Do you supervise or manage employees on the farm or ranch? Do you have questions about how to provide your farm and ranch employees with benefits like healthcare plans, retirement options, bonuses, or pay raises?
Be a part of our Farm Employee Benefits Experience Team!
Farm Commons wants to provide you with easy-to-read, accurate material to help you navigate these important concerns. But we can’t do it alone! As attorneys and educators, we can only get so far – we need guidance and input from folks on the ground, doing the work, to make sure our resources meet your needs.
Your questions, thoughts, and understanding of legal issues are invaluable to us.
When you share where you have questions and what you’re already doing to manage risk, we can create effective materials that help you do even more. Your peers want to hear your thoughts, too! Your input creates the solidarity we need to build stronger agricultural communities together.
Help us create actionable materials for the community while getting answers, sharing your wisdom, and connecting with peers!
Your time and thoughts are valuable, and we want to be sure you are compensated for your contributions. Our Experience Team will meet for three sessions in February 2025 and will take about eight hours of your time. Experience Team participants will receive $600 in respect of their contributions.
Apply for a spot on our Experience Team today!
Can you gather with us for three Zoom meetings in February? If so, and you’d like to be considered for a spot, please complete this application by January 31, 2025. We look forward to hearing from you.
Do you have more questions? Browse our FAQ below or contact our Communications Manager, Bonita (she/her), at bonita@farmcommons.org for more information.
What does the Farm Employee Benefits Experience Team do, exactly?
Experience Team members attend three meetings over Zoom, each of which is 90-minutes long. Meetings are facilitated by our staff, who focus on creating a welcoming, respectful, and interactive environment. During meetings, team members share their questions and concerns about legal/regulatory issues, get solutions to common legal and regulatory questions, and reflect on the impact of those answers on their business, peer community, and customer base.
Team members will also be assigned about one hour of homework ahead of each meeting by reading educational material and reflecting on individual needs and concerns. In total, team members are asked to contribute 8 hours of their time to the program.
When are meetings held?
Thursdays from 11 AM – 12:30 PM ET on the following dates:
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February 13, 2025
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February 20, 2025
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February 27, 2025
You say I’ll be compensated? What are the details?
We will provide each participant who successfully completes the program with an honorarium of $600 on or after the final meeting on February 27, 2025. To receive the honorarium, Farm Employee Benefits Experience Team members will provide their payment information in our secure, online payment management system, Gusto. A social security number, TEIN, or EIN is required to receive payment so we can fulfill our tax obligations. Payment can be made via direct deposit or via paper check through the postal mail. Participants may forgo the payment if they wish.
Am I the type of business owner you are looking for? What are the criteria to participate?
We are looking for folks fitting the following criteria:
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You supervise or manage farm or ranch employees, or you are in a decision-making role regarding farm and ranch employees.
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You are willing to share your stories and questions about legal issues related to farm and ranch employee benefits that will be recorded and potentially incorporated into our educational material (anonymous or credited, your choice)
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You are willing and able to join online group meetings using Zoom (including having the necessary hardware, software, and internet bandwidth), access to Google Drive, complete written responses in an online form, and communicate in English.
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You have the ability to join all of the scheduled meetings: February 13, 2025, February 20, 2025, and February 27, 2025.
Whether you have been a farm or ranch manager or supervisor for many years or you have just begun, we are looking for a diversity of voices! Please consider joining us.
If I apply, will I get a spot on the Experience Team?
We anticipate receiving more applications than we have available spots. We apologize in advance if we are not able to accept all applicants! In that event, we will extend invitations based on our priorities. We are prioritizing the following individuals for participation in no particular order, and we strive to create a diverse Experience Team representative of a wide variety of personal experiences.
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Farm and ranch managers and supervisors.
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Farm and ranch managers and supervisors based in Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands.
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Black, Indigenous, and People of Color business owners