McGill University graduate, Sam Liptay is cultivating social and environmental change through farming in Sainte-Anne-de-Bellevue. Sam’s initiative, Élèves des Champs, is a youth-run market garden rooted in regenerative practices, organic guidelines, and sustainable food production. “It’s a two acre entirely youth-run vegetable farm in the Montreal area,” Sam shares. “It’s a place for youth to work and engage with ecological agriculture.”
The farm has been running for more than 15 years; it began as the McDonald Student Run Ecological Gardens, a small plot where students formed a gardening club and experimented with growing crops on campus. Over time, the farm expanded to offer a farmer incubator program and later a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) program. “When I started working there, the various aspects of the farm were wonderful, but having the capacity to execute a profitable farm, community space, experimental farm, and education farm had its challenges,” says Sam. The farm was entirely self-funded on the vegetable sales each year, a model that Sam says is very difficult, especially if you are learning agriculture for the first time.
At its core, the farm was created to engage youth in agriculture, as Sam notes, “it’s a unique opportunity to work on a farm and get paid, but also to learn every single aspect of what it takes to run.” Over time, however, accessibility became a growing concern. “Half of the people who wanted to work at the farm ended up saying, ‘oh actually, I can’t afford to work here,’ which is where the idea to apply to the Pathy Fellowship came,” Sam shares.
The Pathy Foundation Fellowship is a unique opportunity for young changemakers to design and implement an initiative to strengthen a community they care about. “The Pathy Fellowship really seemed like an awesome opportunity to help bring a vision I had to life,” Sam shares.
Throughout the Fellowship, Sam has found motivation and connection. “I’ve been so inspired by my own cohort. Connecting with them throughout the year keeps me motivated to work harder in a really positive way,” he says. “I’ve been grateful for the community and connection in the Alumnx network. Encountering Alumnx in the work I’m doing or events I’ve been attending has been so helpful. It’s been awesome having access to this network and these connections and feeling like you’re on the same kind of wavelength has been very inspiring.”
Today, Élèves des Champs grows over 40 different types of vegetables and runs a CSA program which allows the team to sell at farmers markets in Montreal over the summer and distribute food to other organizations and food banks in the area. In the 2025 growing season alone, the farm was able to donate over 1,500 pounds of produce to food security groups at the downtown McGill campus.
“Incorporating the initiative as a non-profit and changing the name allowed us the freedom to expand more and alleviate some of the financial pressure by applying for grants and accessing farm and employment subsidies,” says Sam. “This summer is going to be the first one back at the farm as a non-profit, and that’s really exciting.”
In the fall, Sam and the farm community focused on fieldwork, clearing overgrowth, and documenting the site’s inventory. Sam also organized volunteer days twice a week throughout the season. “It was really great to have some new faces out at the farm and also some old faces. It’s nice to see that there’s still a lot of enthusiasm for the initiative,” says Sam.
Looking ahead, Sam is preparing to welcome six new team members to the farm. “It’s going to be an expansion, meeting and working with new people in person and also trying to grow the organization,” he shares. “Through this growth, I have to balance wanting to move quickly and wanting to move decisively. There are so many directions that we could go with the farm, but I have to stay focused in knowing where to put my time.”
For Sam, success means continuing to cultivate an environment that supports learning, exploration, and skill-sharing in pursuit of sustainability. “For me, learning is so important because even if the initiative does not work out exactly the way I anticipated, my skills and learnings gained will come with me and go towards other beautiful things,” he says. Joy and creativity are equally central, with Sam adding,“I think there’s a lot of wonder, curiosity, joy, and learning that comes from the farm. The reason people kept showing up to the farm is because it’s fun and beautiful. Who doesn’t like to see if the watermelons are ripe and then eat them all? Everyone is having a good time and is happy, and that’s the number one most important success.”
To learn more about Sam’s Pathy Fellowship initiative, or the Pathy Foundation Fellowship, please visit PathyFellowship.com.
