion found an outlet in 2010, when Johl learned that Pacific students would have the opportunity to attend CGI U thanks to funding from a generous donation by then-Pacific regent Ron Cordes, who was also a member of the Clinton Global Initiative. Delegates need a project to attend CGI U, and Johl was inspired to share her knowledge of agriculture with other Pacific students. So, she and fellow student Fiona Kelly made the planning, design and construction of a vegetable garden at Pacific their commitment. That garden is now known as the Ted and Chris Robb Garden, named after the sons of former regent and garden benefactor Walter Robb.

“When I look back, the whole idea for the garden was a bit wild,” she said. “Here I am at the University of the Pacific [and] to even think that our administration would allow a student to plant a garden on these beautiful grounds is huge.”

A decade of mentoring

Johl attended CGI U as a Pacific delegate in 2010 and was selected again in 2011 based on another project to promote and teach sustainable living to Pacific undergraduate students.

Once she had completed graduate school, Johl was no longer eligible to attend CGI U as a student, but she still wanted to be involved. Over the last decade, Vinny has served in numerous volunteer roles for the foundation. Every year since 2013 she has supported up to 50 student delegates from around the world as a mentor for agriculture projects, college readiness, and youth development and empowerment initiatives.

Johl is now a health care ombudsman for Kaiser Permanente. She oversees Care Experience, Physician Health and Wellness, and Equity, Inclusion and Diversity for the health care company.

After a decade of service, Johl was ready to step back, but CGI U was not ready to let her go.  This year the foundation created the senior commitments adviser position for her.

“To Pacific students I would say, get involved. The majority of opportunities that came to me were from outside the classroom,” Johl said. “It was the experiences outside of the classroom that really enriched my education and gave me different (leadership) opportunities.”

Watch the Q&A session Johl moderated during the CGI U 2022 Annual Meeting.