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What is the 21-Day Racial Equity Habit-Building Challenge?
The University of New Hampshire welcomes the Food Solutions New England’s (FSNE) 21-Day Racial Equity Habit-Building Challenge to our campus community each spring.
The FSNE 21-Day Racial Equity Habit-Building Challenge is designed to create dedicated time and space to build more effective social justice habits. UNH students, staff and faculty together have been building skill and will to address racial inequities, using the FSNE Challenge as a tool. It allows space for individuals to first explore their own bias and gain a deeper understanding of how that influences thoughts, behaviors and practices. It provides a pathway for embracing the intersectionality of our academic disciplines of curriculum and careers with our humanity in a more just and equitable way.
We invite all students, faculty, and staff to participate in 2024!
April 1 - 21
Register for the FSNE 21-Day Racial Equity Habit Building Challenge
Participate in this year's challenge!
APRIL 1 - 21, 2024
UNH Faculty, interested in embedding the Challenge in your course?
Each year, UNH hosts a suite of events, activities and sharing resources
during the Challenge.
Be sure to also follow us on Instagram @sustainableunh for daily factoids during the Challenge.
2024 Events, Activities & Resources
Join us for Black History Month
Black History Month Speaker Series
We're pleased to co-sponsor this series with UNH's Office of Community Equity and Diversity! Join us online to hear some amazing leaders who will talk with us about racial justice, our food systems and more! Register to attend one, or all three!
Thursday, Feb. 22 from 12:40-2 pm
Context, Culture and Change
Debby Irving, racial justice educator and author will explore the themes at the foundation of the 21-Day Racial Equity Habit-Building Challenge.
Tuesday, Feb. 27 from 12:40-2 pm
14 Million Acres Lost
Dr. Myers, veteran, filmmaker, anthropologist and co-founder of Farms to Grow, Inc., a venture supporting Black farmers, will explain the major factors contributing to the loss of African American farmers and their 14 million acres of land.
Thursday, Feb. 29 from 12:40-2 pm
Now is the Time: Being Action Oriented
Dr. Eddie Moore, Jr. Dr. Moore has pursued and achieved success in academia, business, diversity, leadership and community service. In 1996, he started to provide comprehensive diversity and leadership trainings. He is recognized as one of the nation’s top speakers and educators.
This series is co-sponsored by UNH’s Office of Community, Equity and Diversity and UNH’s Sustainability Institute.
Dining Partnerships and Initiatives in a Just and Equitable Food System
April 1-21, 2024
Holloway Commons
UNH Dining is showcasing the Challenge at Holloway Commons throughout the 21 days. Learn about the locally sourced vendors and taste the menu item labeled "21-Day Challenge” during April 2024. This dining experience deepens intersectional relationship of culture, food, equity, and belonging with every bite!
See the menus and vendors
2023 Events, Activities & Resources
2023 Kickoff Event!
Dr. Ashanté M. Reese
Food and the Black Radical Imagination: Thinking, Writing, and Living Beyond Lack
Wednesday, March 29
3-4:30 p.m.
Cole Hall, Room 219
Students, faculty and staff welcomed
Dr. Ashante Reese, assistant professor of African and African diaspora studies at the University of Texas at Austin, will discuss how "access" often frames contemporary conversations around food inequities. Reese, the author of Black Food Geographies will discuss how thinking reflexively about what “access” does and doesn’t do as a framework for creating an equitable future and explore how the experience of delight coupled with the Black radical imagination offer alternative pathways for imagining food provisioning and consumption.
After Dr. Reese’s talk, Karen Spiller, UNH Sustainability Institute's Thomas W. Haas Professor in Sustainable Food Systems will highlight the different ways you can engage with the Challenge across campus and around the world. Join us for a catered reception after the talk.
Civil Discourse Lab presents an Interactive Dialogue Series Engaging in the 21-Day Racial Equity Habit Building Challenge
Horton 110, Wednesdays:
April 5, 6-7 p.m.
