Partners and Sponsors
Educational Partners
Goddard College
VCIH and the Individualized Bachelor’s (IBA) program at Goddard College are engaged in a learning partnership which enables VCIH students who seek a fully accredited college degree to apply their learning (and transfer credits) to their personalized program of study at Goddard.
By drawing upon the practitioner training available from VCIH, in conjunction with the ongoing inquiry and broader scholarship facilitated at Goddard, students can become practitioner-scholars of Western herbal medicine and expand their focus beyond herbal medicine within the undergraduate program. Upon graduation, students can choose to work as clinicians, consultants, educators or in numerous other fields, or they may pursue additional study. Learn more
To learn more about the programs at Goddard College, you may visit Goddard’s website, or call 800.906.8312.
Relational Uprising
Relational Uprising works with “organizations and communities to foster a resilient, interdependent, relational culture of complex connection and inclusive collaboration. Relational Uprising strives to align with the life protective principles of our social ecology, and to disrupt the dominant culture of disconnection, desensitization, isolation and exclusion.” VCIH has been learning from and collaborating with Cedar Landsman and Lucien Demaris, founders of Relational Uprising, since 2018 to develop our relational organizational culture and integrated, herbalist-specific curriculum for our programs.
We highly recommend their public training programs, as well as their organizational consulting and coaching.
United Plant Savers
UpS is a non-profit organization dedicated to the conservation of North American native medicinal plants and their habitats. VCIH is honored to participate in UpS’s Partners In Education program and to be a past recipient of a $500 grant to support the installation of the small native plant garden that frames our clinic entrance.
Conferences
American Herbalists Guild Symposium
This gathering of professional and student herbalists and the interested public moves around the country each year. Whenever it’s close enough for us to reach easily, VCIH is honored to send faculty and staff to this event.
International Herb Symposium
VCIH faculty and staff attend and present at this biannual conference each time it occurs at Wheaton College in Massachusetts. We hope you’ll join us for the rich exchange and the rousing kava ball, as this conference is a benefit for United Plant Savers.
Supporters
Zack Woods Herb Farm
Our friends Jeff Carpenter and Melanie Slick-Carpenter started Zack Woods Herb Farm in 2001 to fulfill their dreams of providing high-quality herbs to the community, while stewarding the land they love. They support our work by generously offering VCIH a discount on bulk herbs, as well as providing a farm tour for our first-year students every year. We always learn new things and have fun helping out with the calendula harvest. We encourage everyone to order their gorgeous bulk herbs directly or find single herbs and tea blends at local retailers.
Organizations
American Herbalists Guild
The American Herbalists Guild was founded in 1989 as a non-profit, educational organization to represent the goals and voices of herbalists specializing in the medicinal use of plants. Their primary goal is to promote a high level of professionalism and education in the study and practice of therapeutic herbalism. VCIH is an educational member and our curriculum exceeds the educational guidelines established by AHG for professional herbalists.
Northeast Herbalists Association
The Northeast Herbal Association’s mission is to create a strong community of herbalists in the Northeast by providing opportunities for networking, collaboration, herbal education, community outreach, and personal reintegration with the Green World. VCIH is a member of NEHA, and received a grant from the organization in 2011 to help set up our new apothecary!
Other Partners
Numen: The Healing Power of Plants
This documentary film features luminaries such as Rosemary Gladstar and Kenny Ausubel, as well as one of our co-founders and faculty, Guido Masé. Connecting the health of the planet with human health, the message of Numen is that ecological medicine is rooted in whole plant medicine and in the work of herbalists and allied practitioners and activists working towards a sane and sustainable healthcare system. Produced by anthropologist and herbalist Ann Armbrecht and film-maker Terrance Youk, this film and its accompanying website is meant to be a catalyst for conversation and action at the community level. We encourage you to visit the site, check out the articles and resources and get involved. Helpful pages explain everything from how to make a salve to selecting herbs for use in fevers. These articles were written by local herbalists Sandra Lory, Dana Woodruff and VCIH director, Larken Bunce. You might also recognize Larken’s botanical photographs, featuring some of VCIH’s students and gardens.