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Giving Back to — and Through — Our Employees

It’s impossible to separate a company’s passion from the people who make it work every day. Our employees are proud to support Earthbound Farm’s mission to share the benefits of organic food — and in turn, Earthbound Farm supports our employees’ passions for other causes, as well.

Each month we donate to a nonprofit organization nominated by our employees. An Employee Charity Donation Program committee meets monthly to review the nominated organizations and to select the charities to receive awards that month. Here are some of the charitable organizations our program has supported.

Employee Scholarship Program

Earthbound Farm employees make the fulfillment of our mission possible — some have been with us since the earliest days of our company. To honor all of them, we’ve created two renewable scholarships that are awarded each year to children of employees headed to college or other post-secondary education. It’s a smart investment in all our futures.

Meet our 2010 scholarship recipients:

Ruby Baltazar, daughter of Gloria Guzman in Receiving, will be attending the University of California at Davis in the fall, pursuing a civil engineering degree. Those who know her have described her as a mature and dedicated student, driven by an inner strength. Exceptionally dedicated in school, she consistently excelled in mathematics. She looks forward to studying civil engineering, as they rely on problem solving and work to “build new infrastructures” in communities. With her training as a civil engineer, Ruby hopes to “return to the community and provide them with the knowledge I gain.” Ruby knows how much strength and determination her college goal will require, but is prepared to “keep reaching for my goal and push myself until I graduate.”

Francisca Fernandez-Ortiz, daughter of Alicia Ortiz in Packing, will be attending California State University at Chico in the fall. She hopes to study nursing, ultimately working in oncology. Her ability to “attack academic challenges” with a “positive and determined attitude,” as described by her teachers, will serve her well in achieving her goals. She volunteers at Foster Children at the Quadrangle and believes her experiences there, as well watching her younger siblings at home, have helped her grow into the caring person she is today. “I always knew,” she writes, “that any career path I chose to major in had to be one where I could make a difference and have a positive impact on someone’s life. That is my passion.”