April 12, 6-7 p.m.
April 19 , 6-7 p.m.
All welcomed!
Drop in to one or all in the series! Join students from the Civil Discourse Lab (CDL), who are hosting a weekly dialogue series to foster conversations with those participating or interested in the commitment and action inspired by the Challenge.
These peer-to-peer sessions, led by the CDL Team, are designed to focus that week’s Challenge content and encourage peer-to-peer discussion.
Sustainability Cafe
April 6, 5-7 p.m.
Freedom Café, Durham, NH
Drop in & bring a friend, OPEN TO ALL! This month we'll be joined by UNH Sustainability Institute Professor of Sustainable Food Systems, Karen Spiller to talk about sustainability, equity, and creating a culture of belonging and wellbeing. Join students, faculty, and community leaders for coffee, tea, and delicious snacks while connecting with others who want to create a more sustainable world.
21-Day Challenge at the Holloway Commons
UNH Dining is showcasing the Challenge at Holloway Commons throughout the 21 days. Learn about the locally sourced vendors and taste the menu item labeled "21-Day Challenge”. This dining experience deepens intersectional relationship of culture, food, equity, and belonging with every bite!
2022 Events, Activities & Resources
UNH Eats Equitably Blog Series
Guest blogger Paul Young is an AmeriCorps VISTA member serving at the University of New Hampshire on Food Security and other Basic Needs initiatives. Paul has a passion for food systems and how they interact with climate change, health, opportunity and so much more. Paul features three vendors that partner with UNH Dining to bring equitably sourced food to our dining halls. While working at UNH, in addition to working with the Sustainability Institute on the 21 Day Challenge, he has helped launch a food repurposing kitchen and the Cats’ Cupboard (the UNH food pantry).
- UNH Eats Equitably: Cabot Creamery Cooperative
- UNH Eats Equitably: Grandy Organics
- UNH Eats Equitably: North Coast Seafood
Interactive Dialogue Engaging in the 21-Day Racial Equity Habit Building Challenge
Students from the Civil Discourse Lab (CDL) hosted a weekly virtual dialogue series to foster conversations with those participating and/or interested in the commitment and action inspired by the Challenge. These peer-to-peer sessions, led by the CDL Team, were designed to focus that week’s Challenge content and encourage peer-to-peer discussion. All welcomed!
21-Day Challenge at the Holloway Commons
See the menus & featured vendors
UNH Dining will showcase the Challenge at Holloway Commons throughout the 21 days. Learn about the locally sourced vendors and taste the menu item labeled "21-Day Challenge”. This dining experience deepens intersectional relationship of culture, food, equity, and belonging with every bite!
Spring Harvest Dinner
Holloway Commons and Philbrook Dining Halls
UNH Dining and our community welcomed spring for a delicious feast in celebration of Earth Day and UNH’s participation in the Challenge!
The Challenge on Display at Dimond Library
Visit Dimond Library for a collection of selected readings, videos and films focusing racial equity and food justice during the Challenge.
Library hours:
Sunday, 10 a.m. - 7 p.m.
Monday-Thursday, 7:30 a.m.- 12 p.m.
Friday, 7:30 a.m. - 6 p.m.
Saturday, 11 a.m. - 6 p.m.
UNH 21-Day Racial Equity Habit-Building Challenge Details
4th Annual Stories & Voices:
Interactive Dialogue Engaging in the 21-Day Racial Equity Habit Building Challenge
Students from the Civil Discourse Lab hosted a weekly virtual dialogue series, designed for students who could participate in one, two, or all three facilitated sessions. These sessions, led by undergraduate students from CMN 662: Public Dialogue and Deliberation, were designed to foster conversations with those participating and/or interested in the commitment and action inspired by the Challenge and focused on that week’s Challenge content and encouraged peer-to-peer discussion.
The 21-Day Racial Equity Habit-Building Challenge Journey
In this 3-part series, the Inclusion and Equity Committee invited campus to join Karen Spiller, Thomas W. Haas Professor in Sustainable Food Systems, to reflect upon the week’s readings and prompts of the 21-Day Racial Equity Habit-Building Challenge. They explored what was learned and/or affirmed (Head); what commitments they were willing to make (Heart); and what actions they would initiate (Hands).
Spring Harvest Dinner
Hosted at the UNH Dining Halls; open to all.
We welcomed spring with UNH Dining for a delicious feast in celebration of Earth Day and UNH’s participation in the Challenge! All three Dining Halls featured a “Spring Harvest Dinner” focusing on using local products and some of our local partners. This is a result of UNH Dining working with the Challenge at UNH, in which they featured many of their partners that support a “Just and Equitable Food System”.
The Challenge on Display at Dimond Library
Visit Dimond Library for a collection of selected readings, videos and films focusing on racial equity and food justice during the Challenge.
Sunday: 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.
Monday-Thursday: 8 a.m. to 8 p.m.
Friday: 8 a.m. to 6 p.m.
Saturday: 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.
More to ways to engage:
- Chef Todd shared some recipes with us during the 2021 Challenge based on the "What's in Your Pantry?" survey.
1. Simply Stir-Fry
- Watch the UNH 2020 21-Day and 50th Earth Day videos with Chef Todd:
1. Cooking Tortillas:
2. Cooking Koshari
- Follow us on Instagram and Facebook for interesting and informative factiods coming during the Challenge in April!
- Listen to the 2020 UNH Podcats, Episode 74, “Earth Day & The 21-Day Racial Equity Habit Building Challenge”
- Read UNH authored blog posts on the FSNE website by Chris Gagliolo (CDL Fellow) with his Rose Colored Racism, and Michele Holt-Shannon (NH Listens) with her We Need to Talk.
A Community of Learning: Racial Equity
In spring 2021, more than 70 UNH staff and faculty participated in a “peer-to-peer” employee outreach program to deepen the UNH community’s understanding of social justice in the context of our regional food systems. The program, offered in partnership between the Office of Community, Equity and Diversity and the Sustainability Institute, aimed to help all members of the UNH community understand and address structural racism, and environmental and social justice – critical to UNH’s embodiment of its values of sustainability and diversity.
Staff and faculty benefitted from a chance to:
- Be in community with others who care about racial justice and sustainability
- Build professional skills around facilitation and leadership
- Learn more about regional food systems
- Help “build will and skill” to address racial equity
In 2018, the Sustainability Institute, through the Haas Professorship, brought the 21-Day Racial Equity Habit Building Challenge to the UNH campus community.
Thanks to the 2021 UNH Planning Team: Departments of Agriculture, Nutrition and Food Systems; Communications; Psychology; Social Work along with Paul College; Hospitality and Dining Services; and Office of Community, Equity and Diversity. They engaged in creating a menu of interactive activities including a launch event, facilitated discussions, cooking demonstrations and more.
Contact Karen Spiller for more information.
Food Solutions New England (FSNE) is a regional network that unites the food system community around a shared set of values – democratic empowerment, racial equity and dignity for all, sustainability, and trust – and strengthens the movement’s ability to achieve New England Food Vision goals. This network is coordinated by UNH’s Sustainability Institute.
In 2013, FSNE publicly "centered" the racial equity value of our work and, in addition to supporting each other to learn, grow and change toward a more racially just system, the network was inspired by the work of Dr. Eddie Moore, Debby Irving and Dr. Marguerite Pennick-Parks to adapt the 21-Day Habit-Building Challenge with food system lens. FSNE has been organizing and hosting the Challenge every year since 2014. Focusing on our network, it started with a couple of hundred regional participants and has grown to more than 7,000 participants, nationally and internationally in 2020. (As well as many organizations adapting the Challenge for their own unique needs).
